Chapter 12
twelve
. . .
Lucas
Kate has accepted my offer of help, but it feels reluctant. I’m not sure if my presence makes her uncomfortable, or if she’s uncomfortable because of her reaction last night.
I want to ask her about it. I wait until we’ve worked together for a while, chatting about the food we cooked and the recipes we used, and even sharing a few almost-secrets of the trade.
She changes into an apron that says, cooking is love made edible , and I like that one. It’s not funny, exactly, but it’s true. Maybe I have a little bit of trouble with romance and telling people how I feel in a way that doesn’t make them run out the door. But cooking is my love language. It’s how I show people I love them and how I spoil them. It’s…how I tried to bridge the gap between Kate and me. I like cooking for her. Not necessarily for her to eat, but for her business. It’s…how I show love.
I wonder if she’s figured that out. Surely not. It’s just one more apron in a long line of them. I take my first apron off, and the second one says, may the forks be with you .
She scrunches up her nose as soon as she sees it.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks, looking in confusion at the saying one more time, as though she might have not seen it correctly.
“You know, Star Wars . May the force be with you?” I say, but no understanding dawns across her face. And I get a bit of a sinking feeling in my stomach. “Don’t tell me you’ve never seen Star Wars ?”
“Okay. I won’t,” she says, sounding a little uncertain, but there is that grin that always seems to take over, no matter how bad things get.
“I’m going to have to fix this huge gap in your social education.”
“That I haven’t seen Star Wars ?” she asks, sounding surprised. “I didn’t realize that was a requirement of being a US citizen.”
“It is. I’m not sure where you missed that in high school civics, but it is imperative that you watch it at least once in your lifetime, preferably twenty times. And thirty would be even better.”
“Who has time to watch a movie thirty times?” she asks, and then she frowns. “It is a movie?”
“Wow. You need me. I had no idea how badly until this conversation.”
She laughs as I had intended, and it makes my heart smile to hear that sound.
She puts the last pan into the dishwater, and it’s time for me to ask the thing I’ve been waiting to ask her all day.
“Why did you run away from me last night?”
I hold my breath. We agreed to meet at the church at midnight tonight, but there’s really no point in meeting if she ran away because she’s uncomfortable with me because I was being too pushy.
“I guess I was a little scared.”
That doesn’t tell me anything, and I want her to elaborate. I give her a little bit of time, without saying anything, but she doesn’t.
“In a bad way?” I ask. “Am I really scary?”
“No. You’re not the slightest bit scary, but I suppose… It was just new. The idea of thinking about you as anything other than a rival. I know that we had been talking a lot during the day, but I was still adjusting. I appreciate what you did, and I was trying to reconcile all that in my mind. I just was trying to get my head wrapped around you.”
“Have you now?” I ask, knowing I’m pushing, and I should just back off. I say as much. “Sorry. Just take your time. Think about it all you want to. We have the rest of our lives.”
“I would never expect someone to wait on me for the rest of their life, just to figure out whether or not I have feelings for him.”
“All right,” I say, wondering if that means she’s going to tell me now.
“Would you like to walk around the festivals some?” she asks as she hands me the last dish and lets the dirty water out.
“Sure,” I say, disappointed because she changed the subject but encouraged because she wants to spend time with me. I’m not going to turn it down, as much as I wish that she was telling me that she feels the same way about me that I feel about her. Of course, I didn’t exactly declare my feelings. But I want to. I want to see if we can be more than partners in the kitchen. I want to be partners…in life.
Yeah, definitely that’s too fast.
“I am going to change my clothes, and then I’ll be ready,” she says, tossing her rag over top of the spigot and glancing around the kitchen to make sure that everything is in its place.
“Same. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes?” I ask, encouraged that she is willing to walk around with me. I need to focus on what I have, or I will be upset about what I don’t have, and I would rather be happy. If she ends up wanting me, I’m good with that, but if she doesn’t…will I go back to having a crush on her, dealing with unrequited love, and admiring her from a distance? Eventually see her marry someone else?
The idea makes my stomach feel like a bottomless pit, and I stop thinking along those lines. I’m not going to look any further than having a good time with her today. It’s something I’ve looked forward to and wanted for years, and I’m not going to pass up the opportunity now that it’s here. But if she decides she wants more, I won’t turn it down.