Hungry for More (2012)

“What if Daddy doesn’t like Mr. Hoppypants?”

Bridget Parker looked up from the pile of suitcases that she was arranging by the front door of an almost-empty apartment and gave the little boy who was speaking what she hoped was a reassuring smile.

“Of course he’ll like Mr. Hoppypants,” she told him. The syllables of her English accent were low and soothing as she reached over to stroke his cheek with the pad of her thumb. “He’ll
love
him.”

“But what if he doesn’t?” the child persisted. “What if he makes him go away? What will happen to him then?” The child stepped back into a nearby corner, clutching a tatty stuffed rabbit to his chest. “He doesn’t have anywhere to go. Mr. Hoppypants’ mommy died too…” he said in a mournful whisper as he sank down onto the floor.

Bridget stopped what she was doing to pull the boy into a hug. She crushed him against her ample bosom and rubbed her fingers through his soft, dark hair. “Mr. Hoppypants doesn’t have to worry,” she assured him. “Nanny isn’t going to let anything happen to him-or to you.”

“Do you promise?” the boy asked, looking sheepish as she easily sussed out his true concern.

She nodded her head gently. “I promise,” she told him. “You’re going to like it at
D
addy’s- I can just tell.”

“But I’ve never been to Daddy’s before! Not alone!”

“Well, you won’t be alone,” Bridget said, forcing her voice to stay cheerful. “You’ll have Mr. Hoppypants with you.”

“And Raymond,” the boy added anxiously, glancing toward the pile of stuffed animals that Bridget had carefully arranged inside an unused laundry basket.  “And Frog and Ninjaboy.”

“Yes, Raymond, Frog and Ninjaboy will be with you too...” Bridget told him. She included his imaginary friends without hesitation. “I hope that
D
addy has gotten you a nice big room!”

“Maybe if he didn’t, we can come back here,” the boy said hopefully.

Bridget blinked back tears as she shook her head.

If the boy’s mother had still been alive, she never would have dared to use his nickname. Phoebe had always insisted that her son be addressed by his ridiculously pompous Christian name, Atherton Whitman Devoe, but the single syllable slipped easily off Bridget’s tongue now.

“Tad…” she whispered. “Nanny has already explained. You have to leave. Another family is coming to live here, and you get to move to a nice, new apartment by the park. Isn’t that exciting? You can go and play
every
day. Why, I bet you can look out your window and see the zoo!”

Tad refused to be distracted. “But I don’t want to see the zoo! I want to stay in my old room!” He started to cry. “Why did
M
ommy die? When is she going to come back?”

Bridget kissed her charge’s forehead. She struggled, once again, to explain. “She can’t come back, darling, not ever
.
I’m sure that she didn’t want to die, but…well, it happened, and you have to be a strong, brave boy
–
a brave boy who’s going to have a wonderful adventure!”

“But I want you to come on the adventure!” he insisted in a quivering voice.

“I want that too,” Bridget said, biting her lip and fighting back tears as the boy inadvertently touched on her longing.

She had been with Tad for his entire life.

Everything had been frantic at first. His mother, Phoebe, wanted Bridget on hand for the birth, so that she could deal with diaper changes and feedings from the start. It was a planned C-section. Bridget rode with her employer in the cab to the hospital. She was sitting outside the delivery room on a hard plastic chair when they wheeled out Tad’s bassinet on the way to the nursery. Phoebe had insisted on general anesthesia (she refused to deal with any pain), and so, apart from the doctors and nurses, Bridget had been the very first person to see him alive.

She had followed the attendants all the way to the nursery. Then she watched them from behind the glass. She stared, fascinated as they weighed and measured the baby, cringed as they drew blood, and then sighed in wonder as they gave him a bath.

The hospital must have misunderstood Phoebe’s instructions, taking her statement that “Bridget was going to be looking after the baby” to mean that she was going to adopt the boy, because they let her into the sterile room where only parents were allowed to go. Gowned and scrubbed, she fed Tad his very first bottle and, not too long thereafter, gave him his very first diaper change.

Phoebe was recovering from surgery. She had taken the opportunity of her C-
s
ection to get a tummy tuck. Sore and heavily medicated, she didn’t ask for the baby all night, and so Bridget stayed with him. She had stared adoringly, taking a thousand photographs, swooning over how tiny and perfect he was.

The next morning, things changed. Friends and relatives came to see baby Atherton (Bridget still
despised
the name!) and Bridget was, necessarily, pushed aside. Bridget went home to shower and change while Phoebe showed off her child- but Bridget couldn’t wait to get back. Even after only one day of being away from Tad she felt like a rubber band that had been stretched too far. She had to return or
snap
. She spent most of the afternoon at the hospital working a crossword until the visitors were gone- and then she swooped inside to reclaim him again the very second that they left.

