Santa's Sweetheart (The Christmas Tree Ranch #4)(5)
So far so good, Maggie thought. “Does she have a boyfriend?”
Brenda shrugged. “How would I know that? And why are you asking?”
“Oh . . . I just wondered, that’s all.” She’d asked enough questions, Maggie decided. Now she needed to figure out what to do next.
They were walking back toward the building when a ruckus erupted from the far side of the schoolyard—kids shouting and running, the supervising teacher blowing her whistle.
“Hey, it’s a fight!” Brenda was already sprinting toward the commotion. “Come on!”
Maggie followed, a little behind her friend. By the time she reached the scene, the teacher and the principal were pulling two second grade boys apart.
“Oh, no,” Brenda whispered to Maggie. “That’s Johnny Lee Willis. He’s already in trouble for fighting. The last time it happened, his folks had to come to school and meet with his teacher. This time it’ll be the principal for sure.”
“What do you think will happen to him?” Maggie asked.
“I don’t know, but he’s in big trouble. Maybe he’ll have to stay after school and do extra work.”
As the boys grudgingly shook hands and the crowd scattered, the bell rang, signaling the end of recess. But Brenda’s words had stayed with Maggie. By the time she’d hung up her coat, she’d come up with a plan to get her father and Miss Chapman to meet.
It was a daring plan. Maybe too daring. But Christmas was getting closer every day. It was time for an act of desperation.
*
“What’s this?” Sam unfolded the note that Maggie had handed him. He read it once, then again, unable to believe his eyes. What was going on here?
“Why does your teacher want to talk to me, Maggie?” he demanded. “Are you in some kind of trouble?”
“You might say that.” She looked up at him, all wounded innocence. Her expression tugged at his heart, but Sam was determined not to be moved.
“Sit down and tell me about it.” The table was set, their supper of warmed-over chili heating on the stove. Sam turned the temperature down, then joined her at the kitchen table, feeling as if he were about to interrogate a suspect. “It isn’t like you to be in trouble, Maggie,” he said. “Tell me everything. What did you do?”
“I went on strike.”
“What kind of strike?”
“I told Miss Chapman I wasn’t going to phys ed anymore. And I didn’t go. I stayed at my desk and read my book.”
“And your teacher let you do that?”
“She told me I had to go, and I said I wouldn’t. That’s why she wants to talk to you.”
“Maggie!” Sam shook his head. “What’s wrong with you, defying your teacher like that? I thought you liked her.”
“I do. But I hate phys ed. I hate being the worst one in the class. I’m not going anymore.”
It was time for tough love, Sam told himself. “Fine. But until your attitude changes, young lady, you can forget about our getting a Christmas tree.”
A look of utter dismay flashed across her face, but she swiftly masked it. “Whatever,” she said with a shrug.
“And you’re to brush your teeth and go to your room after supper. No TV.” Sam could smell the chili scorching. Biting back a curse, he turned off the stove and moved the pan. He’d have to make grilled cheese sandwiches instead.
“Okay.” Maggie shrugged again, an infuriating gesture. What had happened to his sweet, cheerful daughter? She was too young to be acting like a teenager.
“The note says your teacher wants to meet tomorrow after school,” he said. “When I talk to her, I don’t want to hear that you’ve misbehaved again. That includes refusing to go to phys ed.”
“We don’t have phys ed on Tuesdays,” Maggie said. “We’re having an assembly tomorrow.”
“Fine.” Sam fought the urge to ball up the note and fling it into the trash. “But this ends now, Maggie. No more strikes, or arguing with your teacher, or anything else. Hear?”
“Yes, Daddy.” She appeared almost too meek now, too satisfied. Something was up. But what?
Sam had learned to read people. It was one of the things that made him good at his job. But his own daughter, whom he’d known from the moment of her birth, had become a mystery.
*
After a supper of grilled cheese sandwiches and canned tomato soup, Maggie went off to brush her teeth and go to her room. She went without a murmur of protest, but she didn’t appear to be the least bit sorry for what she’d done.
Even that, Sam mused, wasn’t like her at all.
He cleared the table, scraped the burned chili into the trash, and loaded the dishwasher. The note Maggie had brought home lay on the counter where he’d dropped it. He picked it up and read it again.
The document was a preprinted form with the Branding Iron Elementary School letterhead at the top, and subtitled Request for Parent-Teacher Conference. Only the date and time, the room number, and the teacher’s name and signature had been filled in. There was a blank line at the bottom for the parent’s signature. As Sam signed his name, he continued to study the scant information on the note.
Grace Chapman. He’d never met the teacher, which meant she was likely new in town. The name was old-fashioned, calling up the image of a stern, gray-haired dowager. But the scrawled signature told him the woman had gone to school after the time when students were drilled in penmanship, which would make her no older than about forty. Maggie spoke of her as Miss Chapman, which meant that she was unmarried. The term old maid schoolteacher was as outdated as it was cruel. But Sam’s mental image of Grace Chapman wasn’t a flattering one. She probably wore brown support stockings, kept her glasses on a chain around her neck, and lived in a house full of cats.