Chapter Two:
A Playdate?

0930 EST
JAG HEADQUARTERS
FALLS CHURCH, VIRGINIA

Harm went to Mac's office because he needed paper clips, and he knew that Mac always had extra paperclips. What he wasn't expecting to find in Mac's office was a strange young woman sitting in the guest chair. Harm paused, hovering in the doorway while he figured out if he should go in or not. By the looks of her, she didn't appear to be one of Mac's clients, and she looked too young to be a friend of hers.

Who is she? Harm wondered. Some long lost daughter? That can't be possible, though. She's blonde.

Harm gently knocked on the doorframe. "Hi um, do you know where Colonel Mackenzie went?"

The young woman turned around, and Harm was shocked to see that her face was one that he recognized. "She went to the bathroom, but she'll be back in a few minutes," Chloe grinned at him. "Hi, Harm."

"Hey you," Harm walked into the office. "I hardly recognized you. How have you been?"

Maybe it was all of the hot pink she was wearing, or the fact that her hair was blonde, but Harm was still having a hard time processing that the Chloe in front of him was the same Chloe that climbed on top of the JAG elevator. Now she was all grown up, and it made him feel so, so incredibly old.

"I've been doing good," she said with a nod. She looked Harm up and down, and he hoped she wasn't thinking about how much older he looked.

I'm only forty-one, Harm had to remind himself, That's not old.

"What have you been up to?" Chloe asked. The question made Harm chuckle.

"I've been up to a lot of things, Chloe."

She nodded slowly, and Harm could see the wheels turning in the back of her mind. "I see…" she said. Drawing one leg up to her chest, she rested her chin on top of her knee. She looked up at Harm. "You know Mac's single now, right?"

Harm's eyes widened. He stared at Chloe. "Yeah, I'm aware of that."

"Did you know that she's been single?"

"I-"

"Are you single right now, Harm?"

"Yes he is," Mac answered from the doorway. She eyed Harm smugly as he looked at her in bewilderment. Chloe laughed.

"You should've heard what she said about you," Harm said as Mac walked around him to sit down at her desk.

Mac's brow furrowed. "Really?" she looked at Chloe. "What did you say about me?"

"Nothing!" Chloe answered quickly. "Well, I didn't say anything that wasn't true, at least."

"Sure…" Mac rolled her eyes and gave Harm a knowing glance. He supposed he was supposed to be able to share her feelings, but Mattie never made fun of Harm…to Harm's knowledge at least.

And it wasn't that Chloe was making fun of Mac, she was just stating a fact. Mac was indeed single, as was Harm; both of these facts were something Harm was painfully aware of.

"Chloe's staying here for spring break," Mac explained, her voice breaking Harm from his train of thought.

"Oh really?" he said. "Mattie's on spring break next week, too."

Chloe frowned. "Who's Mattie?"

Harm and Mac exchanged glances, and this Harm knew what the gaze meant.

It had been three months, and Harm still didn't know how to describe who Mattie was to people who didn't know their situation. "Ward" felt too sterile and impersonal, but "foster kid" wasn't entirely accurate, either. At the same time, Harm felt like referring to Mattie as his "daughter" would cross a boundary, especially since Mattie's father was still alive. He just had no interest in being in the picture, though.

"Mattie is my….she's staying with me while she gets stuff with her family sorted out," Harm explained horribly.

"Oh…" Chloe paused. "So are you, like, adopting her or something?"

"Maybe, I don't know yet-"

"What's the deal with her real family?"

Mac looked at Chloe with wide eyes. Harm chuckled. "I guess you still love asking questions?" he asked.

Chloe shrugged, twirling a piece of hair around her finger. "I'm a curious person, what can I say?"

"Right."

Mac began to shuffle through the papers on her desk. "Did you need anything, Harm?"

"Yeah. Paper clips."

Later that day, after coming up with an idea that seemed too ingenious to be an idea that Harm could've come up with, he found Mac in her office, alone.

"Where's your other half?" Harm asked as he walked in.

Mac smirked. "She went to raid the break room cabinets. Some things never change."

"Good to know," Harm sat down across from Mac, in the same chair Chloe had sat in earlier. "Can we talk about something?" he asked.

Mac's eyebrows shot up. Her mind immediately went to the baby deal, as it always did when Harm came to her wanting to talk about something.

