The door opened softly. Mia noticed Noelle was nowhere to be seen but she could hear her talking to someone in the back room. Mia assumed she was fitting someone. This was the first Mia had been to Noelle's house since New Year's Eve which had now been two days ago. Mia slipped into the guest room to open her suitcase. All she had done was sit it on Noelle's guest bed and that was where it remained.
"I like the fabric you've chosen. This is going to be a fun project. I'll have it done at least two weeks before you need it. Mia hi!" Noelle said excitedly seeing that Mia had come in as she returned to the front room of the house. "Anyway, I'll get started on it and I'll see you in four weeks for your first fitting." Noelle explained.
"Thank you, Noelle. I'll see you in four weeks." Her client said leaving the house.
"Mia!" Noelle nearly yelled, so excited to see her.
"Noelle!" Mia shrieked. "I'm so sorry I didn't come in on New Year's Eve and you're right I didn't come in last night either…but I'm here now!" Mia said panicking. She stopped to breathe for a moment. "This is…positively the best New Year's holiday I've ever had. Do you have another client coming?" Mia asked sitting on the couch.
"No, I'm done for the day. I was getting ready to start chopping chicken for my chicken pot pie." Noelle said excitedly sitting on the couch.
"Oh my god! I'm so glad no one else is coming! I HAVE to talk to you!" Mia said quickly sitting beside her. She was about to explode with excitement.
"The chicken can wait a few minutes. I'll melt a bowl of chocolate!" Noelle said running into the kitchen and dumping a bag of chocolate chips out to heat on the stove. "You've been gone for two days Mia!" Noelle looked around the house as if someone were listening to her. "You were a virgin when you got here…are you still?" Noelle asked softly stirring the chips as they melted. Mia screamed into her hand but Noelle could tell she was smiling.
"Yes! Yes! I promise the answer to that is YES." Mia said shaking Noelle's shoulders. Noelle laughed and continued stirring. "Hey what's that gift over there in that chair?" Mia asked.
"Oh, it's a gift from the bride from the wedding. I haven't opened it yet, obviously. Okay, here's a spoon! Come on!" Noelle said handing a spoon to Mia and pulling her over to the couch with a hot pad for the saucepan. "So, we wait for this to cool for a couple of minutes then dive in. What do you HAVE to talk to me about?" Noelle wondered anxiously.
"I um…on New Year's Eve…I…fell asleep in Edward's bed…with Edward beside me." Mia said, her eyes wide with fear and excitement.
"Okay…" Noelle said stirring the chocolate and waiting for it to cool further.
"But…when we woke up early that morning…we had our arms around each other. It felt wonderful…he felt wonderful." Mia sighed nervously. Her hand was actually shaking as she dipped her spoon into the now cool chocolate.
"Calm down, sweetie. What did you do?" Noelle wondered digging her spoon into the chocolate.
"Okay, okay...you're easy to talk to and you're my friend. Edward and I slept pretty much all day yesterday and even through the night last night…but here's the thing. We…." Mia paused. Noelle looked at her encouraging her to go on. "We…we made out…a lot. There I said it!" Mia was a hundred times more relaxed now.
"That's it? That's what you HAD to talk to me about?" Noelle said a little disappointed that Mia didn't have more to tell her.
"I didn't know how you would react. Do you think we've gone too far too fast?" Mia asked indulging on this melted chocolate.
"No…no not at all." Noelle reassured her.
"Really? I'm so glad to hear you say that. I've just never dated anyone that I've really, really, reeeeeally liked before and I have no idea where the boundaries lie." Mia said.
"I don't really know anything about relationships because I don't have any prior experience. I wasn't raised in a strictly religious family where religion governed how you lived every day either. But I'll tell you exactly what my father, Wesley and Johann, the three men who raised me, told me as I was growing up. They would always tell me that a woman holds the cards. She sets the boundaries for every man with whom she becomes involved." Noelle laughed. "Then Wesley would always say boundaries are set to be tested. Should a man cross the lines a woman sets, he isn't worthy of her. Should a man remain within those lines a woman sets then he must be of great virtue." Noelle finished.
"They really told you that? That's had to be nice…to have such honest men raising you." Mia said completely enjoying this chocolate. Noelle laughed.
"Believe me…they've given me lots of advice, lots of wisdom….a lot of it not that cleanly put either. But you'd have to know, them to understand their way of not sugar coating anything. I haven't melted chocolate and eaten it like this for a long time." Mia smiled.
"You make me feel so much more assured. Of course I have to say, the chocolate helps too. I never thought of it like that…a woman setting the boundaries in a relationship. My mother was always quite the submissive personality maybe that's why. So it's okay then…what we did." Mia was actually reassuring herself. She didn't need any further approval from Noelle. Noelle licked the chocolate off the spoon before dragging it through the bowl again.
"Of course it's okay. You make the rules, Mia." Noelle told her.
"What would you have done…if I would have told you I wasn't a virgin?" Mia asked. Noelle smiled. The saucepan was getting low on chocolate so Noelle abandoned the spoon for her finger.
"I won't lie…I would have asked you…for every detail. And then…screw this chocolate we'd go out for ice cream." Noelle said as she laughed at the thought of that scenario. Mia laughed wildly.
"Oh you're funny! You're too funny! So hey, why do you need to chop chicken up anyway? You said something about doing that." Mia said also digging her finger into the saucepan of chocolate.
"Oh shoot! I have to get started doing that. I told Leonardo I was making a chicken pot pie today. He's coming by when he gets back in town later. Come on, you want to learn how to make it?" Noelle asked. Mia desperately needed to learn how to make something…ANYTHING else other than chocolate candy…the ONLY thing she could make.
"I would like to learn. I can't cook Noelle. I mean, at all…I'm a horrible cook." Mia confessed picking up their saucepan that they had nearly licked clean. Noelle smiled.
"Chicken pot pie isn't the easiest place to start, but I can teach you a few things with this recipe." Noelle told her. Mia followed her to the kitchen.
"Is this seriously your recipe book? How many of these have you actually made?" Mia asked admiring the thick book that Noelle had put together through the years.
"I've been through probably eighty percent of it. There are some recipes that I have no intention of ever making." Noelle said throwing ingredients on the table.
"I think I might move closer to the Daein border, when the weather gets better." Mia said out of nowhere.
"Really?" Noelle questioned.
"It's just that…I really like Edward and I know he likes me a lot too. If I move closer to Daein I can see him more often. In the meantime it's a big trip for both of us. Edward's going to come to Crimea soon for a few days." Mia said.
"That sounds like a great idea if that's what you want to do. I'm sure you can find someplace to live near the border." Noelle reassured her. "But, before you go moving near the border you're going to get your first hands on cooking experience." Noelle said spreading food out before Mia. It was obvious that Mia had already made future plans. It was refreshing to hear her talk about it with such light in her eyes. Noelle longed for the day when the weather broke, when she could put all her heavy winter clothes away and feel the warmth of summertime in Nevassa again.