Looking a little abashed, Alice shrugged. “I guess she wasn’t so bad, really, but so not your type, Dad.”
“I’m not sure I have a type right now.”
“What about Meagan?”
He paused in the process of getting a glass for a drink of water. “Uh—what about Meagan?”
His daughter gave him a wide-eyed, innocent smile. “You could always ask her to the charity thing. I bet she’d go. She’s pretty bored, being on sick leave and all.”
Hardly a flattering reason for Meagan to accept an invitation with him, he thought, then quickly shook his head. “I don’t know, Alice. I hardly know her.”
“You’ve had two dinners with her,” she reminded him unnecessarily. “You seemed to like her fine. You smiled a lot with her.”
“I do like her. Your friend is quite nice.” He stressed the “your.”
“But that doesn’t mean she would be interested in going with me to a charity ball.”
“You could ask her and see. Or I could ask her for you. I’m going swimming at her house after school Thursday.”
“I’ll do my own asking,” he said hastily. “Don’t you even think about it.”
She poked out her lip a little, as if she couldn’t see a problem with her making his social arrangements, but she nodded. “Okay. So you’ll ask her? I’ll give you her cell phone number. She gave it to me.”
“I’ll consider it.” Maybe he would ask Meagan. Maybe she wouldn’t mind being invited at a fairly late date to attend a rather exclusive social event with him. He’d make it clear when he asked—if he asked—that there would be no hard feelings if she declined, that she and Alice could still be friends, if she wanted, and that they could still be cordial neighbors. No pressure.
Still—
“If you’re trying to be a matchmaker for me and Meagan, you can forget it,” he warned his daughter. “I’m not looking for a girlfriend right now, okay? You know how busy I am. There’s just no time for a relationship. I want to spend as much of my free time as I can with you.”
“I’m not matchmaking,” she protested too quickly and a bit too loudly. “I just thought you’d have fun with Meagan at the charity thing. Geez.”
“Okay, fine. Just remember what I said.”
“But it’s not like you couldn’t get married again or something, if you wanted to, Dad. You don’t have to stay single just because of me. I mean, I know you and Mom are never going to get back together.”
“You’re right, honey. That’s not going to happen.”
“It’s okay,” she assured him. “I know all about some people not being able to live together. You and Mom are too different. I love you both, but you’d never be happy living the way she does and she wouldn’t be happy living here with us. I want you both to be happy.”
Sometimes his daughter’s quaint mix of innocence and maturity broke his heart. This was one of those times. “Thank you, Alice. That’s all we want for you, too.”
“I know, Daddy. So you’ll ask Meagan to the thing?”
The segue made him a little uncomfortable, but he nodded. “I’ll ask her. That doesn’t mean she’ll accept. Which is perfectly okay. Promise me you won’t say a word to her about it either way.”
She frowned a little but nodded reluctantly. “I promise.”
“Okay. Now, you’d better get busy with whatever you have to do before bedtime. It’s still a school night.”
“I don’t have any homework tonight. But I’ll go change into my pj’s and lay out my clothes for tomorrow.”
Asking Meagan to the charity thing could be a bad idea on so many levels, Seth thought as his daughter headed for her room. Yet picturing himself attending with Meagan made him dread the event a little less. Assuming she agreed to go with him, of course.
Meagan hung up her phone Wednesday afternoon feeling slightly bemused. Her mother and sister looked up from their coffee with interest when she rejoined them at her mother’s kitchen table, having taken her call in another room for privacy. With Meagan still on sick leave for another week and Madison free for a rare weekday afternoon, they had taken advantage of the chance to get together for coffee and cake.
“Well?” Madison prompted before Meagan was even settled comfortably in her chair again. “That was obviously a call from a guy. We want details, don’t we, Mom?”
Their mother shook her head with a laugh. “Don’t get me in the middle of this. I’m not asking any questions.”