‘What’s that?’ He craned over her shoulder as she slammed the lid down on a large electric waffle iron.
‘Oat waffles. And coffee for you.’ She switched off the coffee machine and put the flask of coffee on the table.
‘You didn’t need to do that.’ He sat down anyway at the place that was laid for him. No one had cooked him breakfast since... Jon’s mind recoiled at the thought. This was nothing like that, it was probably just a thank-you for taking care of Amy.
‘A decent breakfast never did anyone any harm.’
That was obviously a matter of pride with her. Chloe’s fridge was always well stocked with good, fresh food, and he didn’t need to look in the larder to know that there would be fruit and vegetables there.
He poured the coffee, noticing that her cup stood next to the kettle, with the tag from a herbal teabag hanging over the side. Chloe struggled momentarily with the waffle maker, and just as he was about to go and help her she got it open and the waffles out onto two plates.
‘You like bananas?’ She turned to him and Jon nodded. ‘Good.’
A liberal helping of sliced banana, along with kiwi fruit and blueberries went on top of the waffles, and she carried the plates across. One waffle for her and three for him.
‘You’re sure you don’t want any more?’ Jon could eat three. He could probably eat half a dozen, but he didn’t like the idea that she was giving him the lion’s share.
‘No, one’s enough for me.’ A glass jar with home-made nut butter clattered onto the table in front of him in a no-nonsense invitation to help himself. Then Chloe fetched her tea and sat down.
‘These look really good.’ Jon took a mouthful and it tasted even better than it looked. ‘Where’s Amy?’
‘In her playpen, in the sitting room. Let’s see whether we can get breakfast eaten before she realises we’re not paying enough attention to her.’
Chloe managed it, and was halfway out of the front door before Amy started to grizzle. Jon’s fuller plate was only part finished, and he picked it up and walked into the sitting room.
‘It’s just you and me, then, Amy. Let’s see what we can get up to today.’
* * *
Despite all Chloe’s misgivings, they’d fallen into a routine that worked. Every morning, she ignored Jon’s assertions that he’d probably stumble across something that would pass for breakfast later and made a proper breakfast for all of them. And every morning he cleared his plate and said that he might be tempted into getting used to this.
Each evening was different, too. Someone to ask about her day, and give an account of how Amy had fed the ducks in the park, or almost managed to sneak a packet of chocolate buttons out of the supermarket without paying.
Amy was beginning to settle, and wasn’t waking up so many times during the night. Jon and Amy had become firm friends. He talked to her all the time, and just the sound of his voice was enough to have her gazing wide-eyed into his face. Chloe sometimes envied her niece the privilege of looking at him so unashamedly when her own glances at Jon were so often stolen. The way Amy had no hesitation about being close to him, steadying herself against his legs as she heaved herself up into his lap, curling up there while he read the paper or a book.
But there was one, magic hour. After Amy was in bed, and when the house was quiet, they sat together in the kitchen, talking about everything and nothing. Jon spent two evenings assembling a moon and stars mobile to hang over Amy’s cot that somehow failed to catch Amy’s eye but which Chloe gazed at every night before she closed her eyes to go to sleep.
* * *
‘She doesn’t like my cookies, then?’ Breakfast at six on a Saturday morning made jumbo sized cookies with elevenses all the more welcome. But Amy had licked the icing off hers and thrown the rest on the floor.
‘Maybe she’s just
saving the world as we know it.’ Jon took his second cookie from the plate, and Amy started to make loud explosive noises, clapping her hands together.
‘Ah. And who taught her how to do that?’
‘If you’re going to make Dalek cookies, you can’t expect them not to fight a bit before you eat them.’ He bit off the Dalek’s head, rolling his eyes at Amy, while the little girl crowed with glee. ‘Although I’ve never seen a pink Dalek before.’
‘The pink ones are the ones you have to look out for. Much more dangerous. And when I looked in the cupboard for some colouring for the icing, I only had pink.’
‘That explains it.’ He broke off a piece of his cookie, handing it to Amy, and she put it in her mouth and then spat it back out again. ‘Actually, I don’t think she does like them. I’ll just have to finish them off myself.’
‘I’ll make some more. That’s the last of them.’
He grinned, leaning back in his chair and reaching for the paper. ‘I’ll get blue food colouring when we go shopping.’
‘Aren’t you going to your house?’ Chloe had expected to be alone with Amy today, but instead Jon had gone out for the paper and seemed ready for a lazy Saturday.