Danielle Steel - Daddy

“I don't really think he wants to. He's just trying to be nice to her. But he looks pretty bored with her too. And she kept looking at the other guys who came by. I don't think she knows what she wants. God, Daddy … imagine being seventeen and having a baby!”

“Keep that in mind, my dear, if the call of the wild ever strikes!” He wagged a finger at her and she laughed, blushing in the darkness.

“Don't worry. I'm not that stupid.” He wasn't quite sure what that meant. If it meant she would never do it, or if she did, she would be more careful. He made a mental note to himself to have Daphne talk to her on the subject, before she went to France for the summer.

“Is Sam asleep?”

“Out like a light.”

“Maybe we should go to bed too.” He stood up and stretched and they walked slowly inside holding hands. It had been a beautiful day, sunny and hot, and now the night was cool. It was exactly the way he liked it.

He kissed her good night outside her room, and lay in his own bed that night, thinking of what the last year had been like. How much had changed, how different they all were. Only a year before, on the Fcurth of July, everything had been so different. Sarah had been there, his mother … Benjamin still seemed like a child. They had all grown up that year, or some of them anyway. He didn't know about Sarah. He suspected that she was still groping. But he felt as though he had found his feet at last, and as he drifted off to sleep, he found himself wondering again about his father and Margaret Porter.

Chapter 14

In July, Mel and Sam left for Europe with Sarah and her French friend, and Oliver moved back to the apartment in New York. There was no point commuting every night now with the kids gone. It was easier for him to stay late at work, and then go back to 84th Street. He and Daphne spent a lot of time working together, and they had a standing spaghetti date now on Monday and Friday nights. She was with her friend the other three weekday nights, and now and then she would talk to Ollie about him. “Why do you do that to yourself?” he scolded more than once. “At your age, you should get married and be with someone who can give you more than three nights a week. Daph, you deserve it.”

She always shrugged and laughed. She was happy as things were. He was a wonderful man, she said, and she didn't want more than that. He was intelligent and kind and generous to her, and she loved him. And without children, marriage didn't seem quite as important to her.

“You'll be sorry one day.”

But she didn't agree with him. What she had was right for her, even though she missed him when she wasn't with him. “I don't think so, Ollie.” He admitted to her how lonely it was being alone, without the kids. He missed having someone to talk to at night, and the companionship he had known for nearly twenty years with Sarah.

He only went out to Purchase now to visit Benjamin and his father. Sandra was getting bigger by the hour. And for the first time in his life, Benjamin looked pale to him. He never got out in the sun anymore. He was always working. He had two jobs now. One pumping gas, and the other at night as a busboy. He was trying to save enough money to get her decent maternity care, pay for the apartment they shared, and have enough on hand to support their baby. And when he had offered to help them, Benjamin had refused it.

“It's my responsibility now, Dad. Not yours.”

“This is ridiculous. You're a child. You should be in school, being supported and getting an education.” But he was learning other things, about how tough life was when you were eighteen, and had a family to support and hadn't even finished high school. Sandra had had to stop work finally, her ankles were swollen to the size of melons, and the doctor was afraid she was becoming toxemic. Benjamin went home at lunch-time to prepare her meals, and she would lie on the couch and watch TV, while he cooked, complaining all the while that she never saw him anymore. He came home at night as early as he could, but he usually worked till two o'clock in the morning. And just thinking about it drove Oliver wild. He kept trying to give him money to ease his burdens, and finally he found a simpler solution. He gave it to Sandra, and she was always happy to take whatever he gave. He urged them to go to the house and at least use the pool, but Sandra didn't want to go anywhere, and Benjamin didn't have time. He was too busy working.

He was not unlike his mother, Oliver thought to himself one day, after writing a $500 check to Sandra and telling her to buy whatever she needed for the baby. Sarah hadn't taken a penny from him either since she left. She was supporting herself on the money her grandmother had left, and she insisted it wasn't right for Ollie to support her. Things were tight for her, and the children reported constantly about things they couldn't do when they visited her, because “Mom couldn't afford it,” but that was the lifestyle Sarah had always wanted. The life that he had provided for her didn't matter to her anymore. She had given mountains of clothes to Mel, and left the rest at the house in Purchase. She lived in blue jeans and T-shirts and sandals. And she and Jean-Pierre were proud of the fact that they were traveling through Europe on a shoestring. He had had several postcards from the kids since they left, but they never called, and he was never quite sure where they were. It made him nervous from time to time, but Sarah had only said that they would stay with relatives of Jean-Pierre's in France, and youth hostels in the other countries where they traveled. It was certainly going to be a different experience for them, but it might be good for them too. And he trusted her to take good care of them. She was their mother, after all, and he had always trusted her. But now, with all of them gone, he was stunned at how much he missed them. It was almost a physical pain when he went home at night to the empty apartment. He had given Aggie the summer off, and hired a weekly cleaning service to take care of the apartment. The house in Purchase was closed, and the dog was staying with his father. It was company for him at least. And when Oliver took the train up to see him one Sunday afternoon, he was touched to find his father lovingly tending his late wife's garden. He had always hated gardening, but now it was vital to him to maintain the roses that had meant so much to her.

“Are you doing all right, Dad?”

“I'm fine. It's awfully quiet here, especially with you and the children gone. Margaret and I go out to dinner from time to time, but I have a lot of work to do, to get your mother's estate in order.” The tax work he had to do for probate seemed to keep him busy, and she had had some stocks that he wanted to transfer now to Ollie's children.

Ollie felt sad after he'd spent the afternoon with him, and he went back on the train that night feeling pensive. His car was in the shop, and it was odd riding home on the train instead of driving. He took a seat in the parlor car, and picked up the book he had brought with him, and it was several stops before the seat next to him was occupied. He glanced up and saw a young woman with long dark hair and a deep tan slide into place beside him.

“Sorry,” she apologized, as she bumped him with her bag. She seemed to have assorted weekend equipment with her, and a tennis racket strapped to an overnight bag poked him in the leg repeatedly until she moved it. “Sorry about all this stuff.” He nodded and assured her it was all right, and went back to his book, as she pulled out what looked like a manuscript and began to make notations. And more than once he sensed her watching him, until finally he looked up and smiled, and realized that she was very attractive. She had blue eyes, and a smattering of freckles on a face that couldn't have been more than twenty-five or six years old. Her hair was pulled back, and she wore no makeup.