“It was one class.”
“Still.”
“I am allowed hobbies.”
“I never said you weren’t.”
His smile is warm and entirely too intimate for the other side of a bakery table.
“You like making things?” he asks.
I look down at my plate.
“Yes,” I say, and the answer feels more private than it should. “I’m not always good at it. But yes.”
“Plants. Pottery. Bad thrillers. Shouting at television.”
“Swimming. Walking. Being an excellent aunt.”
“Excellent?”
“Objectively. My sister Amanda’s kids think so, anyway.”
His smile warms. “What are their names?”
I nod. “Jamie and Samantha.”
He smiles. “What makes you excellent?”
“I provide sugar, dangerous amounts of glitter, and no long-term discipline.”
“Classic aunt strategy.”
“It works.”
“Do you want…” He stops, then shakes his head. “Ignore me. That’s too personal.”
I look at him.
There is a carefulness in his face that I like more than I should.
I could let him retreat.
Instead, I take another sip of coffee and say, “Children?”
“Yes.”
I set the mug down. “No.”
His expression does not change in the way people’s faces often do when I say that. No flicker of surprise. No recalculation. No tiny, patronising sadness.
Just attention.
“No?” he says.
“No. I love Samantha and Jamie. I like children generally. Some more than others, obviously, because I’m not a saint. But I don’t want my own.”
“Right.”
