make things better, not worse.
Her inner sanctum was as he had known it would be, and it made him feel big and clumsy and menacingly masculine. There were ceramic vases on the floor, where they could easily be toppled by a wayward size-eleven foot. There was a huge clear-glass bowl with real flowers floating in it right on the coffee table in front of her television. One too-enthusiastic cheer for a touchdown and it would be goodbye flowers. And bowl. Probably coffee table, too, flimsy-looking thing on skinny, intricate legs.
Beth’s was clearly a world for one: everything in its place, and everything tidy. Despite the fact the breakability factor made him somewhat nervous, there was nothing sterile or uptight about her home. Her space was warmed by tossed cushions and throw rugs, the walls were bright with beautifully framed artwork from her students.
She cast a look at her white slip-covered sofa, decided against it—whether because pizza and white didn’t go together, or because it looked too small to hold two people who were going to behave themselves, he wasn’t quite sure.
He did notice on the way through that this house was loved: hardwood reclaimed, moldings painted, windows shining. She led him through to the kitchen. It still smelled of the cookies she had baked that afternoon.
“What were you doing?” he asked, when she hurried over to the stove and shut off the burner.
“Making soup and doing a crossword puzzle. The soup couldn’t compete with the pizza.”
He stopped himself from asking how he compared to the crossword puzzle. It was still out, on a teeny kitchen table that could barely accommodate one, though there were two fragile chairs at it, with skinny, intricate legs that matched those on her coffee table. There were fresh flowers on that table, as well, and he was willing to bet she had bought them for herself.
The tinyness of the table, the crossword puzzle and the flowers were all stern reminders to him to behave.
She had a life she liked. She was the rarest of things. A person content with her own company and her own life.
“I’ll help you with the puzzle,” he decided, and took a careful seat. Did the chair groan under his weight?
He handed her the pizza since the table was not big enough to accommodate the box. He didn’t miss the fact she raised an eyebrow at him, but took the pizza, and got them plates.
“Knife and fork?” she asked him.
“Get real.” He squinted at the crossword puzzle. He should have known. It was one of the really hard ones, not like the sports one that came with the weekly TV guide in the local paper, which had supersimple clues like “Who is the most famous running back of all time?”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her setting a knife and fork on one of the plates.
“No utensils or I’ll take my pizza and go home. Pizza is food you eat with your hands.” Loosen up, he wanted to tell her. But then he wasn’t so sure he wanted her to loosen up, especially when she complied with his instructions and brought over two plates, no utensils. She picked up her slice gingerly and took a tiny bite, then licked a wayward speck of sauce off her index finger.
He was not so sure he should have encouraged her. Watching Miss Maple eat pizza with her hands was a vaguely erotic experience, nearly as bad as watching her eat tiger ice cream.
He reminded himself they were unchaperoned. He was not even allowed to think anything that was vaguely erotic.
So, he concentrated on the crossword book. “A six-letter word for dumb?” he asked her, but spelled in his head B-e-n.
“Stupid?”
He scorned the pencil she handed him and picked up a pen off the table. “Nitwit.”
“You can’t fill it out in pen!” She didn’t look too happy about him touching her book while he was eating, either.
“We’re living dangerously,” he reminded her. “I’ll buy you a new book if I get pizza on it.”
“I wasn’t worried about my book!” she said huffily.
“Yes, you were. What’s a seven-letter word for hot spot?”
“Volcano? I wasn’t worried about the book.”
“Yes you were. Hell,” he said, pleased.
“Hell does not have seven letters!”
“Hellish, then,” he wrote it in, pressing hard on the pen so she wouldn’t get any ideas about erasing it later. “Eight-letter word for aggravation?”
“Anderson?” she said sweetly.
How did she count letters so darn fast? “Perfect,” he said approvingly, and wrote it in. “This is too easy for us. Next time the New York Times.”
Next time. Way to go, nitwit.
But somehow the evening did become easy. As they focused on the puzzle, she lost her shyness. She even was eating the pizza with relish. Her wall of reservation came down around her as she got into the spirit of wrecking the puzzle.
“Incognito,” she crowed.
“It doesn’t fit.”
Impatiently she took the pen from him, scowled at the puzzle and then wrote, “Inkono.”
“Miss Maple, you are getting the hang of this,” he said with approval. “That makes zuntkun down.”
“Zuntkun,” she said happily, “a seven-letter word for an exotic horned animal in Africa if I’m not mistaken.”
“Done,” he declared, half an hour later looking down at the mess of scribbles and crossed-out words and wrong words with complete satisfaction. So was most of the pizza. So was his control.
This close to her, he could smell lavender and vanilla over the lingering scent of pizza. He liked the laughter in her eyes, and the crinkle on her nose. He decided to make both deepen. He ripped the puzzle out of the book.
“What are you doing?”
“It’s a little something on you. From now on I have this to show your class how their teacher spells incognito in a pinch. If you make me happy, I’ll never have to use it.”
“How would I make you happy?” she asked warily.
“Use your imagination. Any woman who can spell incognito like that, and who can invent horned beasts in Africa, has to have a pretty good imagination.”
“I have a better idea. Just give it back.”
“I’m not one of your fifth-graders. I don’t have to do things just because you say so. You come get it,” he teased, and at the look on her face he pushed back his chair.
She moved toward him. “Give it!”
“Don’t make me run,” he said.
