I woke to the sound of somebody losing an argument with my kitchen drawer.
For a few seconds, I lay still. The other side of the bed was empty but warm. A line of sunlight had reached the floorboards. My clothes were on a chair where I had not put them carefully, and Nick’s watch lay beside my lamp.
Then something clattered in the kitchen, followed by a very quiet swear.
I smiled into the pillow.
He stood at the counter in yesterday’s trousers, studying a wooden spoon as if it had betrayed him. The kettle was on. He had found two mugs, one of which belonged to the collection I used for paintwater.
“Not that one,” I said.
He turned. “Good morning.”
“It will be, if you don’t drink from the blue mug.”
He looked into it. “I did wonder about the sediment.”
I took it from him and found a clean one. We stood close together in the narrow kitchen. Last night had changed something, but not in the simple way I had expected. I knew what his skin felt like beneath my hands. I still did not know whether he took sugar in tea.
“Milk?”
“A little. No sugar.”
“Useful information.”
“I have more, if required.”
I looked up at him. His hair was flattened on one side and hopeless on the other. Without the jacket and the ready expression he wore in company, he looked younger and more vulnerable.
“What were you looking for?”
“A knife.”
“In the drawer with the wooden spoons?”
“I was working methodically.”
I opened the right drawer. He looked inside, then at the one he had chosen.
“That’s an unreasonable system.”
“It’s knives beside the breadboard.”
“I hadn’t reached the breadboard.”
I laughed. He put his hand at the back of my neck and kissed me, softly, as if we had all the time in the world.
We didn’t. I had a meeting at ten. He had a recording job at nine, a short voice-over for an agricultural supplier that he described as his most convincing work to date.
“You sound very committed to farming.”
“Deeply. Especially when the invoice is paid.”
We ate toast at the little table. He liked marmalade. I hated it, a fact he received with disproportionate concern.
“Not even the good kind?”
“There isn’t a good kind.”
“I see. We should have discussed this earlier.”
I stole a corner of his toast to prove my point and found it less dreadful than expected. I did not tell him that. Some information needed to be earned.
His phone vibrated beside his plate. He glanced at it, then looked more closely.
“Priya?” I asked.
“Helen. Elsa Quinn’s coming to the premiere.”
I set down my mug. “That’s good.”
“Yes.”
He was trying to keep his voice ordinary. I could see the effort in the way he put the phone down carefully rather than reaching at once to answer.
“You can be pleased,” I said.
He looked up, and the pleasure broke through. “I’m very pleased.”
I leaned across the table and kissed him. It was a different kind of kiss from the others, full of liking him and wanting something for him that had nothing to do with me.
When I sat back, he was still smiling.
“I should go,” he said. “Before I tell the farmers all about it.”
He washed his plate while I found the shirt he had left across the bedroom chair. For a moment I watched him at the sink. It was dangerously easy to imagine that this was how mornings could be now. I knew enough to be wary of that ease, but not enough to stop enjoying it.
At the door, he paused.
“May I see you later?”
“You’ll see me at the theater.”
“I meant not in front of Helen.”
“Probably wise.”
He waited, smiling.
“Come for supper,” I said. “I have food that isn’t biscuits.”
“A startling development.”
He kissed me once more and left. I closed the door, stood still for a moment, then went back into the bedroom. His watch was still beside the lamp.
I sent him a photograph of it.
Evidence, I wrote.
His answer came at the bottom of the stairs.
I was hoping for a reason to come back.
I knew it was a line. I also knew he had genuinely forgotten the watch. Both things could be true, and for once I didn’t feel required to choose between them.
At the theater, Mina noticed the change in my face before I’d taken off my coat.
“Ah,” she said.
“Don’t.”
“I said one syllable.”
“It was crowded.”
She smiled and passed me the new measurements. Then she let me work.
The morning was busy. A supplier had sent the wrong trim, Ruth’s skirt needed another half-inch at the waist, and Helen wanted to try a hat that had not existed yesterday. I found myself enjoying the problems. Not because they were distractions, but because they were mine to solve and I was good at them.
At lunch, Nick passed the wardrobe door with a mug in one hand. He looked in, saw me and stopped.
“How are the farmers?” I asked.
“Confident about the season.”
Mina laughed without looking up.
He came closer and touched my shoulder. It was a small gesture, but it happened in the open, without the quick glance around that would have made it feel like a secret.
“See you later?”
“Seven.”
He nodded and went on down the corridor.
Mina waited until his footsteps faded.
“Are we happy?”
I looked at the cloth beneath my hands. “I think so.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
I smiled. “Yes. At the moment.”
“Good.”
She said it simply. I was grateful she didn’t ask me to be certain of more than I was.
That evening, Nick brought a bottle of wine and a jar of marmalade.
“For when you’re ready to improve.”
“Put it somewhere I don’t have to look at it.”
He chose the shelf beside the tea. I left it there.
I made pasta. He chopped onions badly but willingly, and when I tried to take the knife from him, he raised an eyebrow.
“Do you want it done differently, or do you want me to do it?”
I stopped with my hand in the air.
“Both.”
“A difficult commission.”
I let him keep the knife. The onions were uneven. The meal was fine.
Afterward, we sat on the sofa with the windows open. Downstairs, somebody played music quietly enough that we could hear the bass but not the words. Nick stretched his legs out and looked around the room.
“You have a lot of things in progress.”
“That’s the polite description.”
“Do you mind them being unfinished?”
I followed his gaze to the half-covered chair, the sketchbook open on the table, a row of fabric samples pinned above the desk.
“Not usually. Sometimes they need to stay that way until I know what I’m doing.”
“I like it.”
I looked at him. “The mess?”
“The possibility.”
That was nearly too beautiful a thing to say. I might have distrusted it if he hadn’t immediately reached beneath himself and pulled out a tape measure with an expression of mild pain.
“Though this part could be more comfortable.”
I laughed and took it from him.
Later, we talked about what we were doing. Not in a grand, formal way. I asked whether he was seeing anyone else; he said no and asked me the same question with a look that acknowledged the absurdity without making it a joke.
“No,” I said.
“I’d like to keep seeing you.”
“I gathered.”
He smiled, then waited until I stopped hiding behind the answer.
“I’d like that too,” I said.
We didn’t promise more than we could know. We didn’t need to make it less important because it was new. When he drew me against him, I let my head rest beneath his chin and listened to his breathing.
The wedding dress hung beyond the open studio door. For the first time, I thought about moving it because I wanted the space, not because I couldn’t bear to look at it.
“I might sell it,” I said.
Nick followed my gaze.
“The dress?”
“Yes.”
“Would Mrs. Avery help?”
“Probably.”
He nodded and left the thought with me.
I sat up a little. “It feels strange that somebody else could have a good day in it.”
“Does it?”
“A little.” I looked at the white bag. “I think I’d like that.”
Nick touched the back of my hand with one finger. I turned it over and took his hand in mine.
We stayed on the sofa until the room grew dark, talking about small things and sometimes not talking at all.