An Unexpected Match

by Corbit, Dana

  “Well, you know what? That table still looks clean.”

  Her smile made him wish he’d said something funny a whole lot earlier.

  “Unfortunately, the table’s the only clean thing.”

  “Nothin’ a few hands and some elbow grease can’t fix.”

  Haley stared at him, appearing surprised by his uncharacteristic use of slang. “Wait. Was that Matthew? If I didn’t know better, I’d say that was your mother talking. Or mine.”

  “Our two mothers are pretty wise women overall.”

  She crouched down again, going after a blob next to the table leg. “You mean about the plan?”

  “Except for that.”

  “You’ve got to give them credit for trying.”

  “I guess.”

  “At least they have your best interests at heart.” She carried her washcloth over to the sink and rinsed it.

  “Now don’t you start.”

  “Don’t worry. This is a matchmaking-free zone.”

  “Whew.” He gave his brow an exaggerated swipe. “I was ready to run for my car.”

  “They are right though. Caroline is a great person.”

  Matthew glanced at her, but when he didn’t find the mischief in her eyes that he’d expected, he nodded. What she said about her sister was true. He couldn’t think of a clever way to respond to that, either, so he reached under the table and began unfastening the tape. Haley did the same thing on the other end. Soon they were rolling the two ends of the paper together, easily keeping that part of the mess inside.

  When Matthew had all the paper in a ball, Haley grabbed the trash can from beneath the sink, and he stuffed the ball inside it.

  “See.” Matthew indicated the table with a nod. “A perfectly clean table.”

  “Great,” she said without enthusiasm.

  Haley plopped down on the floor and started on a new section of the rug. Matthew hung his suit jacket on one of the dining chairs, grabbed his cloth again and worked on the spots that dotted the sideboard. For a few minutes, they worked companionably to restore the kitchen.

  Finally, Haley’s head popped up. “Hey, you never said why you’re home in the middle of the day.”

  “I had this sudden need for a good shave.”

  “It’s definitely important to be clean-shaven in court,” Haley agreed but then tilted her head, studying him. “So you’re sure you weren’t just checking up on us? Maybe seeing if we were jumping off the roof to test the law of gravity?”

  Matthew shook his head. “Have I dropped in to check up any other day?” Though he emphasized his point, his smile was probably too wide for her not to notice. Checking up on them wasn’t his motivation for coming today, and he’d prefer that she not know about those times last week when he’d been tempted to do just that.

  She moved her head from side to side as if considering his question. “No. I guess not. But maybe you just couldn’t get away, and you would have checked up on us before.”

  If it were possible for his smile to widen, Matthew was sure it would have. Haley Scott was a clever woman. He must learn not to underestimate her.

  “Okay, you’re at least partially right. This is the first time I could get away, but I didn’t come to check up on you two.” Glancing around to ensure that they’d cleaned the last of the mess, he reached for the cloth in her hand and carried his and hers into the laundry room just off the kitchen.

  When he returned, he added, “I came to see what you two were doing.”

  “Can you explain to me how those two things are different?”

  “I just wanted to see what fun activities you’d planned for today.” He opened the refrigerator door and collected the makings of a turkey and provolone sandwich before leaning out again. “You always have some kind of exciting event planned.”

  “How did you—”

  “You didn’t expect a four-year-old to be able to keep a secret, did you? I’ve been getting the play-by-play every night. The A-B-C clay monsters, Princess and one hundred peas, those amazing pairs on Noah’s ark. She’s told me about all of them.”

  At first, he’d been a little jealous of both Haley’s creativity and the fact that Elizabeth was so enamored with her, but now he just appreciated that someone was making such an effort to make learning fun for his daughter.

  Haley’s cheeks reddened, but she didn’t look away from him. “I guess I don’t have any secrets, then.”

  “You’re like Mary Poppins with that satchel of yours. It has as many surprises as her carpetbag. I’m beginning to expect you to pull a floor lamp out of it soon.”

  “I doubt I can do that.”

  “But you’ve done something even more important with your fun approach to learning. You’ve convinced Elizabeth that she should try preschool in the fall. She wasn’t ready earlier this year.”

  Her smile and her pretty blush made everything he’d said seem worthwhile. He was tempted to say more, just to keep her smiling that way, so he focused on making his sandwich. He offered her one, as well, but she’d already eaten with Elizabeth, precisely at noon, as the schedule required. Trying not to feel guilty over that, he asked her to join him while he ate, and she took a seat opposite him at the dinette.

  When he looked up from saying grace, Haley was watching him.

  “Maybe I am a little like Mary Poppins. ‘Practically perfect in every way.’” She chuckled over her own joke.

  “Elizabeth sure thinks so.”

  He understood that Haley had been kidding, and he’d just been playing along, but Matthew was surprised by how tempted he was to agree with his daughter. In a lot of ways, particularly those that involved Elizabeth, Haley was “practically perfect.”

  The fact that he was beginning to think so worried him, so he pushed away the errant thought. He needed to remind himself that this particular Mary Poppins was also known for her Peter Pan complex. She considered growing up something other people did, and while the rest of the world had to work in jobs even when they hated them, Haley never stuck to any long enough to have business cards made.

