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“Of course,” she said, shaking her head in disbelief. “You can’t leave a baby home alone.”
“Terrans,” he said to himself.
“The population of Terra-58 has a higher marriage success rate than Maltaffia,” she heard herself say coldly.
“I… didn’t know that,” he admitted.
“Our ways may seem strange to you,” she said. “But they have allowed our planet to thrive where other Terran planets have struggled.”
“I believe you,” he said, sounding impressed.
“Not to say that our culture is better than others,” she said quickly. “I just… sometimes other beings assume that Terrans are backwards.”
“That’s true,” he said, his expression a little guilty. “Your people are an easy target since you came so late to space exploration.”
“Well, we laugh at ourselves plenty, so we can take it,” Olivia teased.
“You do laugh at yourselves,” Stark said thoughtfully. “It’s oddly endearing.”
His face was so handsome in the flickering candlelightand the expression in his eyes so compelling that Olivia lost herself for a moment.
“Now, how do I eat this?” he asked, looking down at his plate.
“That’s the tricky part,” she laughed. “Take your fork like this, and twirl it around.”
He watched her swirl a bite on her fork and eat it.
“Mmm,” she moaned.
His eyes ignited with interest and she realized her sound might have other implications.
“It’s really good,” she told him quickly. “You try some.”
He stabbed and turned with his fork, but kept catching more and more strands until the giant ball of spaghetti on the end of his fork was an unwieldy mess.
“Wait,” she laughed. “Wait, wait, wait…”
“This is impossible,” he huffed.
“No, just, start over again,” she told him. “And pull the fork away when you have as much as you want to wind up. You can use a spoon too, on the end of the fork if it helps, like this.”
She demonstrated, blown away a second time at how delicious the spaghetti was. Oberon had clearly done his homework when it came to recreating the cuisine of the various planets.
Stark tried the twirl again, but the result was the same. And the frustrated expression on his handsome face was priceless.
Olivia struggled not to laugh.
“Is this a joke?” he asked her. “Shouldn’t I just cut it into pieces?”
“Sure,” she said. “If you want to look like a baby.”
He glowered at her and tried again.
“Do you want me to help you?” she asked him after a moment.
“You want to feed me?” he asked.
As soon as the idea entered her mind, she had to do it.