After the novelty wore off, Bridget had the boy more or less to herself. She didn’t allow herself to wonder whether Phoebe had actually loved her little boy. She hoped, for Tad’s sake, that the woman did, but she knew very well that her employer had never been able to
offer any
real affection.
Phoebe treated the baby like a hot new accessory. She flashed him around for a season, and then relegated
him
to a drawer. Happily, that drawer was Bridget’s domain. By the time that Tad was six months old, Phoebe rarely
involved herself
with the baby at all. Shortly thereafter, she had taken up with a foreign investment banker and drifted almost completely out of their lives. There were months at a time when the most Bridget saw of her employer was the signature on her checks. Of course, she never complained!
The wages were outstanding, the benefits were tolerable and
she had hours alone with the sweetest baby in the world
. Bridget was left more or less to her own devices, raising the child as if he were her own precious son, with someone else picking up the bill. That was certainly how she thought of Tad
–
as
her
boy
–
and the idea that it was all about to end just because
that
idiot
Phoebe Whitman had gotten herself killed in a skiing accident was breaking Bridget’s heart.

“What’s wrong, Nanny?” Atherton cried, his huge brown eyes wide with worry when he saw the glimmer of moisture around her eyelids.

Bridget reached into her pocket for a handkerchief. She dabbed her eyes and then blew her nose. “Nanny is being silly,” she told him, ruffling his hair again. She turned around, hopeful that being busy would hold her gloom at bay, “Why don’t you tell me a story while I finish our packing?” she suggested. “Then I’ll make us a nice cup of tea.”

It
had been
five years since Bridget had moved to America, but some things never changed. On either side of the ocean, there weren’t many problems that a pot of tea and a plate of McVities biscuits couldn’t solve. Luckily, she had trained the boy to feel the exact same way. He settled down at the promise of a treat. He made up a story about Ninjaboy and Frog going to the doctor, amusing himself while she finished arranging boxes. She was able to her
d
him into the kitchen after just a few minutes.

“What time is
D
addy coming?” Tad asked as he licked the chocolate off his biscuit.

Bridget dabbed brown smudges off his cheeks with a napkin. “Aunt Dixie said three o’clock.” 

Bridget dearly wished that Tad’s brazen but warm-hearted aunt was coming to collect the child instead of his father. At least Aunt Dixie was someone that the little boy
knew
! To the best that Bridget could remember, Tad had always spent his holidays, and the other breaks that he was meant to pass with the father, in the care of his grandparents or one or another of his uncles and aunts. Tad’s father, Paul Devoe, was an up and coming celebrity chef who always claimed to be far too busy to look after the child himself. He lo
g
ged appearances at birthdays and Christmas, but that was the limit of their interaction. Bridget herself had glimpsed Chef Devoe a mere handful of times.

Bridget had seen Paul more often on TV than in real life. He had starred for two seasons on a restaurant channel reality program that revolved around amateur chefs trying to open restaurants in dream locations. His trademark was his nuclear temper. Bridget couldn’t count the number of times that Chef Devoe had reduced a would-be chef to tears over an undercooked piece of chicken or an over-salted vegetable, and there were vast stretches of the program with more bleeped out curses than actual words. It was great for ratings, but did not bode well for parenting a young child.

Bridget knew for a fact that all the other family members had been asked to take Tad for themselves, but no one could make it work. Tad’s grandparents were in their 70’s- far too old and too frail to take on the care of a preschooler themselves. Paul’s older sister was in the Army, currently stationed with her family in Berlin. His brother Jack was a doctor, whose wife was juggling medical school with attempts at having a baby of their own. The house of Tad’s other uncle was Bridget’s first choice for placement. Bridget had never met Paul’s brother, Drew, but she was on very good terms with his wife. The first time she met Dixie Devoe, Bridget didn’t quite know what to think. Dixie seemed more like a sassy Southern belle from a movie than an actual human being, but Bridget quickly determined that the feisty redhead had a heart of gold. Moreover, Dixie was a natural mother, nurturing anything that came within range. She was the person who had given Tad his nickname (apparently Paul was known to his family as “Wog
,
” a derivative of “PaulyWog
,
” and she had decided that Tad, from “Tadpole
,
” was the logical choice for his little boy) and was always his favorite
a
unt. Bridget
wanted Dixie to take Tad in, but Tad’s aunt was already struggling to raise her own son, to bring up the two children that she shared with her husband Drew, to nurture Drew’s teenage daughter
and to
run a business. There was simply no way to make it work.

Paul Devoe was Tad’s only option. Bridget had assumed that a disinterested father was better than no father at all, but an hour later, she wasn’t so sure.

“What time is it, Nanny?” Tad asked. He looked uncomprehendingly at the grandfather clock that stood in the hall.

Bridget scowled at the display. It was nearly four. She was
sure
that Mr. Devoe had promised to come for Tad at three o’clock. She had written it down! She had called his restaurant the day before to confirm.

Four o’clock came and went with nothing.

At four-thirty, Bridget called the cell phone number that she’d been given, but no one answered. Fortunately, that was the time that the doorman buzzed up.

“
There is someone
here to collect young Mr. Atherton,” he said over the intercom.

“Thank you,” Bridget replied. “We have a lot of bags, will you
send
him up?”