  Sure, she might have put more effort into her activities than any of Elizabeth’s other child-care providers, but Haley would never be around long enough to see the success of her efforts.

  “I’m sorry I made Elizabeth late for her nap again,” she said, clearly misunderstanding the meaning of his pause.

  “There’s no reason to apologize. I’m the one who should apologize for being so rigid about the schedule and the rules. I get caught up in the details sometimes.”

  “Ya think?” She stopped, looking wide-eyed. “I mean, you think so?”

  “Okay, that’s fair.”

  “No.” Haley closed her eyes, shaking her head. “That’s not what I meant.”

  “So, what did you mean? That my schedule and list of rules were over-the-top? That a few house rules and general schedule guidelines would have been plenty?”

  “You said those things, not me.”

  She looked as if she was trying to keep a straight face, but the ends of the straight line of her lips slipped upward, and then she started giggling. Not a laugh like he would have expected from an adult woman but a youthful giggle. A strangely contagious one, too.

  Soon Matthew found himself laughing right along with her. At himself, no less. He was surprised by how good it felt. Most of the time, he didn’t have the luxury of taking himself less seriously. Too many people, too many things, were relying on him. He couldn’t afford to fail.

  When she finally stopped laughing, Haley rested her hands on the table and gave him a steady look. “Okay, maybe the lists were a bit…er…painstaking, but you had every right to make them. It’s your house. Your child. You were just doing what you felt you had to—”

  “To be the one in control,” he finished for her.

  She started shaking her head, but he continued, anyway. “You might not know this about me, but I’m a control freak.”

  One side of Haley’s mouth lifted,
but she didn’t say anything clever. If they were discussing her negative personality traits, he doubted he would have shown the same restraint. He certainly hadn’t before.

  Pushing back from the table, he crossed to the refrigerator where the rules and the schedule were hanging from separate magnets. He pulled them both lose and ripped them in half. When he looked back to the table, Haley was watching him.

  “I’m not suggesting that there should be no rules in this house,” he explained, “but it wasn’t necessary to post them like edicts. You know my general expectations. Beyond that, I’d just like you to use your judgment.”

  “Why the change of heart?”

  “I overreacted.” He returned to the table, carrying the torn papers with him. “We both know that. Yet, you followed all the rules and deadlines without complaining and still managed to squeeze in time for fun. I realized I don’t need any lists to know you have my daughter’s best interests at heart.”

  Haley lifted the remnants of the two torn documents. “So just how hard was it for you to get rid of these?”

  He waved away her question. “Not hard.” Then he stopped. “Okay, a little hard. I like to have all my ducks in a row, and I want all the mallards separated from the domestic varieties, too. I like plans, deadlines and boundaries. Could there ever be a person better suited to practice law?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be in control of your life, Matthew.”

  He shrugged. “I guess as long as you realize that you’re not ever really in control.”

  “There’s an old saying that if you really want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans,” she said.

  Finishing the last bite of his sandwich, Matthew pushed his plate aside. “I didn’t get that. I figured as long as I did the right things, jumped through the right hoops, then my life would turn out differently than—”

  Matthew stopped himself. What was he doing? It wasn’t like him to spill his guts to anyone about Stacey or his father, so why was he tempted to make Haley the first? Sure, she could relate to the experience of rejection, but she couldn’t understand what it felt like for a father to fail his child, how emasculating it felt to not be able to protect Elizabeth from people who would hurt her.

  He stared at her and waited. If she were anything like either of their mothers, she would be pressing him for details before he had time to exhale.

  Finally, he couldn’t resist his curiosity. He looked up to find her studying him. Her eyes were so warm. So wise. She didn’t ask him to say more, but she seemed to understand him almost too well, more than her own experiences should have taught her.

  “You know,” she said, taking an exaggerated pause, “one good thing about never having any plans for your life is that you always get to be surprised.”

  “I’ve never thought of it that way.” Matthew smiled. She’d let him off the hook, and he was grateful. Maybe it had been wrong of him to always think of Haley as not quite a grown-up. She had grown into a kind, perceptive woman.

  “Planning for a whole new life outlook?”

  “You know me. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

  “You’re not an old dog. Only twenty-eight in human years though I’m afraid it’s far older in dog years.”

  “That’s one hundred ninety-six.”

  “Okay, I take it back. You are an old dog.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.” Haley grinned but then her expression became serious. “I sure hope old dogs can change when they really need to. I know I’m trying.”

  Matthew glanced at her, but she was studying her hands. He wasn’t sure what she was trying to tell him. It could have been anything from a decision to choose a more reliable fiancé to finally picking a career she liked enough to stick with it.

  “Your mom told me that you’re thinking of going back to school again,” he said, hoping she would clue him in.

  “I put aside my plans to earn my MFA—that’s a master’s in fine arts—when I became engaged. I’d always had this silly dream of being a writer.” She shrugged, staring at the table. “Anyway, I’ve been accepted to the program at Indiana University, but now I’m not sure I still want it.”

