They passed time as friendly strangers, conversations on the porch short and meaningless when Walter could bring himself to speak -fine weather this morning, how are you-, until one morning he asked again if she'd like to return to Hong Kong. Or perhaps England.
"It would be best," Kitty agreed, wiping the last of the foam from his face. No matter how awkward, neither of them could bring themselves to stop this ritual. "But what about you? You won't stay out here alone?"
"I think perhaps they won't have me back," he admitted sheepishly, "after what I did. Mind you, it was a tremendous help, but I understand from Waddington that they aren't anxious to have me back in the field."
The decision was easy in the end, but it left Walter even more unsettled when they'd agreed to go. She'd still given him no answer, and the day before they were to leave he was more agitated than usual, folding and packing his clothes with an aggression that would have amused her if she'd not been in a similar state. By evening, she almost couldn't stand the sight of him pacing about and when he suggested that he might like to dine alone at Waddington's, just to give them a break from each other, she jumped to agree. Let him leave her for a little while, perhaps she might think in peace. His silently hopeful presence was intolerable and made her wary of rejecting him no matter what she discovered of her own feelings. It would have been like kicking a puppy.
She'd come to no certain decision when he returned, but he was much more cheerful and Kitty felt emboldened enough by that to attempt the much-needed conversation. If only her thoughts weren't so muddled, but perhaps speaking them outloud would make sense of them.
"I never liked being married to you," she began, pacing as Walter folded his arms on the dining room table and laid his head on them. "And I don't think you ever really loved me for my own sake. You all but called me a beautiful idiot, do you remember," she asked with all the asperity of remembered hurt.
Walter nodded tiredly against his arm, not looking at her. And she felt bad for bringing it up when he was obviously not fully himself yet, and no doubt exhausted on top of it. He'd really pushed himself, walking to their neighbor's.
"But," she went on, "being here, I don't think much of the girl I was, either. And I wonder if you wouldn't find me more of an equal, now. And then there's the issue of..." Oh, she knew he hated this subject, but it must be done! "Of...our bed. I never really enjoyed it, but lately, for some reason, I miss it. Does that make sense?"
When her husband raised himself to look at her, he did not look as Kitty expected. Instead of the mortified hurt she'd thought to see, he was grinning. "No," he said, cheerful and slow. "Not a bit."
"Oh, for Heaven's sake!" All of that, and he wasn't even in his right mind tonight. She spun to leave, more than a little annoyed.
"Kitty! Kitty, wait!" Walter stumbled after her, catching her at the door with a hand on her arm. Wearing a drunken imitation of his most serious expression, he beckoned her to lean in with his free hand. When she did not, he brought his lips close to her ear, instead. "I think. I'm very...drunk," he told her sincerely. And giggled.
"I think you're right," she said with exasperation, lips twitching in spite of herself.
Drunk Walter was just as affectionate as post-coital Walter, as it turned out, for when she tried to gently tug her arm from his grasp, he looked every bit the lost puppy she often compared him to and pulled her into his arms. Embracing her from behind, he laid his head on her shoulder with a contented sigh, nuzzling at her neck. She'd longed so very badly to be held and petted lately, that it was no surprise to her that her blood heated.
"Walter," she said with a little smile, "are you trying to seduce me?"
He paused, turning his head to regard her with confusion. "I don't know. Am I?"
"I think so," Kitty laughed when he tugged at her earlobe with his teeth.
"Oh. Alright." He nodded seriously before rubbing his cheek against her own, his evening stubble chafing her pleasantly. "Is it working?"
She bit her lip, almost bursting with giddy tenderness.
"Yes," she admitted, and Walter looked decidedly proud of himself when she turned in his arms, putting her own around his neck to kiss him.
He'd had no practice since she turned him out of her bed, and thus had not improved. Sex for its own sake, then, was a lost cause for her. But sex because she wanted to be near him, that was new and novel, and pleasant enough in its way. Walter was as unskilled as ever he'd been, moreso with the drink, but he giggled his way through his clumsiness so that she became caught up in laughing, too, and in the end they were both more amused than aroused and very pleased with themselves when he fell asleep on her naked breast before they'd gotten very far.