“Mm hmm.” Elea scurried back to her seat.
“She has a typewriter at home?” Not entirely odd, he supposed... but not entirely common, either. Noone inhisfamily had one, certainly not that they kept out on display.
Elea nodded and picked up her pencil again. “She’s on it all the time—always typing when I get up, and once I’ve gone to bed too. Even now, when we have to leave so early and get home so late.”
Anders’s brows lifted. That didn’t sound like correspondence, though he supposed it could have been. Perhaps she had a lot of friends from their village to write letters to. “What is she writing?”
Elea shrugged. “A story, but she wouldn’t tell me more than that.”
He glanced to Helga, but she looked just as surprised by the information as he felt.
His pulse kicked up—he couldn’t help it. The mention of story writing always did that to him, whether it was one he was working on, one he was editing, or one he was simply hearing about. And the thought of Tatiana writing a story... excitement bubbled. It could give them something to talk about. Something else they had in common. Perhaps he could even help her somehow—if ever she admitted her writing to him, he could offer. Perhaps they could have a little critique partnership. Get together for coffee and reading and talk aboutplots and characters and... and he’d probably make some suggestion that she would hate and then she’d resent him and think him idiotic and heavy-handed, and then instead of seeing hermore, she’d avoid him even at the office and...
There he went again. Why was his imagination always so quick to think up worst-case scenarios?
Elea paused suddenly, turning her face his way. “Haveyouever drawn Aunt Tatta?”
And now heat climbed his neck and stained his cheeks. He turned back to his door in the hopes that the little girl wouldn’t notice. “No, I haven’t.” It was true. He hadn’t dared, not with how often his family dropped by without warning. If they saw a drawing of a beautiful modern woman, they’d tease him endlessly. And he certainly couldn’t work on such a thinghere.
But he’d mentally composed any number of drawings. Some portraits, others candid. Occasionally he’d imagined her as the beautiful Brynhild, sporting gleaming chain mail and her warrior’s sword, or the determined Signy, or the young Sigrun. Though inevitably he decided not to cast her in any of those tragic roles—it seemed all the heroes and heroines of the old sagas met violent ends, something he usually neglected to includein his children’s versions. But still,heknew how the real tales went, and he had no desire to imagine anyone he admired taking on those roles.
Elea turned on her chair to face him, eyes alight. “Would you draw one of me and Aunt Tatta too? I was going to give her mine for Christmas—you could too. It would be fun! A way to remember my visit.”
He ought to decline—after all, he hadn’t time for random drawing. He had editing to do in the morning, books to help pack up in the afternoon and evening, and his own next manuscript to write and illustrate over the weekends.
Yet the mere suggestion was enough to make a scene jump into his mind, and his lips twitched into a smile as he returned to his desk chair. He imagined Tatiana in that red suit she wore so often this time of year, in profile, holding a stack of books that towered far too high. Beside her would be Elea, standing on a stack of books rather than carrying them, giving her enough height to peek over her aunt’s shoulder at the title on the top of the stack. The snowy city behind them, with the aurora dancing in the background, a few snowflakes drifting down.
Bother. Now he had no choice but to pull out apiece of watercolor paper from the stack he always kept in a drawer—one never knew when inspiration would strike over a lunch or coffee break—and grab his favorite sketching pencil. He imagined this one almost in the style of the American Norman Rockwell, though not with the earthy color scheme Rockwell often chose. No, he imagined deep blues and bold reds and then that dance of pastels in the sky.
He would grant himself fifteen minutes—the amount of time he could have taken for a coffee break, since it was time for one anyway. Not enough time to really get the details down, and certainly not time enough for painting. But enough to get the rough image onto paper, anyway. Light strokes that would be covered up with paint. Straight lines for the books, soft curves for the females. A dreamy expression on Tatiana’s face as she looked up at the night sky, all those books in her arms. An inquisitive one for Elea, so eager to learn and understand. Once he added color, he’d give Tatiana red lips to match her skirt and jacket. Elea he’d put in the green dress she’d worn her first day here, with the crisp white blouse beneath it. Together they would look like Christmas.
He kept glancing at his watch as he worked, so thatwhen his self-imposed time had run out, he put his pencil down again. His gaze moved critically over the drawing. It was hasty, yes, and he could see several things he’d tweak before he put color to it. But it was close enough to his vision to make him grin. He held it up for Elea to see through the doorway. “What do you think?”
She’d given up on her own work and had moved to stand in front of his desk at some point. He hadn’t even noticed, but she must have been watching him for a while. Her grin was quick and bright. “That’s... that’s justperfect. It’sus!”
“We’ll call itJolabokoflod.”
Elea clapped. “Uncle Valdi should use it for an advertisement next year!”
He laughed, because Valdi had never once asked him to develop any art for advertising... but it wasn’t a bad idea, really. With the success of the Book Bulletin, it was quite possible that they’d want artwork for it in the future. He didn’t want to presume anything, of course. But knowing Elea as he’d begun to do, she’d suggest it to her uncle without any help from Anders.
Which was perfect, really. She’d plant the idea, and if Valdi liked it, he’d bring it up to Anders. If not, it couldbe waved off as a little girl’s fancy, no hard feelings on either side.
For now, he set the paper aside. “All right, enough of that. I had better get back to work so that I can help in the warehouse again after lunch.”
Elea nodded. “Me too. Once I get the typewriter fixed, I still need to color it all in.” She motioned to the box of colored crayons she’d brought with her today.
He granted her a serious nod. “Indeed. And after you’ve finished, I can help you frame it, if you like. I have plenty of them at home.” Once upon a time he too had given drawings to family members, so had begun buying up frames whenever he saw them for a bargain. But after realizing they never displayed any of them, he’d given up. Which meant he still had quite a stack of frames and only so much space on his own walls.
“Really?” Elea’s eyes twinkled. “And you’ll frame that one too? Aunt Tatta’s going toloveit!”
He nodded, even as his stomach churned at the thought. He’d never given Tatiana a gift. They exchanged names at the office, but he’d never drawn hers—and even if he had, that would have been different. This... this was a voluntary gift. A personal gift. It meant feelings were on the line. It meant...something.Giving a gift to a beautiful young woman—other than family—was momentous, wasn’t it? He’d never done it before. He’d taken ladies out on a few dates over the years, of course, but none had ever turned into relationships that lasted through Christmas.
Yet another reason his brothers taunted him and his mother was perpetually disappointed. Anders the Red-Faced Bookworm was a lost cause in their minds. He’d never actually convince a woman to marry him, despite the fact that he thought he’d make a decent husband and father.Women don’t want a man who has his nose always stuck in a book, Ulric had pointed out just a few months ago.Don’t you learn anything from those sagas you read nonstop? They want strong men, capable of providing for them with the work of their hands. They want men willing to fight for them, if it comes down to it.
Much as he wanted to think modern women were a bit more enlightened than all that anddidn’trate potential husbands solely on their height or musculature or propensity to get into fistfights, it was hard to argue with the elder brothers who outdid him physically in every way. Who’d never shied away from a brawl, and who had all been married by the age of twenty-five.
Although let it be noted, Valdi was a bookworm too,and he had a wife and family who seemed happy with him. So perhaps there was hope for Anders yet.