  “Why not?”

  Looking up at him, she smiled. “I’m feeling differently about it now that I’ve found work that I really enjoy. Elizabeth’s just amazing.”

  Matthew didn’t know if she was trying to reassure him or warn him with her words. Hadn’t she once had a dream of being an accountant or something, followed by a list of other dreams?

  Maybe she was having fun playing dollhouse with his daughter right now, but in another week she would probably start waffling again and realize she needed a new adventure. He couldn’t sit back and wait for that day. He hadn’t seriously been looking for a permanent replacement lately, but he needed to step up the search as soon as he had a free minute. Whenever that would be.

  He looked at the clock, tightening his jaw with the realization that, as usual, his life was controlled by it instead of the other way around. “I need to get back to work. I have to be in court at three, and it’s probably going to be a long one.”

  Haley stood, as well, taking his plate from him and carrying it to the dishwasher. She turned back just as he shrugged into his suit jacket.

  “You never answered my earlier question. Not really. If you weren’t checking up on us, then why are you home in the middle of the day?”

  “I just had a little free time, and I—”

  She shook her head, not buying it. “You pack a lunch every day, and you happened not to pack one today on the off chance you’d have some free time?”

  He held up both hands, caught. “All right. Guilty.”

  “Then why?”

  “I didn’t want to miss out on the fun.”

  In the preschool class that next Sunday morning, children were waving palm branches much the way Matthew imagined the people of Jerusalem might have as Jesus made his triumphant entrance into the city. Okay, he doubted the multitudes mentioned in the Gospels were using the branches as samurai swords the way these kids were. Just another Palm Sunday tradition.

  “Okay now. Let’s put down the palms.”

  As he stood in the classroom’s open doorway, Matthew turned at the sound of a surprising but familiar voice. At the front of the class, Haley motioned to stop the frenzy around her. Matthew was shocked to see her there. She’d only been in Markston a few weeks and wouldn’t be around long, and yet here she was volunteering to teach Sunday school.

  When she caught sight of Matthew, she gave him a quick wave before turning back to the children.

  “Does anybody remember what we were supposed to do with the palms?”

  “Lay them down for the donkey and the baby donkey to walk on,” Elizabeth called out.

  “That’s right,” Haley said, nodding enthusiastically. “The people of Jerusalem laid clothes on the road and then cut branches and spread them on the ground for Jesus to come into the city.”

  As the samurai swords came up for battle again, she drew attention to the front of the room. “Who remembers what the people said to Jesus when he came into the city?”

  “Hosanna!” several children called out at once.

  Haley pointed to the white board behind her where she reviewed the words of Matthew 21:9b: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the Highest!”

  Asking her students to lay their palm branches on the floor, Haley led a quick prayer and dismissed the children. She and the other teacher, who had been cleaning up spilled juice while Haley finished teaching, asked the children to line up by the classroom entrance and handed them off to their parents one by one. Each child gave her a big hug before heading out the door.

  Elizabeth was last in line. “Hi, Daddy. Look at the picture I made.” She shoved a large piece of tracing paper into his hands. The shape on it was obviously a palm that she’d placed under her paper, but she’d
created her version by coloring over that texture with orange and purple crayons.

  “That’s nice.” He turned to Haley, who handed Elizabeth’s coat to him. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

  “It’s something new,” she said unnecessarily.

  “You do know they can’t read, right?” He indicated the Scripture she’d written on the white board.

  “I know, but they like to pretend they can.” She glanced back at the words she’d written in block letters. “They really liked the word hosanna.”

  He nodded. His curiosity piqued, he couldn’t help asking, “How did you end up teaching in here?”

  “I’ve been looking for a way to do my part in the church. I thought it would be fun to teach the little ones, so I volunteered to substitute.” She shrugged. “I guess they needed me right away.”

  “So it’s temporary, then.” That made sense to him. Just another short-term project in a life that had been filled with them.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Elizabeth putting down her drawing and moving over to the white board. A marker had been left out, so she grabbed it and started drawing on the board.

  “It’s not necessarily only temporary.” Haley’s gaze followed his daughter, as well, but then she looked back to Matthew. “One of the teachers is pregnant with her first child, and she would like to take some time off, so they’ve been looking for a replacement.”

  “Oh.” He noticed she hadn’t said “permanent,” but then permanent probably didn’t mean the same to Haley that it did to others.

  “This was the perfect time to start though.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Are you kidding?” She looked at him as if he’d just grown a third ear or something. “It’s the Easter season. What a wonderful time of year for Christians.”

  He had to chuckle at her enthusiasm. “For those of us in the church business, Easter is another working weekend. We work overtime. Somebody has to put together all those wonderful services that everyone loves to attend. Good Friday, the Easter sunrise service, the main Easter service. Somebody has to plan all the vocal and instrumental selections.”

  As he was speaking, Haley had lifted her hand to her chin, and now she was holding it between her thumb and forefinger. Her gaze flicked to his daughter and back to him. “Are you always this cynical?”