Prompt: Chapped Lips
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"Will you be feeding me everything, tonight?" I returned from my food slumber and met a pair of sparkling emeralds peering back at me.
You slut! Where the hell did that come from?
Oh lighten up. You said you'd have fun.
"I definitely wouldn't be opposed." Edward looked down to my lips, as I licked a bit of the lemon sauce away, and then grinned before returning his gaze to my eyes. "Why don't we go to the stove?"
He about faced, I took a deep breath, and then followed him to a large industrial looking cook top. A bunch of items were prepared for him and he went to work pulling them together in a sauté pan.
"I cook a little, too. Or, at least, I used to," I offered.
Most of my dinners consisted of Caesar Salads and lunches were whatever they had premade at the office café. Breakfast was usually a piece of fruit or packaged oatmeal. I only ate anything with taste over the weekends when I forced myself to walk away from the computer long enough to cook a meal. But even that was either baked chicken or tacos.
"Is that so?" He wanted to hear more. This was the first thing I'd volunteered about myself, without him asking. He was showing me a bit of his life and I figured I could do the same.
"I'm no chef…" I paused to glance at his effortless handy work over the entrée. "My mom's an experimental cook. When I was growing up, she made a lot of disasters. Eventually, I took over dinner."
"Maybe you'll cook for me some time."
"Who cooks for a chef unless they want to make an ass out of themselves?"
"I can't imagine you doing such a thing and do you really think so little of me? …That'd I'd be judgmental?" He was only half serious, by the arch in his brow.
"I don't know what to think of you," I mused, audibly. There was no harshness in my words or pitch. If anything, there was a combination of marvel and disbelief, but only because he seemed like something I'd imagined up.
After all of the years I'd spent alone – more or less oblivious to men altogether – how could the first man I'd paid any attention to turn out so picturesque? Edward was lively, intelligent, caring, and good looking (that was an understatement). There had to be a flaw. Some big, blaring, impossible to miss or ignore defect. He had to be a drunk, murderer, or at least a complete asshole, right?
God I hope not. Please be perfect. I really, really want you to be perfect. Or at least sort of perfect. I'll settle for sort of.
He shoveled the pasta into two plates and picked them up. "Well, let's see what we can do to fix that. Shall we?"
His smile was wide and forthcoming. He wasn't at all discouraged. I felt my unnecessarily icy exterior melt a little with each peek at his pearly whites. The slight nervous inducing nausea I'd been trying to bat down since he'd asked me out would also flair up every time I considered that I might actually be able to fall for the must-be-monster.
While trailing him to the table, I thought of the many ways this night could go. He could finally decide I was the bitch he'd probably pegged me for and give up trying to break me down. I could become the fumbling mess externally that I was within and start swooning aloud, effectively scaring him away from the potential groupie. And, best case scenario, he could walk me to the car at the end of the night, ask for my number, and promise to call.
Would he actually call? Would he try to kiss me? Did I even remember how to kiss?
I was in the middle of trying to remember the last time I'd participated in a kiss and worrying over chapped lips when he stopped in front of me and I ran into him. I stumbled back a few steps and he'd somehow set the plates down, pivoted, and grabbed my hand before I could completely fall backward. In the effort to reverse my plummet and steady me, he'd pulled me into him and wrapped his other arm around me. We were almost an exact replica of how we'd been before lunch.
"Are you alright?" He was so close that I could feel his warm breath on my face. It smelled of cinnamon and ginger. I actually wanted to taste it, as if he were a pastry of some sort.
This time I wasn't really worried about embarrassment or awkwardness. I was only very aware our proximity because I wasn't repelled by it. Edward was firm, yet comfortable. I was almost saddened by the notion that he'd likely let me go, soon.
"I'm okay," I replied in a bit of a sigh.
He didn't loosen his hold. "We have to stop meeting this way. I'd prefer if you weren't about to fall over every time I held you."