help?”
“Thank you, but no.”
She went into the kitchen and I glanced around again. There was a pair of running shoes by the door and several books about marathon training on her coffee table. I wasn’t usually so aware of my surroundings, but this felt like getting a glimpse of a superhero’s secret lair. This was her home. Where she took off her shoes—and her clothes, but I was trying not to get into that—and put her feet up. Where she ate and slept and relaxed and lived.
Did it always smell so good? It wasn’t just the food she had cooking, although that was making my stomach growl and my mouth water. Beneath that, it smelled like her, and it was oddly relaxing.
I took a seat on the couch, once again admiring her precision. My mouth turned up in a grin and I scooted the table lamp an inch to the side, just to see if she’d notice. I couldn’t resist.
The fattest cat I’d ever seen ambled down the hall. He stopped to stretch, arching his back. Or at least, he was probably arching his back. Cats usually did, but it was hard to tell what this one was doing beneath the enormous amount of gray fur.
The cat’s head swiveled toward me. He had long whiskers and a flat face. He yawned, then seemed to decide he needed to come inspect his owner’s guest. Between his long fur and considerable girth, I could barely see his legs. He was like a big, poofy ball of gray, shuffling across the room toward me. He plopped down next to my foot and sniffed my pants.
“Hi, kitty.” I reached down and scratched his head.
“That’s Erwin,” Hazel said from the kitchen entrance.
I chuckled. “Erwin. I get it. Erwin Schrodinger. Schrodinger’s cat. That’s funny.”
“It is funny. But no one ever gets the joke.”
“Really?” I kept petting him. He allowed it. His soft fur was perfectly groomed—not a single mat. Impressive, considering the thickness of his coat.
“You’re the first person to both understand and find amusement in the reference.” She tilted her head, a little smile crossing her lips. “He likes you. He’s waiting for you to pick him up and put him on the couch.”
“He won’t jump up?”
“No, he can’t make it anymore.”
I chuckled again. “Erwin, I know your mommy’s a good cook, but if you can’t jump up onto the couch, you’re probably eating too many cookies while she’s at work.”
“It’s not his size that prevents him from jumping onto the couch. He’s just getting older.”
“Are you sure? Because he’s huge.”
She crossed her arms. “He’s just fluffy.”
Raising my eyebrows, I put my hands around his middle and lifted him onto the couch next to me. He was very fluffy, she was right about that, but he had to weigh twenty pounds. “Holy crap, Hazel, he’s heavy.”
“He’s not that heavy. And he’s perfectly healthy.”
I smoothed down his fur as he settled onto the cushion, looking like a gray blob of fur with ears and a flat face. “He’s definitely a happy cat.”
“Precisely,” she said, her tone decisive, and went back into the kitchen.
“What do you think, Erwin?” I lowered my voice and kept petting him. “Did your mommy really invite me over to discuss study data?”
Erwin closed his eyes.
“I didn’t think so.”
Hazel came back out, pulling her apron over her head. “Dinner’s ready.”
“It smells amazing.” I stood, but glanced at Erwin, still on the couch. “Can he get down by himself?”
“Oh, yes, he’s fine.”
The table was already set for two and I helped Hazel bring dinner from the kitchen. She’d made chicken in a lemon cream sauce with pasta. I couldn’t wait to dig in.
We sat down and dished up. The food was delicious. I didn’t get home-cooked meals like this very often and I devoured two helpings in the time it took Hazel to eat one.
We mostly talked about work, and Hazel brought up the motion capture study. In the back of my mind I once again wondered if that was really the reason she’d invited me over. Maybe it was. Maybe whatever crazy sexual connection we’d had was over.
But it wasn’t over for me. The longer I spent here, surrounded by all things Hazel, the more I thought about taking her clothes off.
“I made dessert,” she said after we’d both finished.
She rose and gathered our plates and silverware. The clipped way she spoke and her stiff posture reminded me of the day we’d flown to the conference in Florida. I’d assumed the way she’d