Page 33 of Time for You
“I don’t find you unbearable,” Daphne argued.
“But you do find me to be a boor?”
“Even you have to admit, you have your moments.”
Henry flashed her a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“It sounds like Maggie’s a bit of a handful?”
“They’re both absolute hellions,” he said, shaking his head fondly. “Maggie has quite the head for numbers, and I think she would like it here. More possibilities for her, anyway. Anne spends all her time reading, but mostly loves playing pranks on me.”
“Not on Maggie?”
“No, only me,” he said, and returned her soft smile. They stopped halfway across the bridge overlooking the Mississippi, and he leaned back against the railing. “Maggie would have her head if she even thought about it. Sometimes Anne teases George too, since he’s been like a brother to her for as long as we can remember.”
“It sounds like you miss them,” she said gently.
“Your patients must be very lucky, to have a doctor who cares this much,” he said, rather than answering her question.
“I don’t really have the time to talk to most of them,” she admitted. She rested her forearms on the railing, looking out toward the river while he faced the road behind them.
“Sounds as though you wish it were otherwise.”
“American health care is all fucked up, yeah.”
“So much I’ve gathered. But I meant that it sounds as though you’re unhappy.”
“I’m not,” she said, probably a little too quickly. “It’s what I’ve always wanted.”
Henry looked at her, his gaze unsettling. It was like he could see inside her, see things even she didn’t want to look at. And even worse, he wasn’t looking away, disgusted, or appalled. He simply looked at her, like who she was, deep down, was interesting.
She couldn’t take it anymore. “We should get back.”
Henry looked as though he were about to say something, but then he closed his mouth and shook his head. “Daphne?” he said, and as he’d never used her given name, her heart skipped a beat at the irregularity of it all. “Are we friends now?”
“Do you want to be?”
His eyes seemed to glow in the midafternoon light. “I think I’d like that, Daphne. I’d like that very much.”
And Daphne was left to ponder if it was the strangeness of having him use her given name that made her heart beat like that, or something else entirely.
Chapter Twelve
“Okay, now that the water’s boiling, you just pour the pasta in, but be ready to stir or it’ll boil over.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it,” Daphne confirmed.
Henry did as instructed, although his face remained dubious.
It was another day where Ellie had to work but Daphne was off, which meant spending time with Henry.
Ever since that day at the library, it felt like something critical between them had shifted, and now rather than dreading it, she was looking forward to it. Being around Henry wasn’t always easy, but she felt like she understood why he could be so difficult. Picking apart what was because he was living in an entirely unfamiliar century and what was just him being an arrogant dick was tricky, but Daphne was getting better at it.
Questioning her every suggestion when she instructed him on how to make spaghetti? That was due to being baffled by everything, including dried pasta and electric stoves. Haughtily informing her that his cook made far superior dishes back in 1885? That was, unfortunately, all Henry. Even stranger was that he was growing on her, arrogance and everything. He was, she had to admit, charmingly interested in new experiences, like the drag brunch Brittany and Ellie had taken him to the previous weekend while Daphne was stuck at the hospital.
“Tell me, Daphne,” he said, and there was still the slightest hesitation before he said her first name, like he had to remind himself of what to say. “What’s your favorite food?”
