“Ha ha, thanks.”
“You want some tea?”
“You have tea?”
“I have tea. I like to drink it when I’m writing at night—somehow, coffee after dark just doesn’t seem right. Or maybe another martini?”
“Tea sounds great.”
He went to the kitchen, and she sat on the sofa and took in the space. Its most striking feature was the huge wall of bookcases she’d been admiring, the wall opposite the windows that looked out over the river and the skyline. It was nearly dusk, but the residue of the sunset endured. She could see why he’d bought this place.
“Milk or sugar in your tea?” he called.
“Neither, thanks.”
She shifted so her back was against an armrest and allowed herself to stretch her legs out along the length of the sofa, because it was clear that Jack’s reading spot was a nearby armchair. On a table next to it was the book he’d set there but also a newspaper folded open to the crossword, a pair of reading glasses, and a notebook and pen. A hoodie was slung over one arm. She smiled as she arranged one of the blankets over her legs. The whole tableau was very grumpy novelist and exactly where she would have imagined him before she knew him.
When he emerged with two mugs of tea, he set one on the floor on the opposite side of the sofa from Blair, then dragged the coffee table so it was within arm’s reach of her and placed the other mug on it. “Black tea for the lady.”
He did not retreat to his grandpa chair but sat on the other side of the sofa with his back to the armrest on the far side, in a mirror image of her. She started to pull her legs up.
“No, no, stay where you are.”
He picked up his book.
He hadn’t extended his legs; he was sitting with his knees bent and the soles of his feet on the cushion. But if she moved her own feet a few inches, they would touch his. Was she just supposed to sithere and read now, with him inches from her? She pulled her legs partway back to where they’d been. She rearranged the blanket over her bent knees like a tent and picked up her book.
She only read a few pages before she started to feel his feet. Not really. They weren’t touching her, but she could kind of… sense them. Feel into his space. As if his feet were giving off heat. They probably were—he always ran so hot.
Her feet, of course, were freezing. Her mind jumped back to the few occasions in LA when Jack had warmed her hands. She thought of those times with fondness.
Also with lust.
That part was new. She had been dead inside in that regard for so long, first because of her stagnant marriage, then because when a person was busy trying to survive existential storms, it didn’t leave much space for an erotic imagination.
That last night, though, in her kitchen. Her knickers got into a knot when she thought about that. It was as if he had pushed her off a cliff. In more ways than one: the mind-shattering orgasm, of course, but also what he’d said about her being at a precipice.
She thought about the concept of a precipice. About standing on the edge of something new and contemplating jumping.
Did it always have to be a jump, though? A great big upheaval? Could a person effect change with a smaller, more measured move?
She inched her toes forward a tiny bit.
She waited. The world did not end. So she inched forward again and made contact with the side of his foot. It was as toasty as she’d imagined.
He glanced up from his book. What was shedoing? She started to reverse course, but he grabbed her foot with one hand. They embarked on a staring contest. She wasn’t sure why, or what any of it meant. He kept her gaze as he encouraged her leg to straighten. She let it happen. He scooched around, reaching for her second legand straightening his, arranging them so their legs were intertwined. Apparently satisfied with his handiwork, he returned to his book.
Well. What could she do but return to hers?
It was very… cozy.
No, that was a lie. It would have looked cozy from the outside: two people reading on a sofa together. In actuality, it was possibly the most erotic thing that had ever happened to her.
She read a paragraph. Then, realizing she had no idea what she’d just read, started over.
“Everything OK over there?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