"Sure?" she asked slowly, eyeing Harm wearily. Her endometriosis diagnosis was something she'd told no one about, not even the man she was supposed to be having a child with that year. She was waiting for the perfect opportunity (not that there could ever be a 'perfect' opportunity to tell someone you were pretty much infertile) to tell him, and she would hate to have to tell him in her office during the middle of a work day.

"What do you think about setting up a playdate for Mattie and Chloe?" Harm asked.

Mac's shoulders sagged with relief, but that relief was soon replaced by confusion. She gave Harm a strange look. "A playdate?" she asked. "What do you mean?"

Harm shrugged. "I just figured that since they're both off on spring break, maybe we should try and get them together. You know, they're about the same age."

"Isn't Mattie like twelve?"

"She's fourteen."

"Oh," Mac frowned. "I mean I guess they could get together for something, I'd have to talk to Chloe. I wouldn't call it a playdate, though."

"Why not?" Harm asked.

Mac gave him a look. "They're not six, Harm. They're high schoolers."

"Still," Harm insisted. "I think it would be a good idea."

"Does Mattie not have plans with friends from school?" Mac asked. She opened one of her desk drawers, rummaging around in search of a paperclip. She peered into her desk, dismayed that she didn't seem to have any more. Harm must've taken her last one.

Looking up from her desk, she saw Harm looking at her with wide eyes.

"What?" she asked.

He leaned in. "The thing is, I don't think Mattie has that many friends at school," he whispered as if Mattie was hiding somewhere in the walls, listening.

"Oh."

"Yeah…"

Mac pursed her lips. She wasn't sure if Chloe would want to hang out with a high school freshman she'd never met before, but it was worth a shot. Plus it was the least she could for Harm if she probably wasn't going to be able to have a baby with him.

"I'll see what I can do," she told him.

2015 EST
APARTMENT OF HARMON RABB JR
WASHINGTON DC

Harm waited until Mattie was done with her algebra homework before he brought the topic up to her. She was helping him do the dishes, drying while he washed. Harm had already stalled long enough - he had planned to bring it up over dinner, but hadn't. Now they were on the last of the forks, and Mattie was probably going to want to go back to her and Jen's place after to watch TV and write in diary (Harm did know that she kept a diary; he also knew that her favorite color was green and that pandas were her favorite animal), so time was of the essence.

"Sooo…I had an idea for something."

Mattie paused, fork and drying cloth frozen in midair. "An idea for what?" she asked. She'd known Harm long enough to know that plans always seemed to go awry when he was around.

"Did I tell you about Mac's younger sister?"

"Mac has a younger sister?" Mattie asked, her nose wrinkling.

"Yeah, and she's about your age. She's visiting next week because she's out of school for spring break next week. I was wondering if you would want to have a play - a hangout," he cleared his throat. "I was wondering if you wanted to hangout with her."

Mattie looked up at him. "She's not weird, is she?" she asked.

"Weird? No she isn't weird," Harm said. In that moment he decided he wouldn't tell Mattie about the elevator thing. In Chloe's defense that had been five years ago. "She's perfectly normal."

"By the way you said that, you're making it sound like she's weird," Mattie said.

"She's not weird!"

"Fine," Mattie sat the fork and dish rag down and folded her arms across her chest. "If she isn't weird, then tell me about her. I'll decide."

Harm ran his fingers through his hair. He turned off the kitchen sink, figuring that this would require his full concentration. "Well, for starters, she wears the color pink a lot," he said. "And she puts that, that stuff on her eyes-"

"Mascara?"

"Yeah, and the other stuff, the powder-"

"Eyeshadow?"

"Yeah," Harm nodded. "And she has an earring in one of her nostrils-"

Mattie raised an eyebrow. "She has a nose ring?"

"That's it!" Harm said, snapping his fingers. "That's what those are called. She has a nose ring."

He looked at Mattie eagerly, hoping that she would jump at the chance to hang out with Chloe. He would hate to drag her all the way to Georgetown kicking and screaming. Unfortunately, Mattie didn't seem to share in Harm's eagerness.

"Are you serious?" she asked, looking at him incredulously.

