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I beam proudly at my little pantry. "I like to eat well. No better place for ingredients than the markets here. I'm a much better cook now."
"You weren't too bad before. Bread decorator, however..." he teases. "It looks like you enough here to last you through a, er, long winter,” he says, wistfully.
"Ora really hungry weekend," I giggle.
He clears his throat. "Or, um, a birthday party?"
"Hmmm?"
"It's my birthday on Saturday."
Oh my god.
"Oh...you're turning..."
"Five hundred and four months."
He gets a smile for remembering. "The lucky forty-two."
"Forty-two is lucky?"
"Well, it will be for Baxter Enterprises, now that you'll finally be CEO."
He doesn't say anything and just reaches for a bag of the truffle and saffron infused pasta on the top shelf, inspecting the artisan packaging, fingers tracing the hand written ingredients list.
"Would you make me this for my birthday dinner, please?" he asks, still turning it over in his hands, not looking at me. "Show off your new culinary skills."
"Don't you have some big giant bash planned? Your jubilee?"
He shakes his head. "That's Baxter's birthday, not mine. So, will you?” He lets out a nervous chuckle. “That is, if you don't have plans for that night."
"Of course. If that’s what you want."
His eyes soften, cheeks flushing a little. "Don't do anything special. Just this pasta is perfect. We can go to the farmer's market in the morning and find some veggies for a salad? If... you're not doing anything else."
"I'm not. But... shouldn't you be celebrating with your family?"
He puts the pasta back on the shelf and walks to the door. His hand on the handle, he turns back before leaving just to say, "I will be."
He doesn't stay long the next day, and we barely talk.
He splits some more wood for me, builds my fire and joins me for a slice of toast and cup of tea.
When I grab my coat, ready for the walk to the market, the cobblestones start to darken from the spatter of gentle rain, and he takes my coat from me, and hangs it back on the rack.
"Not today."
We stand on the deck under shelter, watching the rain, and the gentle gray sky blend in with the lake, painting a melancholictableau that mirrors the dull ache that always blooms in my chest when he leaves for the day.
But the whisper of wind overnight blows the clouds away, and when I greet him on my doorstep early the next morning, the sky and water have returned to the color of his eyes.
He comes inside with a smile, grabbing my market totes from the coat rack and shoulders them.
"Happy Birthmorning, Kingsley." Then I press a soft kiss to his cheek, realizing that it’s only the second time I’ve said his name since he appeared in Annecy seemingly out of nowhere a few days ago. Maybe I’m scared if I saw his name, he’ll disappear. But still shapes itself as perfectly in my mouth as it always did, since that very first time at the diner that night.
His hand brushes the small of my back, as he lingers on the closeness, and then stands back straight.
"Thank you, Luna. Ready to market?"
