Actually, he wouldn’t even take it into the library. He would have her come out, and they’d sit at the dining room table together.
He had nodded, making his decision, and walked through the entryway into the dining room. He stopped short when he saw the table.
What were they going to do, sit at opposite ends? He’d need a megaphone to talk to her.
Was he going to talk to her?
This was stupid. What was he thinking? He was actually going to eat with her? That was dumb.
Turning on his toes, he marched right back out of the dining room, frustrated with himself for forgetting for one second that he was who he was, what he was, and that someone as nice and normal as Peyton might not be interested in spending time with him.
It was a stupid thought.
He had his hand on the banister and one foot on the stair when he stopped short again.
She was the one who had brought the casserole. She was the one who had expected him to cook it so that they could eat it together. She was the one who knew that they would need plates and silverware in order to eat a casserole.
He’d always made sandwiches, something they could just hold and eat.
He hadn’t ever put anything on a plate.
She was the one who had come up with that new idea.
New for them.
Slowly, he let his hand fall from the banister and his foot drop.
It was funny how a few seconds could change a man’s life forever.
At the height of his career, and even before, he had more confidence than was healthy, probably, when it came to women. They chased him, and when he felt like it, he’d allowed himself to get caught.
Never for long.
He looked back on those days with a mixture of longing but also revulsion.
He hadn’t been a very good man. He’d been successful beyond his wildest dreams, and he hadn’t handled it well. He’d taken the adoration of fans, but even more than that, women, as his due.
He assumed his friends liked him for him and not his success. Or that his success was a part of him, intrinsically woven together so that he was it and it was him and it wasn’t something he could lose or have ripped away from him.
But when his success went, when his handsomeness had been destroyed, when his integrity had been questioned and found grossly lacking, when he’d been tried on the fires of social media, branded guilty, and blacklisted, he hadn’t had any friends who stayed, other than Dwight.
Maybe, maybe what he admired so much about Peyton was something that was sincere and genuine, something he wasn’t used to seeing in the people around him.
He turned, slowly, and walked back through the hall into the dining room. To the kitchen.
He cooked her casserole, deciding they’d eat in the small breakfast nook, since that was more intimate than the large dining room. And he would try as hard as he could to take the chip off his shoulder while he ate with her. To return some of the kindness to her that she showed to him.
Nothing too deep or costly, just a casual friendliness to match hers.
He could do it.
Twenty minutes later, he took the casserole dish out of the oven and considered texting Peyton to let her know that it was done and she could come to the kitchen.
He decided that he’d rather go get her. Or maybe that just seemed more polite. A text seemed kind of impersonal, and he wanted her to know that he wasn’t commanding her, that she was a guest, and he was treating her that way.
That he was expecting her to take time off from her job, not expecting her to rush through a meal so she could get back to work. Opening the library door, he found her sitting on the floor, with the scanner beside her, several books lying there and one in her hand, as she carefully put the sticky paper in the front of the book on her lap.
He noted his dogs were lying, one behind her and one beside her, their heads on their paws, perking their ears at his entrance but relaxing as soon as they figured out it was him.