"What?" Harm looked at her, bewildered. "I told you she wasn't weird. She looks like every cool girl in all the movies you and Jen watch together-"

"Exactly!" Mattie exclaimed. "She's probably going to think I'm weird!"

"You're not weird!"

"Have you seen me lately?"

"Of course I have! I'm looking at you right now."

Mattie huffed and rolled her eyes. "I can't believe this," she said, picking up the dish rag and tossing it at his chest. She stormed off, heading for the door.

Harm turned around to stare after him. "What did I do?" he asked.

"Ugh!" Mattie glared at him from the doorway. "It's like you're trying to ruin my life or something!"

"I'm not-" Harm winced as the front door slammed shut. "I'm just trying to help you make some friends!"

"I don't need your help making friends!" Mattie shouted from behind the door. "You're like forty-five! It's weird!"

"I'm forty-one!"

2130 EST
RISTORANTE PICCOLO
GEORGETOWN

Mac waited until the main courses came before she brought the topic up to Chloe. She was nervous to see what Chloe would say, what her thoughts on the entire situation would be,

"You're going to pay for this, right?" Chloe asked as she twirled spaghetti noodles around her fork. "I didn't work this week and I'm not working next week. I'm going to be waiting four weeks for my next paycheck from Nordstrom."

"It's okay," Mac nodded, Chloe's honesty making her laugh. "I wasn't going to make you pay."

"Okay. Awesome," Chloe sat down her fork and picked up a spoon, turning it over to look at her reflection in it. She bared her teeth, poking the tip of her tongue at a spot of garlic stuck between her two from teeth.

Mac eyed her with amusement in her eyes. "You make such an attractive dinner date," she said.

Chloe paused. She promptly closed her mouth and sat the spoon down. "Sorry," she said.

"It's okay," Mac smiled. Clearing her throat, she rested her chin on her upturned palm. "So, Chlo, I was wondering if I could talk to you about something-"

"Mac, you gave me the sex talk last summer."

Mac blinked. "This isn't - I'm not going to talk to you about sex. Unless -"

"No," Chloe quickly shook her head. "I'm good. I promise."

"Oh okay," Mac slowly nodded. She wasn't expecting the conversation to get derailed this quickly. "Well, I was going to talk to you about something else, anyway. Do you remember the girl Harm and I were talking about this morning? Mattie?"

"Yeah. The girl that's just living with Harm even though he's not adopting her."

"Right."

"What about her?"

"Well…" Mac paused. It was now or never. "What do you think about hanging out with her this week since you're both not in school? Like for a sleepover or something?"

Chloe blinked at her. "Isn't she like, ten, or something?"

"She's fourteen," Mac corrected, trying to not think about the similar mistake she'd made earlier. "And I know she's still a couple of years younger than you, but it would probably only be for one night."

"What's she like?" Chloe asked, taking a stab at a meatball with her fork.

"She likes planes, I think," Mac offered, knowing what a lame response that was. "And she wears flannels a lot, and she wears this old, vintage looking watch-"

"She sounds weird. Is she weird?"

"No," Mac looked at Chloe in shock. "Don't say that," she scolded. "That's mean."

Chloe shrugged. "I was just asking," she said. "Why? Do you think she's weird."

Mac balked at the question. "I never said that…"

"Give me your honest opinion," Chloe said. "Is she weird or not?"

"Well…." Mac paused, opting to choose her words carefully. "Weird is a strong word. She's just a little sheltered, that's all. She could really use your influence."

While Chloe thought things over while chewing, Mac watched her with bated breath. She wasn't going to be necessarily upset with Chloe if she said no, but Mac really needed her to say yes. Mac didn't know what she was going to say to Harm if Chloe said no, especially since he'd probably already told Mattie. That poor girl had already gone through enough over the past few months.

Chloe, please say yes, Mac silently begged, She needs at least one friend, please say yes-

"Alright," Chloe said. "I'll do it."

Mac's eyes brightened. "Really?"

"I can put it on my college applications. I can say I did charity work."

I'm really enjoying this story so far. It's probably been one of my favorites to write. Hope you guys are enjoying it!

My seasonal allergies have been acting up (it's not covid), so my heart is with anyone else who may be suffering along with me. My Allegra has only been able to help but so much, so it looks like I'll be just riding it out for the next week or so.

Thanks for reading!

-Harper