Chapter Twenty-six
?
This is the part where he cooks for her.
Malcolm
“And now, now you wash your hands again.” At her usual island seat, Azalea—anxiety incarnate—turns her crystal heart over between her fingers and watches me like a frightened, just-hatched, baby hawk.
Conceding to her instructions, since we’re taking things one step at a time and the goal today is just getting her to eat food someone other than her has made, I wash my hands for the twelfth time.
Never mind that I only started cooking for her roughly fifteen minutes ago. Far be it from me to complain.
After all.
I woke with my wife snuggled against my side, her fists in my shirt, and her lashes fluttering with a dream.
Every single day, she grows more perfect and more precious.
And now that the truth is out concerning my villainy, we have reached our perfect beginning.
It’s the one I’ve wanted ever since I saw her for the first time.
“Should we connect our apartments?” she asks as I flip the last pancake into a casserole dish.
“Connect?” I ask.
Her gaze lifts. “It’s a pain to go all the way down and all the way up to get between them, and you’re just right above me, aren’t you?
Since you own the building, it’d be simple to put stairs in, right?
” Her cheeks blister. “Or maybe your place is more than big enough for the both of us, and I should suck it up and consider doing the normal thing and move in with my…husband.”
Precious, tender, sweet little dove. “I think it’s important for us both to have our own space.
I’ll have my assistant look into contractors for the renovations to connect our apartments once it’s no longer the weekend.
” I place the casserole dish of pancakes down in front of her, wash my hands again, then get her a plate.
“That is, of course, assuming my assistant will be able to handle planning renovations on top of her other big project. Do you think she can manage both? You know I’d never want to be cruel. ”
“Are you talking about your brother’s Flag Day wedding?” she asks. “It’s mostly done. There’s just the technicalities of setting up the ballroom closer to June 14th now. Iverson hasn’t asked me to book any plans for their honeymoon yet, though. Is that something I should follow up with him on?”
“He probably already has it covered. I did get an email from him outlining some things he said he wanted a few weeks ago, but they seemed stupid, so I assumed it was a prank and trashed it.”
“Iverson…pranks…people?”
“Sure. All the time. We are related, you know. He needs to possess some mischief somewhere in his body.”
Azalea stares at me as though she can’t seem to picture my outwardly coarse little brother sending me information on how I simply must have Azalea research ball pit options for his wedding ball. The man, like me, is nuts. Just a different type. He’s more…brazil nut. Tough facade. Savory center.
In contrast, I’m a rancid cashew. As a close relative of the poison ivy family, I’m toxic on the outside and still rotten at my core. I’ll give you a rash and indigestion without an ounce of remorse.
Setting the matter of my brother’s sense of humor aside, Azalea begins dissecting her first pancake, inspecting each square inch, analyzing every grain.
“May I disrobe now?” I ask, lifting my hands like a surgeon.
Beet-red, Azalea’s head launches up, wide eyes pinning on me—then on the collection of hair nets she told me to wear. “Oh,” she breathes. “Yes. Sorry. Do it…away from the food, though.”
I sanction myself on the complete opposite side of the kitchen to pull the nets off my face and head, then I call across the bleached space, “What did you think I meant by disrobe?”
“Obviously, the definition of the word.”
And here I thought I made my position on risque conduct ever so clear last night.
Careful not to startle her, I slip into my seat, heating through when she lifts a dainty bite of pancake to her mouth. Her poor sweet lips tremble, but she squeezes her eyes shut, stuffs the morsel in, and struggles.
I say, “Do you desire me, dove?”
Every thought of what’s in her mouth vanishes into thin air, and she swallows before she can realize she has. “What?”
I serve myself a stack of pancakes, dress them in syrup and vegan butter, then cut in.
“I’m just curious. What with you thinking of racy literal definitions and all, instead of my innocent—yet more obscure—intentions.
” Eyeing her, I lift a forkful to my mouth.
“It’s just…well…if you desire me, that changes the curriculum a small bit, doesn’t it?
” I nod at her food as I bite into mine.
Distracted, she cuts a notably larger piece, and it reaches more-stable lips. “I don’t…” Her eyes lower. “…know what that’s like. I’m scared to find out how it might hit me.”
“Nothing to be scared of. We’re married.”
“Right. But.” Her free hand lands on her stomach. “I don’t think I’d survive any…surprises.”
Ah.
I ask, “Do you want kids?”
Immediately, her head shakes.
“I don’t mean the process, I mean the children. Do you want to raise children?”
“No, absolutely not. They’re…so…” She shudders.
“Sticky?”
Vehement, she nods.
“This might be a hard question to approach right now, but if you weren’t bothered by that sort of thing, would you want kids?”
“I really don’t think so.”
I nod. “Okay. If that decision persists for long enough, I’ll take steps toward making sure surprises aren’t possible.”
She stares at me. “What…are you saying?”
“Permanent birth control.”
“For…me?” she asks.
Sweet dove. “No.”
Baffled, she lifts a finger and points it at my chest. “For…you?”
I cut another bite for myself and prompt her toward one as well when I say, “Yes.”
“You’d…do that for me?”
