The tingle of an urge to be impressive had me perplexed. Why did I want him to like the way I looked? Shrugging, I fished out a lightweight black sweater that fit my chest and shoulders nicely and a pair of gray corduroy pants I felt were sinfully seventies. Once dressed, I pulled out a heavy red sweater that would drown Maxwell, but it didn’t matter; at least he wouldn’t be cold.
Downstairs again, I paused in the doorway to the sitting room. I’d expected him to have eaten and be ready to be shown to his room for the night. Instead, what I found had me holding my hand over my face to keep from laughing. He stood in front of the tree in the corner, a deep vee between his eyebrows and a small crease across his forehead that made my fingers tingle to touch it. The tree glowed, but he glared like it had offended him, and he had four delicate ornaments hooked on his fingers. He smiled and hung one ornament on a branch in a spot that appealed to him, though I could tell no difference.
“What on earth are you doing?”
He flinched, and I closed my eyes as the inevitable happened. One of the ornaments slipped from his fingers and smashed on the floor. He stood there gaping at it. I tossed the sweater on the back of the nearest couch and then went to get the broom. By the time I got back he was hunched over picking up pieces of glass with the worst look on his face. My heart crumpled. He didn’t just fumble things in the office, apparently.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted, as I began to sweep my way across the shiny wooden floor toward him. The glass had spread, as it tended to do, and even five feet away I was finding shards on the floor.
“What were you doing?” I snapped.
“I didn’t mean to break it.”
“But what were you doing?” I asked, making an effort to soften my tone, even with the beginnings of exasperation curling its hooks into me.
He glanced my direction. The delicate glass ornaments he’d been holding were now on the table by the food. I swept around him, and he moved docilely so I could get the entire area, his mouth still drawn in a tight line.
“I—”
“Didn’t mean to break it, yes, we’ve covered that,” I said as I bent to brush the glass bits into the dustpan. Standing, I held out the pan to him, and he tipped the few bigger pieces he held into it. “Butwhatwere you doing?”
“There were a few too close together,” he mumbled and glanced away toward the fire. “They weren’t right.” His face tinged a shade of pink I was starting to enjoy more than I should. “The tree looked lopsided and I was fixing it.”
Gaping for a second, I stared from the tree to him. “Okay. That’s….”
“If you hadn’t surprised me, I would have just fixed it,” he accused with a furrowed brow in my direction.
Anger blazed to life in me. “If you hadn’t been touching things that weren’t yours, it wouldn’t have been a problem.”
He hung his head, and I was presented with the unfathomable situation of not wanting him to feel bad. I couldn’t go soft now, though. Tomorrow I’d be right back to trying to get him to quit. My stomach sank at the thought. What type of nightmare would I have to concoct for him to endure in order to succeed?
“Go sit down and….” I looked at the coffee table and again was startled. He’d taken everything off the tray and arranged the cutlery properly around the bowls. He’d even filled the glasses halfway and set them to the right, where the knives would have been if I’d bothered to pull any out of the drawer.
He’d been waiting politely and had been useful. He eyed me before choosing a seat that would allow him to look at the tree, but as he sat, I could already tell he had no intention of doing anything except stare down at his bowl. I put the broom and dustpan away, and when I came back, I warily took the other seat. The fire whooshed and the room was too warm for me, but he looked comfortable enough, so I simply shoved my sleeves up to my elbows.
“Why did you do this?” I asked, picking up my glass to sip at the dry wine. The bitterness was refreshing and woke me up a little.
“It’s the right way to set a table,” he said quietly, and while I was still perplexed, I couldn’t disagree with him. Raising my eyebrows, I drained my glass, filled it again to the middle, and then started eating.
He played with his spoon, and the firelight danced on his skin, making him a sad, exotic waif.
After eating half my bowl of stew, while making a couple of yum noises that should have allowed him to know it wasn’t poisoned, I dropped the spoon and rested my elbow on my knee, my chin in my palm.
“I’m going to regret asking, I already know I will, but why aren’t you eating?”
He sat up straight, tense as a bowstring. “I’m sorry.”
Pursing my lips, I fought back the urge to snarl at him. “What’s wrong with it?”
“There could be glass in it,” he whispered.
I blinked at him for a few seconds and then glanced at the gleaming floorboards. “The glass was cleaned up. We got it all.”
“I’m sorry,” he murmured and pushed the bowl away.
Anger prickled through me that he was being difficult, but then it occurred to me that he’d apologized, and I was fairly certain that was the first time I’d ever heard something like that from him. He had to be hungry, so was it just a strange hang-up?
Snagging his bowl, I stood and paced out of the room to the kitchen. I dumped the bowl into the basin where it clattered, then dropped my hands to the sink for a moment, staring at it. I made myself think. I’d gotten into the bad habit of raging at him, in my own way, without giving him even the slightest inch of understanding. But tonight he was a guest in my home.
