water turned tepid and I cranked it off, opening the glass door to a room full of steam. When it cleared, I found a towel and a black robe on the marble counter where I’d been sitting.
He’d snuck in while I’d been shaving. I wondered what he’d seen. I wondered if he’d watched. Between my legs I felt puffy. Totally different.
The robe was silk and way too big and even though I rolled up the sleeves and looped the belt around my waist twice, I was still swimming in it.
But it was silky and perfect against my skin and Dylan had laid it out for me, so why would I change? The bedroom when I came out of the bathroom was dark. A king-size bed covered in a dark duvet monopolized the room. There was a dresser on a far wall. A closet in the corner, with the door left partially open. Inside I could see suits. Three or four suits. A tuxedo. I stepped forward and reached into the closet, touching the black sleeve of the tuxedo jacket. There was no label inside, which I gathered to mean he’d had it made custom. And the fabric was the softest, finest thing I’d ever touched.
One day, I thought, looking at that jacket, pushing aside the anxiety it gave me. I have one day in this magical house. Try not to ruin it. The door to the rest of the house was open and I could hear music from the kitchen. And I could smell food. Good food.
My stomach got excited. It had been many hours since the cornbread I’d eaten with peanut butter (a terrible combination) for dinner.
I got even more excited when I stepped into that kitchen and found Dylan drinking beer and putting food out on that barn table. He was listening to music I didn’t recognize. But I never recognized music.
“Wow, these are some serious preparations,” I said, trying to be light to hide all my misgivings. My nerves. The nonstop pounding of reality.
“Hey!” He looked up, his eyes taking in the dark robe and my damp hair. “That looks real good on you.” I did a little preen, pretending to poof up my hair or something. “Can I get you something to drink?” he asked.
“You have anything in a bucket?” He shot me a quizzical look and I waved it off. “I’ll have whatever is easy.” My pat answer.
“Well…” He turned and opened up the silver fridge. “Margaret took this shit pretty seriously, so I have a fully stocked fridge right now. But I think we’ll start with…” He pulled out a big bottle. “This.”
“Champagne?”
“Only the best.”
I almost told him I’d never had champagne before, but I thought maybe there’d been enough revealing how little I knew of the world.
I sat down at the table while he opened the champagne.
“What is all this?” I asked, looking at the food he’d set out.
“That,” he pointed with the champagne bottle toward a plate, “is some kind of cheese that you are supposed to eat with those kinds of crackers. I don’t really know, to tell you the truth. Margaret did this.”
There was a bowl of olives on the table and I ate one. There was a pit in it. The pit must make it fancy. As discreetly as I could I took it out of my mouth and placed it in a little bowl that must be there for just that reason.
“Margaret came back while I was in the shower?”
“No, I imagine she came back hours ago. She lives in another house on the property. I called her when you were in the shower.”
“This is quite a compound you’ve got here,” I said, eating the cheese with the appropriate cracker. It tasted expensive. I was used to Velveeta and stale Ritz.
The champagne cork popped and he handed me a flute. And I sat in a mountain home in a silk robe, drinking champagne, and truthfully, I didn’t know how I got there.
Do not, I thought again, ruin this.
Dylan had put on a shirt while I was in the shower. A dark plaid button-up shirt, with most of the buttons undone. The sleeves were rolled up revealing his forearms, and somehow that was even sexier than his bare chest.
I put the cracker and cheese down on a plate and took a sip of my champagne. The champagne was amazing. Like sweet-and-sour sunlight. I took another sip.
“You don’t like it?” he asked, glancing down at the cheese.