I felt so comfortable moving around the room that before I knew it I was making biscuits to go with his eggs and sausage with homemade potatoes.
I looked down at my floury hands and back at him, not quiet sure how I’d got there. He wasn’t saying anything so I figured it was okay as we kept up our running conversation about school and my plans after the summer.
I was about to ask him where Trudy was when I pulled the biscuits from the oven, but heard her tread just then, coming down the stairs. My body started to tense but I fought it off.
Maybe if I open a dialogue things would ease between us. “Good morning Trudy, would you like me to make you something?”
“You’re not her servant. She can make her own breakfast.” Boy, if he dislikes her this much, why is she here again? I wish I’d paid more attention during that job interview.
She huffed, gave me the stink eye and moved to the coffee pot. I decided not to let her mood bother me as I sat at the table where I had the night before, after serving him.
“Another cup, of coffee?” He took my cup and refilled it along with another one for himself, even grabbing the juice I’d forgotten and bringing it to the table.
Everything tasted amazing. In fact it was the best meal I’d ever made and I don’t remember ever making biscuits before, or even knowing how to.
I shrugged it off as nothing more than the influence of being here in this place that felt more and more like home the longer I was here.
Noelle
It would be hard I imagine not to get caught up in the history that laid so heavily over the place. Almost like walking back and forth between now and then.
That didn’t explain me knowing how to make biscuits, or the wild urge to cook something else for him to put that look of appreciation on his face.
“Would it be okay if I cook sometimes?” He’d said that the housekeeper who’d been absent yesterday for whatever reason, usually did the cooking.
“Whatever you want is fine.” Damn, he’s so easy! Trudy grunted from her place at the other end of the table where she was busy sipping coffee and shooting daggers at me with her eyes.
He seems to have practice ignoring her presence, an art I’m going to have to learn soon. There is something seriously wrong with that female.
Just then the baby’s cries came through the monitor and I got up to go see to her. I have no explanation for the rush of excitement I felt as I lifted her from her cradle.
“Good morning sweetheart, did you sleep well? Huh pretty baby?” I nuzzled her warm cheek, inhaling her scent as she chuckled. “What a good baby!”
I changed her soiled diaper and put it in the bin with the others to be washed later. Another one of my duties that I’d silently scoffed at during the interview.
But now that I was here in this magical place I saw the incongruity of store bought pampers in a place like this. Of course she needs cloth nappies.
I cooed and laughed with her, tickling her round little tummy as she kicked her legs and garbled at me. “Who’s a good girl?”
I took her downstairs for her first bottle and she went nuts when she saw her daddy. I took her to him and wondered at the look on his face when I passed her to him.
Then I saw the light of the monitor. He’d heard it all. I would’ve been embarrassed if not for the look of appreciation he gave me, and the silent ‘thank you’ he formed with his lips as he nuzzled his daughter’s cheek.
Callan insisted on giving the baby her bottle before he left, but not before giving a very strange look to Trudy who seemed to understand the silent message very well as she made herself scarce the rest of the day.
The next few days followed pretty much the same pattern. Except my cooking skills seemed to improve with the help of the recipe books in the kitchen as well as some modern tips from Ella, the housekeeper slash jack-of-all-trades.
It was also from her that I learned a little bit more about the McCormick family and their standing in the community going back to the early nineteenth century.
The house I was standing in now was the second one built on the spot. The first had been partially burnt in a suspicious fire, supposedly by the wife of one of the past owners.
Her stories were fascinating and awe inspiring, especially the ones rich in the family’s history. It was Callan’s great-great-great grandfather a couple times removed, whose wife had burnt his home to the ground.
As the story goes, he’d been in love with someone else, but the wife was more suitable and so the family made him marry her.