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“Hmm,” she said, chewing her lower lip as she looked at what was in there. “We can make hot sandwiches. Jeremy got us a lot of roast beef and roasted turkey slices with swiss cheese. So we could even do open faced sandwiches. Or…” She nodded to the freezer. “He got us a bunch of appetizers we could throw in the oven to cook.”
“Sure, but what do you want?” I raised my eyebrows.
Lips pursed, she shifted her weight from foot to foot. “Breakfast for dinner?”
“Bacon, eggs?” I guessed.
“Fried potatoes too?”
Well… “With you telling me what to do? What could go wrong?”
Remind me toneverask that question again. The eggs were about the only thing that came out right and easy. She promised scrambled eggs, which we could add cheese to after, would not be remotely hard.
But they were also the last thing I made. Cutting up the potatoes was easy, and Frankie gave me very specific instructions on the size of the cuts. The fact that she started punking me about five minutes into that process made it all the sweeter. Anything not cut correctly I had to redo.
Totally fine. I’d do my penance.
I got the oil heating, and then once it was sizzling, in the potatoes went. When she had to keep shifting to get out of my way, I paused to wipe off my hands, and then picked her up and set her on the opposite counter. It was the first time in a while that I’d had my hands on her for more than just a quick hug or to hand her something.
Her swift intake pulled my attention to her lips, both of which gleamed as she licked them.
“Just creating a safer workspace,” I assured her, though it took me a minute to convince my hands to slide down to her legs and then off. “Need to do the bacon now.”
Maybe that was why I nearly burnt the bacon and set off the smoke alarms because I forgot to turn on the extractor, and the cats lost their minds racing away from the noise.
The potatoes were a little too crispy in the process, too. Also, oil spatter burns suck.
But the smile on Frankie’s face and her laughter?
Worth every aching inch.
It was raining again when I opened up the backdoor to get the smoke out. Frankie still had a hand over her mouth, laughing, as I waved the door. “Well,” I told her, having to say it louder over the alarms. “Now I know how hard it is.”
That just made her laugh harder.
When we finally sat down to eat though, she ate every piece of the bacon. Even the blackened bits, and her smile as she crunched the potatoes helped, but seriously, I just enjoyed the bubble of tension bursting.
She nudged me with her toes. “Okay,” she said after she ate the last bite of eggs. “You did good. But I think we aim a little lower next time.”
I frowned. “How much lower?”
“Hmm…sausage and waffles?”
I snorted.
“Hey, I’ll have you know waffles are easy with a waffle iron.”
“Good to know.”
She hung out while I cleaned up, and then we retreated back to the living room, and I helped her get settled into place with her book and then went to get my guitar out.
“Do you mind if I play?”
“I never mind if you play,” she reminded me. That was true. She never had. She’d always been the one to encourage me. “But…I haven’t listened to that song you recorded for me yet.”
Well, that was a bit of a knee to the balls, but I nodded. “When you’re ready,” I said. “I meant it. No pressure.”
“It’s not about being ready…or maybe it is.” She ran her finger over the words on the page, mouth twisting as though she was working through her thoughts.