“In a heartbeat.”
Scarlet, she picks her way through half her pancake, then her mouth opens, and closes, with nothing entering it.
“Yes, dove?” I ask.
“Do you want kids?”
I laugh. “No. No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. For the sake of keeping whatever went wrong in my brain a singular sort of problem, I don’t think it’s wise for me to procreate.”
Her shoulders loosen, and my adorable wife says, “Yeah, that’s for the best.”
I love how we can be brutally honest with each other. No holds barred. It’s surprisingly refreshing to have the woman I love, who I know loves me, say, Yeah, you really shouldn’t reproduce.
Raising my fork, I say, “Best of luck to Ivy.”
Azalea smiles and lifts hers as well. “May he continue the family name well.”
I get up to get some orange juice, delighted when Azalea asks for a glass, too, even though I’ve eschewed my hairnets. As I place the cup in front of her, I say, “Wouldn’t it be awful if the strain of insanity came through our parents and pass into his kids, though?”
Her nose wrinkles. “Yes.”
“Prayers for his wife, whatever her name is.”
“Maple,” Azalea says, and that does sound a bit familiar. “Her name is Maple. It was on the invitations. You don’t know the name of the woman your brother is marrying?”
“I kind of keep forgetting it. I know her brother’s name is Birch.
He makes me pizzas.” Puffing a breath, I rest my hip against the counter and sip my juice.
“It’s really bad, actually. Since the four of us grew up together, you’d think I’d be able to remember.
I’ve just known for a while that she’s Ivy’s, so I’ve always just said, oh yeah, that one.
Ivy’s, and cut off all further thought, because—really—what does Ivy’s girl have to do with me? ”
Azalea considers me deeply, then she also cuts off all further thought on the matter. In favor of dropping a bomb. Right on my head. “I think I do desire you, crow.”
I cough into my juice and lower the glass. “Really? What…part of our conversation over the past ten minutes enlightened you to that fact?”
“I was only partially paying attention to your ramble while I was thinking about dating sims, and I’ve realized that if I don’t think about the realistic details, I might want a full-color image of us with our bodies too close to remain innocent for long once our lips brush…”
My incredibly innocent heart trips on the mere idea. “Well.”
“So,” she continues, relentless, “if you could change the curriculum to include that interest, I’d appreciate it.
Maybe go slower with those sorts of things than we have been with everything else, though.
” She pushes her hair back, leans forward, and takes one of the last bites of her pancake.
“I’d like to ease into the idea more gently. ”
Well. This is…unprecedented.
I’d fully mentally prepared to remain chaste for the rest of my days.
Now, I need to pretend that when I mentioned a curriculum, I wasn’t baselessly flirting to get her mind off every step involved in eating her food.
It’s a bit fast to begin booking a surgery, even if I imagine the recovery time won’t be quick, either.
How exactly do I handle this new information when it feels like my heart is going to explode?
Azalea glances at me and freezes. “Is…everything all right?”
I tip my chin forward, back, forward again. “Yes. I’m just unprepared.”
“Unprepared?”
“I’d completely committed to an idea that you’d never be ready or never want me like that.
I’m not sure if I’m ecstatic or grateful or hopeful or…
worried.” Blinking, I snap myself back into the moment, shove whatever’s going on in my body firmly out of mind, and cover my mouth with my hand.
“We’ll have to practice not just more intimate touch, but also communication.
If we’re going to embrace romantic physical closeness, I’ll need to know every thought in your head throughout the process. ”
Her lashes beat against her apple-red cheeks.
“The objective would be to make every moment bliss for you. I’ll need information to ascertain exactly what you crave and how I can fulfill those cravings.
This is a sensitive topic, so there’s no room for error.
” I drop my arm. “Should we play more of your dating sims? Perhaps we can mimic a few of your favorite romantic gestures in them as practice?”
Azalea shifts in her seat, folding her hands together in her lap. Gazing at me, her eyes wide and shining, she says, “That wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
I watch her, then I melt. “Darling dove, are you very in love with me right now?”
“Yes. Incredibly so.”
“How about you have another pancake for me, then?”
She doesn’t protest as she serves herself.
I smile, relieved and grateful and so—unequivocally—in love.
“For the moment, I think we’ll get used to sharing a bed.
Once you’re comfortable with proximity in any context, we’ll introduce various kisses, lips excluded.
After that’s effortless, we’ll bring mouth-to-mouth into the picture, following with teeth… and tongue.”
She tenses.
“We won’t go beyond that until other matters are addressed and settled.” Leaning forward, I set my glass down and tilt her chin up—in my bare hand. “Tell me your thoughts.”
“Yuck,” she says.
I laugh. “Sorry. Maybe I should have censored the later modules for now. It’s never too late to change your mind before we get to them, though.”
“You are a confounding man, Malcolm.”
“Is that a compliment?”
Her eyes do not suggest that it’s a compliment, but she’s not nearly as fed up with me as she has been previously. “After breakfast, can we start researching possibilities?” she asks.
“May we play dating sims all day, you mean?”
She smiles.
“Of course, dove. I’d like nothing more.”