The Good Pan Bakery
His voice dropped between them like a stone. It has. A weight, to be sure, but somehow not one she minded. Maybe it was the smile that curled at the edges of his mouth. The smile wasn't happy in the least—neither, it had to be said, was hers. Years and years between them, and more than just time besides. Still, she thought she could bear it. If he wanted her to.
Aurelie didn't know what to say now. Something in his face stopped her. His hand was so warm between her own, large and solid. A hand that could hurt her as easily as anything, and still she... Oh, she was stupid, wasn't she? Even now she couldn't help but think he wouldn't.
I don't have any boats anymore, she thought. Henrietta was long gone, too—Aurelie had been sad about that, as a little girl, thinking of her poor Henrietta abandoned and alone. She liked to think that Nurse had taken her home and given her to some other little child who would love her as she deserved. (She knew it wasn't likely, but the fantasy remained.) They could find new games to play. Better ones. It all seemed so much easier, with him there. More difficult, too, but... She could face it, she thought.
Desiderio took off his glasses to rub at his eyes; they looked awfully irritated now. Aurelie's expression shifted to one of concern. He looked... Oh. He sat straighter, and there was not so much as a flicker of anything in his field (all around her, always, filling the air between them in a way she did not remember it doing when they were younger). Aurelie froze in place; he settled his glasses back on his nose, and a tear rolled down the side of his face.
He was talking about—about Shadow, Aurelie realized, who had snored and whined a little in his sleep. His paw twitched, then settled. Don't do it, she told herself. Aurelie nodded; Shadow needed a bath, a proper one, and they could do that together. (He was their dog after all, their pup, the first of...) And then other things. Other than cooking and needlework, he was saying. Aurelie could have laughed. She didn't know how else she liked to spend her days, either. Don't do it, Aurelie.
"That sounds like—like a plan. A good one. A good... a good sort of day." She was smiling at him in some twisted, fond way. He was smiling still, too, and it made her heart ache rather terribly. He had done so much to her, and so much for her now in so quick a span. Hurting and helping together. Yet here he was, offering to help around the house, to spend time with her. To bathe the dog with her, to...
To be her friend, in the way she had missed for so very, very long. All she wanted was his company—they didn't have to do anything at all. She could have sat quietly next to him doing nothing, and she knew she would have been happy to do so.
"I don't know what else I like to do," she confessed, voice choked. He had laid his other hand on top of hers, a gentle pressure. She could feel the ring there, if she let herself. With a small pang of guilt, she ignored it. Instead she turned her hand upwards, catching his fingers with her own. She squeezed, gently.
"But we can certainly find something. Whatever... whatever you'd like. I can think of nothing I want more, Des." Her smile didn't feel so sad now. Her heart was still heavy, and her head still tangled—but no more than she had tangled their fingers together. That had to be all right. And if it wasn't?
If it wasn't, then it was too late anyway. She wasn't about to let this go.