“Hi, Dr.—er, Anne.”
She smiled at Rose, who held little Parker’s hand as they walked across the parking lot. Rose carried a couple of envelopes in her other hand, as if they’d just returned from a walk to the mailboxes built into a small, covered structure close to the apartment office
“Hello, Rose. Hi, Parker. How are you today?”
The toddler grinned at her. A smudge on his chin and a matching stain on his superhero sweatshirt suggested that he’d eaten chocolate recently. His cheeks were red from the exercise and from the brisk breeze that was beginning to blow stronger, bringing the colder temperatures that had been predicted for the next few days.
“I saw your friend Lee an hour or so ago,” Rose commented. “He was just getting out of his car to go back up to your apartment. He’s such a nice guy. He picked up Parker and tossed him in the air a few times. Parker loved the attention. He laughed and laughed.”
“Lee’s just a kid at heart himself,” she said, the new nickname sounding odd to her ears. She wondered where Liam had been that morning. He hadn’t mentioned plans to leave the apartment; she’d assumed he would be working all day.
“I could tell,” Rose replied with a laugh. “He’s so funny. Parker really likes him.”
Murmuring something noncommittal, Anne made her escape and headed up the stairs to her apartment.
She found Liam sitting in the middle of her living room floor, surrounded by what appeared to be the parts to an assemble-it-yourself wooden bookcase. He frowned at the instruction sheet in his hand, his expression puzzled.
“Oh, hi,” he said, glancing up from the paper when she walked in.
“What are you doing?”
“The shelves on the bookcase in your office are so overloaded they’re starting to sag. I went out this morning and found one that will fit on the opposite wall. I think it will look good there—if I can ever translate these instructions into English,” he added darkly. “Not sure what language this is, but it sure doesn’t make much sense.”
“I thought you were going to work on your book today.”
He shrugged without looking at her and reached for a shelf. “I’ll work on it while you’re studying. Just wanted to take care of this first.”
Shaking her head, Anne went into the bedroom to hang up her new dress, saying over her shoulder, “You really didn’t have to do that. But it’s a nice gesture, anyway.”
“I’d hate to see your other bookcase collapse,” he called after her. “The way you keep adding those thick medical books, it won’t hold much more.”
She couldn’t help wondering if this was yet another excuse for Liam to procrastinate on his writing. Apparently he was having a hard time getting into that task. Granted, she’d never tried writing a book, but she couldn’t figure out what was holding him back. It seemed as though it should be relatively simple; he’d already written a lot of it, now all he had to do was make the changes his editor had requested and finish the rest.
A short while later, she helped him carry the newly assembled bookcase into the office. As he’d said, the new case fit well on the opposite wall from her old one, and the style worked nicely with the room. She took a few books from the old case and arranged them on the new one, and she had to admit that it looked better not having her books so crowded together.
“I should probably start studying,” she said, then waved a hand toward the desk that was almost buried beneath his notes and papers. “And now that you’ve taken care of my storage problem, you should start your own work. I don’t like thinking that taking care of me is keeping you from the things you need to do.”
Liam frowned. “I’m handling it.”
She glanced at the overflowing wastebasket beneath the desk, the many scraps of paper on which he’d scribbled an idea, then crumpled and discarded. “Looks like you’re having a little trouble. Are you sure there’s nothing I can do to help?”
“I’m sure. Go study. I’ll start working in here.”
Though she wasn’t entirely reassured by his tone, she nodded and left the room to make a fresh pot of coffee before diving into her material.
For the next three hours, Anne studied without a break, looking up only to refill her coffee cup. The material was new, and therefore confusing, and it didn’t help that Liam couldn’t seem to sit still in the other room. She heard him walking around, maybe looking out the window. Twice he came through to the kitchen, muttering an apology for disturbing her. Once he got a cup of coffee, the other time a soda and a handful of grapes.
She didn’t think he got any work done. Resting her chin in her hand when a noise distracted her again, she glanced toward the office. He’d left the door open, and she could see him sitting at the desk. He had made a game out of tossing and catching the purple beanbag cat she kept on the corner of her desk. He was probably unaware that she could see him from her chair, and probably had no clue that his restlessness was affecting her studies. It didn’t, usually.
A few minutes later, he wandered into the room again. “Can I get you anything? Something to drink? A snack?”
She glanced at her watch. “It will be dinnertime soon.” And she’d gotten precious little accomplished.
“Oh, yeah. I guess you’re right. I’ll start dinner—what would you like?”
“You don’t have to cook, Liam. We can order a pizza or something.”
“If that’s what you’d rather have.”