She looked up at him when he asked. Aware even more acutely of how close they were standing, of the way his
presence surrounded and mingled with her own. Of the way she was almost in his arms and yet not. Almost touching
and yet not. She couldn't have backed away from him because of the ice box behind her and found that a strangely
protected feeling. And he was looking down at her with his dark, dark eyes, strong hands full of torch and eggs,
making a joke, and she'd been quiet too long.
She felt as if her heart were being squeezed in her chest.
"I don't think MacDonald's cheeseburgers count as cows." She managed the soft tease and a quiet smile. Reached up
helplessly and almost, almost touched his chest before she stopped herself. Too soon. It was too soon for her to be
wanting things from him. It wasn't fair to him and it wasn't right and - her hand shifted, palm up. "Da always said cows
weren't enough." She raised her eyes back to his and gave him a fleeting smile. "He said I would cost a man his whole
heart. For the rest of time." And because that was too serious and he needed a way out, she added with another
flickering smile: "He is my Da after all."
Hector nodded. "He sounds like a good dad." He said, and took the out before she ran away. She almost looked like
she was going to as he hopped on the counter behind him and put the flashlight down, juggling the eggs with both
hands. "You've heard all about my illustrious grandparents. All I know is your dad preaches and your mom teaches."
He said, quoting her. "And Cary Grant. So fill in some blanks for me." If he could keep her talking, he had the feeling
he could keep her there. The thought of her just turning around and walking out formed a knot he couldn't quite
explain away with unfamiliar surroundings deep in the pit of his stomach.
Safer. Much safer, she thought, able to breathe again. Focusing herself on his question with a slight jerk of her chin
and lowering eyebrows.
She didn't talk about her family. She could give, and had as a fund raiser, talks about her time in Zaire and what kind
of work they did there. And she'd had to explain often enough in school why her parents had chosen to live in Africa in
a cinder block house without electricity instead of in a comfortable town house in London like everyone else's parents.
But that wasn't talking about her family. That was throwing out what people wanted to hear so they'd stop looking at
her and asking. She took cheese out of the ice box and closed it with a hip absently, so the only light came now from
the torch he'd propped up on the counter.
"Da is," she paused to order her thoughts. What was important to her. What she wanted to tell him because she
wanted him to know her family the way she did and not the way strangers were allowed to. "Da is huge." She gestured
up for height and outward for shoulders. "He grew up in Sheffield. Its an industry town and the work's hard. He did
welding in the family business. And ran around and got into trouble and drank too much. Boy stuff." She shrugged,
moving efficiently about the work as she found a couple frying pans and set them on the stove next to him. Liking the
feel of Hector nearby. She gave him a smile. "Mum grew up in several country houses scattered throughout England
and France. Her parents," she shook her head, adding a bit of oil to one of the pans before adding the potato cubes,
"Da calls them nobs." She chuckled. "They call him a yob though so its fair." She took the eggs, one at a time, from
his hands and cracked them expertly over the second pan. "Da and a couple of his friends were in an auto accident.
Messed them up pretty bad and killed one of them. A minister visited him while he was in the hospital afterward and
Da said it was like someone turning on a light after you'd been living in the dark all your life. Said he didn't like what he
saw. Right about that time they were having problems in Zaire and Da just couldn't seem to get his hands on enough
information about that country. Said it was like always being hungry. After he got released from the hospital, things
just weren't the same for him. Said he couldn't be content living the way he had before. And he still couldn't stop
digging up things on Zaire. Finally his minister got in touch with a team that went over to help dig wells and build
houses for a month or two at a time and Da went with them. After that, he'd work until he had enough money and then
go over again. Finally he found a church that would support him and he just stayed. He hasn't got a lot of training but
when he talks to people about God he doesn't do it with high, fancy words or abstract concepts. Mum says he's like
Peter. Rough and down to earth and when he talks about God its because he expects God to be working right next to
him, whether its finding money to send his only daughter to university or helping villagers haul a floundering cow out
of a mud hole." She gave a soft laugh then. Realizing how much she'd been rambling. Realizing she couldn't
remember the last person she'd shared that story with. "Sorry." She gave him a smile. "I'm not used to talking about
my family. Guess I got carried away."
He listened with rapt attention, as if his very body were absorbing the details like a sponge would water, instead of just
his mind, giving her his full attention and smiling softly after it.
"Yeah, I was right. He is a good dad." He said and watched her make the eggs...looked like a frittata she was making,
or it could be just the addition of the potatoes that made him think so. He looked down at his hands in the dim light
before speaking. "A lot better than mine. Remember when I said my mother died when I was five?" She nodded briefly.
