Therewasa Matchmakers Guild, although as far as Dorrimin knew, his mother was not in it.
Mothers were like that, Tommick had said, but he must have meant Millia, which didn’t make sense.Unless… unless that was why she winked whenever she saw Dorrimin.
“Mother.”Dorrimin stood very still.“You don’t need to do that.”
She looked up from winding a spool of twine that must have come loose.“Do you not like Tommick?I thought he was your friend.”
“I don’t have any friends outside of the family.”That was the truth.He’d had some friends as a child.Then he’d come of age and shot up like a gangly crane, and his stern, funereal features had hardly been pleasing.Once his friends had begun to get sweethearts or started courting for real, they’d sort of melted away, too busy, or not interested in talk about floor polish.That Dorrimin had never had a sweetheart, even a glimmer of one, said enough.
Maybe he did need other interests.Tommick kept insisting he would like poetry.And now art as well, if paint was chemistry.Dorrimin might like to study it.Maybe Tommick would take such a class with him.
Hedidstop in frequently.More like every other day now, every three days at the longest, unless family events kept him away longer.Tommick wasn’t inclined to love complex calculations or to do any work involving precision, but he was good for smelling concoctions and deciding which scent would likely sell the best, or if the texture felt wrong.He was quite skilled at putting Dorrimin at ease.
He was as good at that as he was standing at the counter and persuading customers to try this or that, as though he’d ever cleaned in his life.He went by Millia’s opinions, he claimed.Customers had no idea a Fortune was selling to them while in his college clothes, but he made them smile and laugh and buy things anyway.Sometimes he walked with Dorrimin when Dorrimin ran errands or made special deliveries.He liked to walk.He was sturdy, as Ollis claimed.
Dorrimin still wasn’t sure what Tommick got out of it.Dorriminwasa stick-in-the-mud.He didn’t mean to be, but he was, and he wasn’t attractive like Tommick to make up for it.Tommick was off with his friends having a good time, having forgotten about Dorrimin and his intention to come back.Maybe he had a sweetheart.Or lovers but no sweetheart.
“You’re brooding again.”His mother tugged Dorrimin from his darkening thoughts and shook her head when he glanced to her.“Why don’t you do something with that energy and run out to get us some sausages and tea and extra candles, in case the storm lasts longer than expected?”
Part Three
Bundledupandfightingagainst a wind that wanted to blow him off his feet, Dorrimin purchased what he could from shops about to close due to the weather and therefore crowded with customers also out to get extra provisions in case they were trapped inside by snowdrifts for more than a day.
He got tea and cheese, cured meats, and what logs would fit in the delivery cart.He didn’t think they needed candles as there was a huge supply in the storehouse, but got some anyway since his mother had mentioned them directly.He also got a bottle of plum brandy, a family tradition of sorts on the coldest of days.
The skies were dark, with the wind messing with the city power, because streetlamps were already flickering.Dorrimin should hurry home, but lingered at the street corner, looking around for one topper fool without a hat but of course not seeing him.
Tommick had taken Dorrimin’s advice and gone home, Dorrimin told himself, and didn’t know why he was so unhappy about it.It wasn’t as if Tommick had made a promise to see him.And even if snow did trap people in their homes or on their streets, it would only be for a few days.
But he frowned to return to the house and discover that Tommick hadn’t popped in on his way to catch a train before the service stopped.
Ollis, also just getting in, wearing a heavy coat over her fitted suit, her short hair in slight disarray from the wind, helped him get the cart in the door, then closed the door behind them and flipped the sign to say Closed.Dorrimin had to unload everything and go help prep the house for the weather and get dinner ready, so he couldn’t keep watch as the last of the daylight disappeared.But he was outside closing the storm shutters over the front windows when the first snowflakes began to fall.
Part Four
Dinnerwaschickenwithrosemary dumplings and what remained of the cassia cookies, served with tea.Dorrimin sat at one end of the kitchen table—the dining room was for formal occasions and holidays—listening to the howling wind outside and the occasional bang of something, a shutter or a door or a sign, coming loose to be blown down the street.
His mother eyed him with concern but Ollis was going on about some new beau of hers and that didn’t give their mother a chance to question Dorrimin about his flinches.Dorrimin was grateful, even though he was a bit tired of hearing about Ollis’ romances.Ollis was built on sturdy lines herself, sturdier than Dorrimin despite being nearly his height, and forever had a pack of wispy, delicate, pretty men chasing after her.
His father, irritated at being interrupted at work although aware that the storm would likely cut the city’s electricity and end his work regardless, was scowling down at his notes while eating, absently petting Bemmi as he did but not feeding her the scraps she was begging for.Yet he straightened up first, somehow hearing the sound before Dorrimin did: knocking, fast and regular.Close.
Dorrimin was on his feet and dashing downstairs before he had even consciously decided to.
The store was dark, lit only by the flickering streetlamps outside and the low fire in the fireplace creating just enough heat to keep the products on display from freezing.The outline of a figure at the door was visible through the glass, knocking insistently and yet politely, far too politely as far as Dorrimin was concerned.
He fumbled with the lock, tore open the door, dragged Tommick inside, slammed the door shut again, then crushed Tommick against it to sweep snow from his clothes and hair.
“You’re all right!”There was snowinsideTommick’s clothes too, and snowflakes in his eyebrows.Dorrimin dealt with them quickly, though not as gently as he probably should have, and then heard himself say it again, “You’re all right,” before squeezing Tommick as tightly as he could.
Tommick wheezed.His cold skin was a shock against Dorrimin’s cheek.Dorrimin yanked himself away immediately to pull him toward the fireplace.
The thundering sound in his ears wasn’t his heart, but the rest of his family tumbling down the stairs and into the room.Dorrimin stopped, his hands on Tommick, his arms around Tommick, and stared blankly at his family.
Tommick stared back up at him and no one else.“You were worried about me?”
His teeth chattered so much Dorrimin hardly understood him.He was shaking noticeably.
“I’ll get a bath going,” Ollis called out from behind them, then darted back upstairs.
