Standing next to his stove, Claymore Gregg kept muttering underneath his breath. "It is NOT impossible! I've seen it. I KNOW it is possible to find the right person – if they can do it so can I!" Pausing as the milk began to steam, he poured it into his favorite cup with a dash of sugar and cinnamon. Putting the aluminum saucepan into the sink, he filled it with cold water to soak, and turning off the kitchen light, he slowly scuffed along back to his bedroom.
He set the oversized mug on the mat on his bedside table. Watching the steam curl upwards, he recalled the first time he had seen it, it had been purchased as a souvenir during a trip he and his mother had taken to the Delaware Water Gap in late July before she died the following year.
As he did every evening, he straightened the bills in his wallet, and looked woefully at the day's receipts from the various food stands. It seemed so unfair. He had been called upon to spend exactly $8 and 43 cents on such a miserable evening. Granted he should have been able to call it a date, but clearly Amelia had only agreed to go out to get a solid meal, not for any desire to spend time with him at all.
Crawling under his covers, he took the mug in hand. Blowing on the warm milk, he recalled another meal, one that presented a very different version of romance. Even now he wasn't sure if it was the Captain inspired dream or the actual meal Martha had prepared the day that 'Slugger' was returned to his family. All Claymore knew, was that without question he had witnessed something between the Captain and Carolyn Muir. Two people who didn't even share the same state of being had found one another, and were happily, and if he was right, were even passionately able to find one another.
Draining the mug, he set it carefully aside, and shook his head. "IF she can make it work with a ghost and be so happy, so content, there isn't a reason in the world why I shouldn't make some kind of connection with a living, breathing human woman, wouldn't you think?" Deciding to be a rebel just for this night, he reached over to turn off bedside table light without even brushing his teeth. Pulling the covers up to his chin, he tried to stop thinking about the woeful evening and instead focused on tomorrow when he would to go visit Carolyn Muir, to talk about what had happened and hopefully to receive some advice that might help him find the kind of happiness she and the Captain had clearly found together.