He says a word that sounds like “elk” but if, like, a sick person said it.
“What?” Callum asks, scrunching up his nose.
“Älg,” he repeats. “It means elk, but it’s not the elk that you know. It’s actually a moose.”
“So your nickname is moose?” Thyme asks.
“Like in the Archie Comics,” Rosemary says.
“Why moose?” I ask.
He grins at me. “Have you ever seen a moose, especially a young one? They’re all legs with a big head. Growing up, that was just like me. Of course, now that I’ve gotten older this head is…” he trails off and looks at the kids, “well, my head, seems pretty normal.”
“Except what’s in the inside,” Callum giggles.
“Callum, please,” I beg.
“No, he’s right,” Viktor says good-naturedly. “Long legs, big head, a little crazy. Seems like a moose to me.” He takes a step back from the pot and wipes his hands on the apron. “Hey, Callum, how about you add the paprika at the end, the finishing touch.”
Callum looks so proud to be chosen, he can barely get out of his chair fast enough.
Viktor holds a mound of the red spice in his hand and lowers it for Callum who carefully takes a pinch. For one long, agonizing moment I swear I can see the wheels in Callum’s head turning, evil wheels, ones that are telling him to blow the mound of dusty paprika all over Viktor’s pristine white shirt.
Please no, I think to myself.
And Callum actually looks over at me with a tiny smile like he can hear what I’m thinking and suddenly I’m struck by how much he looks like that creepy kid at the end of The Omen. I swear I hear the demonic Latin chanting, Ave Satani!
Then he stands on his toes and sprinkles the pinch of paprika into the pot.
“Voila,” he says proudly. “Mac and cheese by moi.”
“Your French is very good,” Viktor says. “Now we eat.”
I breathe a sigh of relief and get up to start helping him serve.
“Sit Maggie,” Viktor commands.
“Yeah sit Maggie, woof,” Callum says.
“Not what I meant,” Viktor chides him and then nods at me to sit down as he grabs the pot from the stove. “Maggie, please. Just relax for once. There’s no cow on the ice tonight.”
“Cows?” Callum asks.
“It’s, what do you call it, an inside thing between us,” Viktor explains.
I sit down, both loving and hating the feeling of him doting on me. I’m so used to doing everything all the time that to actually just sit and be served food like this makes me feel like I’m royalty here and not the other way around.
And once again I’m reminded that, holy shit, he’s a fucking prince.
“Where’s April?” Thyme asks, grinning up at Viktor like she’s got a mad crush on him as he doles out the incredible looking pasta onto her plate.
“April!” I holler. I know I heard her get out of the bathroom a while ago.
I guess the strength of my bellow surprises Viktor because he says, “Wow. That’s a set of lungs.”
“Comes with the territory.”
“I’ll get her,” Rosemary says, getting out of her chair and running up the stairs. By the time Viktor has poured the two of us wine and the kids all have juice, she comes back, alone. “She’s not coming.”
I sigh heavily. This hurts. I don’t know why this does in particular but I feel like this is her way of telling me to fuck off again. It’s obvious I like Viktor and that this means a lot to me that he’s here and doing this for all of us.
“Should I go talk to her?” Viktor says, poised to get up.
“No,” I say quickly at the same time Rosemary says, “Big mistake.”
“I think she’s sore that you beat up her boyfriend,” Thyme offers.
“He wasn’t her boyfriend,” I tell her. “He was just a big jerk.”
“That’s one way of putting it,” Viktor says under his breath. Then he smiles at everyone and raises his wine glass. “Smaklig måltid!” he says. “Which means have a nice meal.”
We all raise our glasses and clink against each other’s and I look into Viktor’s eyes and he looks into mine and I hope he can see just how touched, just how happy I am, that this is happening. I know April and Pike aren’t here, I know I felt like charity at the beginning but now, now I just feel what it’s like to just be normal for once.
Of course, the food is absolutely amazing. I know you wouldn’t expect too much with mac and cheese but with the spices and the chorizo and the cheese, it’s melting me inside.
“I think you really are the Swedish Chef,” Callum says after a few bites, cheese dripping from his mouth. “Hurdy schmerdy!”
“It’s really good,” Thyme says.
“Can you cook for us every day?” asks Rosemary. She’s serious too.
“Sadly, Viktor has to leave for LA at the end of the week,” I tell them. “He’s flying back to Stockholm.”
