Ghost of You

1. Perfect family

"Dinner's ready," - a soft female voice comes from the kitchen. Rosemary likes cooking. She's been exploring new recipes and the whole magic of the kitchen since her mother allowed her to use kitchen supplies. Rose was about eight years old. Old enough to know how hot an oven can be.

"Coming," - replies Connor, closing his laptop. Unlike his wife, he isn't so inspired about "evoking his inner chef". Delivery service was his best friend until he met Rosemary and she made him love homemade meals again. Connor was truly impressed by how one can enjoy all this boiling and frying stuff, realizing you're going to need to clean all this mess after the dish is ready. The idea of cleaning seemed the worst. Maybe that's why he didn't like cooking. Though, we need to mention that his wonderful wife made him enjoy this process now and then. But she was the only reason.

"Mmm, smells fantastic", - says Connor, entering the modern-furnished kitchen. Rosemary is already sitting at the table, waiting for her husband to finally start eating. Smell of a just made dish makes the waiting impossible. Especially for a hungry person.

"I tried a new recipe today and we better like this steak because I swear, they scared the shit out of me," – Rose takes a sip of wine. Cabernet Sauvignon. Perfect for meat, perfect for a cozy dinner for a newly born family.

"You definitely won that fight," - says Connor, softly laughing - "Seriously, it tastes better than at that fancy restaurant we've been to last month. Now I think they're even more overpriced". This surprising seriousness in his voice makes Rosemary laugh. She loves when her husband says compliments about the food she cooked. At such moments she feels like a proud chef, and she realizes how soft her significant other could be. Seriously look at this teddy bear's eyes when he says how good that meat is. You just can't not to fall in love with double strength.

"Watch out! I can become way too confident about my cooking skills," – Rosemary laughs.

"Maybe then I will finally convince you to open your own place and stop being so shy about your passion!" - says Connor looking straight at Rose. He knows it is her dream to open a small family restaurant. He also knows she is scared to death of this idea cause in her view she wasn't enough for doingthis. "Bullshit" - Connor tried to convince her way to many times, - "You're gonna blow people's minds with the power of your food". And he meant it. At the end of the day, their story started with food.

He studied music production at university and just got a chance to perform some of his songs in one of the local bars. She studied English literature and worked as a waitress in between studies. Both were artsy, but their chances to meet were miserable. She was a "cool kid" from a good family who were in touch with other cool kids kids from other good families. Some kind of elite, if you like this word. Connor could never fit in. He grew up in foster families that were changing way faster than he could get used to any of those people. He wanted to study music and worked all his soul out to become as good at it as he could because his only chance to get a good education was to get a scholarship. He had nothing so he couldn't dream too much, he couldn't be unrealistic.

The fact that Rosemary Williams was a waitress at that bar really confused Connor. Was that some kind of game? Was she bored? She definitely hadn't needed money that much to work at a shitty bar. Have you seen her parents? They could buy this whole place. They could buy the whole street if they wanted.

Anyway, she was there, and she was the one reaching for him first. "Hey", - he heard a little bit hoarse woman's  voice right behind him. She was standing there wearing a green apron over her beige pants and a t-shirt with the logo of a famous band that most girls liked so much. Connor couldn't blame them though. They had catchy songs. He even had some in his playlist.

"Uhm, hello", - he responded with some clumsiness in the voice, "didn't know you were working here. What a surprise". He smiled, but he could swear it was the most awkward smile ever. He didn't even know why he reacted like this. It was beyond unusual for a guy who had never been shy.