Thario couldn’t believeCalla wanted him. She wasn’t requiring him to jump through any hoops or make changes. She accepted him as he was.
It had been a long time since he felt something like this. Together, they could end up having something great.
After a moment, they sat down, both of them laughing. They ate lunch, not really talking about anything important.
Thario glanced outside. "The weather is great now, but I wonder how much it snows here." Normally, he would have investigated something like that, but the move had been sofast he hadn't even cared. Being closer to Calla had been more important.
Calla met his gaze and smiled. Warmth spread through him. He really liked it when she smiled at him. It made him feel special, and he hadn’t felt special to someone in a long time.
“Elowen said it didn’t snow much, and it melted fairly quickly on the roads. Deep in the woods, where the shadows stay for most of the day, snow will build up there.”
“That makes sense. This isn’t too high up in the mountains. I think it can get bad in the high passes.”
“Yes. Griz said something about that.”
“I guess I don’t need to get snow tires.”
“Is that really a thing?” Calla asked.
"In northern areas, yes. Like in Minnesota, they do snow tires."
"Minnesota," Calla said the word slowly, then shook her head. "I've never left California. I've never traveled anywhere."
“I like California, but there are a lot of other places we can go.”
She bit her lower lip. “What about Brent? I don’t want him to find me.”
Thario felt guilty since he hadn’t found him yet. “I started searching this morning, but I still have to monitor my time on the computer so my head doesn’t hurt too bad, but it’s much better.”
“Maybe I could help.”
“Sure. It’s not hard to learn. It may be intimidating at first, but most of it is just reading through information.”
"It has been a while since I've done stuff on a computer. I mean, I had the session with the therapist this morning, but Elowen set that up for me."
“I’ll help you get set up. The main thing is don’t stress about it.”
“I don’t want to slow you down.”
"Don't worry about that. Honestly, there are some sites that are a bunch of reading, and that stuff slows me down. You could dig into those sites and the information, while I do some of the quick search sites."
She shook her head. “I don’t even know what that means.”
“Don’t worry about it. If you need to know, I’m sure you’ll learn.”
Laughter from Calla filled the room. “You have a lot of confidence in me. I’m not sure I deserve it.”
“I can tell from talking with you that you pick up on things real fast.”
“Thank you. You’re too kind.”
He took her hand and squeezed. “No, I’m not. You deserve more than just a little kindness. You are a wonderful person.”
She looked uncomfortable, and that was the last thing he wanted for her. He wanted to make her feel good.
“Hey, you are a good person.”
“I don’t know. I didn’t do anything to stop him.”