"She died in a car accident. Drunk driver. Makes for a nice infomercial I guess, except my dad was the driver. He really
hasn't changed, except most people don't let him drive anymore. More cause they're afraid for the mail boxes than
anything else. History fades from people's minds I guess until its repeated. My first memory of him is me waiting up for
him to come from work, he works in a factory. Course he didn't come home until after the bars closed. He walked in,
didn't even see me, just teeter tottered on off to his chair, where he passed out for the night until it was time to get up
and go to work again. He hates that I'm in the army, he was a draft dodger back in Vietnam. But I hate his drinking, so
I guess it’s a fair trade, right?"
He took to playing with a plastic bag, folding it into nice neat precise squares as he talked. "Once everyone got over
the accident, calling it a tragic accident no one could have predicted, seemed they all forgot everyone knew it was
coming eventually, he became the tragic figure, raising two kids, me and my sister, all alone, wife lost tragically. And
Vanessa, the step mother, became a saint for taking on all that responsibility, plus she then had four kids of her own
with my father." He chuckled, without humor after that and shrugged, looking at her. "Whole lot easier to say stuff in
the middle of the night in the dark, ain't it?"
It was almost funny how wide and yet small the difference between their fathers really was, she thought, leaving the
food to its own devices for the moment as she shifted over to slip the plastic from him and cradle his larger hands in
her own slim ones.
"Things don't have sharp edges at night." She murmured, looking up at his face. Wanting to memorize how he looked,
right now.
There was so much hurt, so many wounds. He had every right to be crippled or stunted or broken inside. Every right
to be poisoned with bitterness and anger in his soul. And yet she didn't see it. There was anger and bitterness and
betrayal but it hadn't poisoned him. Hurt him. But not crippled him. There was a difference. She moved her thumbs
over the inside of his palms. Soothing. Starting to understand some of the puzzle pieces of him. Wanting to
understand more.
"That's why you worry about your little brother. The one in university." She met his eyes. "You'd worry anyway. But
you worry about what's influencing him from his past that might be trying to pass itself to the next generation."
"He forgot to come to my high school graduation. Don't know rightly now someone forgets, but he did. Said he lost
track of time. So after the graduation when we were all congratulating each other, the recruiters were making their
rounds. Normally I probably would have ignored him, said no thanks buddy, and maybe ended up at the same factory
as him, or maybe in college, who knows? But I was so pissed. And knew his feelings on it. So I joined up. Didn't even
tell him until the day I left for basic." He looked at her. "Pretty damn stupid reason to join the Army, isn't it? I have no
idea why I'm telling you this," he confessed.
She stepped forward. So that his knees were on either side of her and she could cup his cheek with one of her hands.
Gently smoothing the pad of her thumb across his cheekbone as she watched his face, her own eyes soft.
A mother lost to death. A father lost to drink. A fractioned family and grandparents that tried their hardest to give
some semblance of order. And Hector...
Her fingers slid back, curled in the dark hair at the back of his neck and gently drew his face down so that she could
rest her forehead against his.
"You tell me for the same reasons I need to tell you all the things I hide in my heart." She murmured softly. Smiled
wistfully with a touch of sadness. "And I'm glad you didn't end up at that factory." She whispered.
He sighed a bit and lifted his free hand to the back of her neck, stroking the long soft hair he found there. "Me too."
He said, corners of his mouth quirking in a quick, brief grin. Then he smelled something...not quite so pleasant. And
knew it wasn't her (he liked the soft floral scent her hair and pillow carried....)
"Think something's burning?" He suggested, knowing one of them would have to move before they burned the kitchen
down, but he was on the counter, so it would probably be her.
She made a noise, rolling her eyes at herself as she pulled away from him and moved quickly into damage control.
The eggs were easy to save but she wrinkled her nose at the potatoes. Mostly because they'd forced her out of a
very comfortable position with Hector. She was too easily distracted when cooking to not be good at salvage. Though
it was usually books or reports that made her lose track of time. Not the way someone's hands felt in her hair.
"Should have turned the heat down first." She muttered, doing so now as she saved what she could and shifted the
rest to the side. Lips twisting she slide him a look from the corners of her eyes. "Shouldn't have let myself get
distracted either." She chided him, dark eyes dancing. "You did mention that part of your family was from Louisiana,
yeah? Does that included 'blackened' food?"
Hector had to chuckle at that as he leaned his head against one of the cabinets when she moved away to tend to the
food. "Just add tabasco sauce. Covers a multitude of culinary sins, trust me." He said with another chuckle as she
turned around the potatoes to check out just how bad off they were.
"Blackened is spice. If you can't handle tabasco, there's no way you can handle that." He said, tossing her a smile
from his perch on the counter. "Guaranteed to clear the sinuses if not burn a hole in your GI tract."