In unison, all of their faces fall.
“Bummer,” Thyme says.
“But,” Viktor says, wiping his mouth with a napkin, “we still have a lot of time to get to know each other. You were asking me questions earlier, so I think it’s time I ask you the questions.”
And then he proceeds to ask the twins and Callum questions about themselves. Mainly trivial questions, but questions nonetheless. The kids feel important, that much I can tell, and even though the food is incredible, there’s more talking at the table than eating.
The way that Viktor listens so intently to each one, his focus completely on them, makes my ovaries want to explode. Add in the fact that he cooked us this damn meal, he’s wearing a suit, his forearms are golden and rippling with strength and I now know what running my fingers through his hair feels like, it presses a small ache in between my ribs.
I want this man so much, I don’t even have words for it.
And I’m not sure I’ll even get a chance to have him before he leaves.
He doesn’t belong to me.
He belongs to another country.
And I’ll be left behind in mine.
As if sensing my thoughts, he turns his head to look at me and once again the breath is knocked out of me. He is so damn gorgeous it makes me want to cry.
“And you, Maggie,” he says to me. “What’s your favorite flower?”
Is this where the conversation turned?
But I don’t even have to think.
“Lavender,” I tell him, my eyes falling on the pot I put in the middle of the table. Forever lavender.
When we’re all finished eating I tell the kids to go in the living room and watch some TV while Viktor and I clean up in the kitchen.
They take off like rockets. Usually I have them help me with clean-up but since Viktor is here, I want time with him alone.
“I suppose I should have brought dessert,” Viktor says as he starts filling up the sink with dish soap and warm water. We’ve never had a dishwasher, so you can imagine the amount of dishes there always were to do in this house. “Your brother and sisters would have liked that, maybe a pie of some kind.”
I grab a dish towel and lean back against the counter beside him, ready to dry. “You did enough,” I tell him. “Those kids are over the moon with you.”
He glances at me with a smirk. “Over the moon?”
“It means to be, I don’t know, not quite in love but…enamored. Charmed. In such a huge way that the moon somehow gets involved.”
He chuckles softly, the sound spreading warmth through me. “And you, are you over the moon with me?”
Well that puts me on the spot.
I give him a shy smile. “The moon doesn’t seem big enough. I might be over the sun.”
He studies me for a moment, his gaze sinking deep into mine. I see enough longing and heat in his eyes that I don’t feel silly for my admission. “I don’t think anyone’s been over the sun for me before,” he muses.
“I’m sure they would be if you cooked them a meal like you did.”
“The way to your heart is through your stomach,” he says with a nod. “I shall keep that in mind.”
You’ve already found your way to my heart, I think and for once, the thought doesn’t scare me. Tonight, I feel emboldened.
Yet when he hands me a wet dish, my eyes focus on drying it, afraid to look at him. He’s so close, his elbow and arm brushing mine as he works, that gorgeous scent of his mixed with the lavender and the lemon dish soap are burning a memory in my head. My skin feels tight and hot and the nerves in my stomach dance in a constant conga line. Every part of me feels alive.
The fact that I think I’m falling for him doesn’t scare me but what does scare me is what happens after that.
“So, when does the interview start?” he asks after a long bout of silence.
Oh right. That.
The truth is, I don’t want to write about this dinner even though that was his intention. I feel like what I witnessed tonight, the quiet charming moments between him and my family, I want to keep that just for me.
“Tomorrow,” I tell him. “It starts tomorrow.”
“So then what is tonight?” There’s gravity to his voice, the low tone making electricity burn in my stomach.
I look up at him and try to read his gaze. “I guess we’re just getting to know each other,” I say. Because what can I say? That this is a date? A date with me and my brothers and sisters? I don’t think so.
He nods in response, hands me another dish.
We work together in silence but it’s comfortable. It’s the kind of silence that lets you be lost in your head without having to explain your thoughts, the kind that tricks you into believing you’re deep in the stages of domesticated bliss.
And I am lost in my thoughts. Thoughts about him, the kids, my life, my future, that it takes me a moment to notice that we’re done and Viktor is taking off his apron. He’s standing right in front of me, folding it in his hands, and staring at me with such intensity that I feel like I might have missed something, like he was saying something before and I didn’t hear him. Something heated. Something I want to hear.