Page 46 of Teacakes & Tangos
He walked over and bent to assess the sad-looking plant. ‘It looks half-dead.’
‘Well, yes. That’s what I thought. I decided not to insult you by giving it to you.’
‘I kill houseplants,’ he said cheerfully, still peering at the odd specimen in front of him. ‘I’m the very opposite of green-fingered. If we ever had a house together, you’d have to be in charge of the garden because I’d murder everything in a few short weeks. I’d let the dog pee on the lawn and turn the grass brown...’
He turned and met my eye, and we exchanged a rather surprised look.
Then I laughed awkwardly and glanced away. And so did he.
There was a pause. Then he said, ‘Just to clarify, that’s ahypotheticalhouse share I was talking about there.’
I nodded solemnly, although inside I was feeling all kinds of emotions, mostly good ones. ‘We don’t actually have a dog. So I guess he’s also hypothetical?’
‘Absolutely.’
We laughed, again rather awkwardly.
Then Xander turned and scooped up the plant.
‘What are you doing?’ I looked at him in surprise. ‘You’re not taking that away with you, are you?’
‘Well, you did buy it for me, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, but you don’t need to feel obliged to take it. I mean,lookat it!’
He grinned. ‘Ah, but it’s just begging to be loved.’
‘Look, why don’t I get you a nicer one? One that’s alive for a start.’
He hugged the plant in its pot and gave me a pained look. ‘I don’t want another one. I want this one. And stop being so rude about it. Plants have feelings, you know.’
I chuckled. ‘Well, okay. Take it. It needs to be put out of its misery, so I guess as a plant-killer, you’re the best person for the job.’
‘Yup. Give me three days and it’ll be dead as a doornail, I promise.’
We lingered in the hallway, and I asked Xander what we’d do on our date.
He smiled. ‘Well . . . I thought maybe we could . . . go to the tango night?’
‘Really?’ I looked at him in disbelief.
He shrugged. ‘I know you’d like to.’
‘Yes, butyou’reon this date as well. Wouldyoulike to?’
He gave me a sheepish smile. ‘Actually, I would. Dancing’s obviously been a big thing in your life. So it seems to me that if I want to get to know the real Anika, learning to tango with you would be the perfect way to do it.’
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Over the next few days, as I continued being a regular visitor to Dad’s bedside, it was a huge relief to find that Dad was on the mend.
He’d had various scans and there seemed to be no permanent brain damage. He was still sleepy and confused a lot of the time. But his periods of lucidity were becoming longer and more frequent, and he was delighted to hear about my new job at the café. I also told him about Xander and joked that he didn’t need to worry about me being single forever now.
He squeezed my hand quite hard at that, and the cheerful relief in his eyes as he looked at me made me realise his worry for me had been real.
I smiled at him, feeling my heart doing a crazy dance just at the mention of Xander. ‘He’s definitely one of the good ones. I like him a lot.’
I’d been to see Mavis over the road, although (surprisingly) she didn’t actually know where Minnie, her fellow WI member, lived.