She slipped him another look from the edges of her eyes while she added the rest of the ingredients she'd procured
to the eggs. Thinking that the day, and everything in it, tonight included, might finally be catching up with him. Gentle
she reached out and slipped the backs of her fingers down his cheek, giving him a soft smile when he looked at her.
Then she went back to work, turning the omelets and shifting the potatoes that hadn't burned to keep them that way.
"I would complain about your American eating habits." She commented. Offering a mild conversation topic. "But I
believe English ones are just as bad. I was truly horrified the first time my grandda introduced me to blood pudding."
He had to make a face at that. "Blood pudding? That alone sounds disgusting. I don't even want to know what it smells
like, let alone tastes like." He said, feeling he had just found one of the few things he wouldn't touch. Sounded like it
rated right up there with sushi!
"And this grandfather of yours loved you? And still made you eat something called blood pudding? And I thought my
family was weird!"
She chuckled at that, reaching around him to the cabinet next to his head to get down plates.
"Grandda thought I was the world's last princess." She smiled. "He would have given me anything I asked for, even if
he had to beggar himself to afford it. I always stayed with him for Christmas holiday from school because we couldn't
afford to fly me home. One year he decided that my taste was far too foreign and I needed to appreciate some truly
English food." She shut down the burners. "He must have spent all night and a day in that tiny kitchen, pouring over
recipe books he'd borrowed from everyone else in the building's flats." She was laughing as she remembered. "I was
banished to the living room and the black and white telly, of course, so as not to spoil the surprise. It was - truly - " she
paused, searched for the right word. "Impressive when he finally brought out the fruit of his labors. That," she added,
filling his plate before she handed it to him with a fork, "is why I never disagree when Suzette claims all English are
barbarians. And it was also the reason I started cooking us Christmas dinner forever after." She took two bottles of
juice from the icebox and then joined him on the counter with her own plate.
"Sometimes he'd distract me too." She confided. "We got very good at saving burned food."
He laughed at that last part as he accepted the bottle of juice, balancing it between his knees while he held the plate
and the fork. He took a bite. "Consider it salvaged. Course, I'm a single guy who's used to eating either rations or in a
military mess hall, so not sure how much my opinion counts. Usually if it’s the right color that's enough to make me
happy." He said, twisting the top off his juice and taking a drink of it.
"But I do have to say, this has to be the best midnight snack I've had in a while, even if I had to get cathartic to earn it."
"I should have made something with a longer simmer time" She agreed. Shifting so her leg could rest against the side
of his without interfering with either one of their eating arms. "Though if I'd known you were so easy to please I would
have made due with soup out of a can instead." Willing to keep things light while they ate, she thought a minute and
than asked:
"So tell me - why do red socks 'suck'?"
"Red Sox. S-O-X. It's a baseball team. And if you’re a Yankees fan, I know, funny name for a Southerner to like, you
hate them. Has something to do with a trade of a player in 1918. Yeah, we really do hold grudges that long. At least in
sports. I don't know, seems to make it more fun. As long as your team is winning. Which...unfortunately...they don't
always. Was glad my grandfather was dead already when the Red Sox won the series recently. That would have killed
him without a doubt!" He had to chuckle again at his explanation of a particularly weird view point on his family. But he
liked sitting here with her on the counter, barely touching, eating. Not having to measure words and make quick
decisions about what to say and what not to reveal for once.
"Mm." She made the familiar noise while she ate. Thinking. "So I'm 'talking smack' when I call you a Yankee yet it’s a
good thing to be a Yankee but only if you play baseball. Unless someone is trading you a hundred years ago. In which
case people will take umbrage and Red's Ox is a bad thing." She intentionally waited until he was drinking to throw in
her misappropriation of the team's name and than looked over at him innocently. "And all this time I thought your
grandparents were simply giving you fashion pointers."
He had to laugh at her wacky summarization of American life as it pertains to sports. "That's actually pretty close." He
said and looked at her. "You know, you should come see the US. Sounds like you've been tons of places, but not the
great big country smack dab between Europe and Asia." Which, if you were turning a globe, the US and the rest of the
Americas would seem that way.
Her stomach knotted oddly. Not at the thought of going somewhere new. But at who was so casually making the offer.
And by how much she wanted to read into it and knew she shouldn't. She met his eyes and managed a quick smile.
"I've never been to the States." She stated. Wanting... more than she should. "I've never had a reason to before." She
caught herself, looking down and than back up with a smile. "But I think I would like to. It sounds like something I would
enjoy."
"It’s a great place, no matter what all the foreigners say." He said with a chuckle as he studied her face. "Any time you
got the time and inclination, just let me know. Have a house down there I don't get to as much as I'd like."