Deconstructing Bridges

Chapter Eighteen

"I swear, all you ever do these days is try to fatten me up," Rose giggled as she stared at the bulging grocery bags in Matthew's hands. 

It was three days since he had shown her the photographs of her family, and things between them were starting to settle into a somewhat comfortable pattern. Although there were still moments she seemed as though she was in some kind of trance, there were also moments where she was the woman he remembered. No smiles, though. Plenty of smirks, but still no genuine smiles. 

He had slept on the couch each night, popping out in the morning to attend his regular briefing before returning. No longer did it feel like a chore to be here - rather, it was something he had to do. He needed to do it. The impulse to be near her was becoming as deeply embedded as was the routine of brushing his teeth. Even if the teeth didn’t seem to want to be cleaned.  

"You could do with some fattening," he retorted, pulling items from the bags and spreading them on the counter.. 

"I looked through your recipes and found the one for your vegetable stew, so I collected the ingredients. Feel like eating that for lunch?"

"You want to cook it?"

"I don't think the disdainful tone is necessary," he pouted, staring at the bare utensil drawer in mild confusion. 

She pointed to a nearby cupboard.

"All the cooking stuff is locked in there. Your guys installed the lock when you decided I wasn't safe to be left with a bunch of knives at my disposal, remember?" 

He chuckled, and she watched as he fumbled with the latch. When he finally remembered he had keys and unlocked the cabinet, she rolled her eyes at him bemusedly as he stared at the ingredients.

"Do you want me to cook it?"

Relief followed by suspicion crossed his face. 

"I will be right behind you in case you try to pull a knife on me," he stipulated sternly, and she raised an eyebrow. One corner of her mouth curved up in mild humour, but it didn't quite reach her eyes. 

The recipe was so familiar to her, she didn't need to measure any proportions or look at a timer. She simply chopped and tossed into the pot while he watched. There was an expression of calm about her, in her posture, her mouth, her eyes as she moved around the small kitchen with graceful ease and he remained close, noting that the simple act of being in the kitchen had always seemed to make her appear more content. She'd let slip once that her mother had taught her, and he had completely understood the comfort that could bring. He also was a relatively skilled cook, learning at his mother's elbow as a young teen. 

"The girls love a man who can cook," his mother had insisted, a sparkle in her eye as she would gesture in annoyance towards her husband who would be grinning nearby. 

"This one is a lost cause. He can barely fry an egg, but you? This is my gift to your ladies."

Cooking held warm memories for him, because it reminded him of a time before his family was shaken by his mother’s passing. He had tried to recreate those moments by taking over the kitchen, and he knew his attempts were appreciated, but he'd accepted that he could not make his mother's recipes for his father without bringing him to tears. 

He had told Rose that on their third date, when he'd come to her tiny apartment to pick her up. They had paused for a drink of wine, and he'd admired the cookbook of handwritten recipes she had sitting on her stove. A shadow had fallen across her face when he'd picked it up, but it had been quickly masked when he began talking about his mother's chicken linguine.