Miranda's acquaintance with this life has happened in the same span as James', and yet she feels as though change has come over her more slowly than he. Every time he strides through her front door (their door, but she finds she cannot help but think of the house with a sense of possession), the man he's made himself into sloughs away a little more slowly. The transformation is, perhaps, more dramatic when one encounters more of the world--or she simply spends too much time with herself to see more alteration than the calluses her palms have developed.
"I have not," she agrees, letting the words sit lightly between them as she sets the kettle on the pothook. The last brick of tea is not more than half gone, each little crumble of leaves having been steeped and resteeped more than once; the price is too dear, and James' comings and goings too unpredictable, to risk using it up quickly. She learned that lesson in the first year.
Leaving the water to heat, she comes back to the table, and to the gift he's brought. The pointed envelopes bear the names of plants, written in a careful hand; she lifts and looks at each packet in turn before setting it back on the tabletop. When she is finished, she looks up at Flint, one hand smoothing over his coat, and the familiar chest beneath it. "Thank you. I trust it was a good voyage?"
He might touch her hand then - catch her knuckles between his palm and the span of his collarbone. There could be some tender instance there. Instead, he grins and his hand doesn't float up from the chair back where it's settled. These are early days yet, and good humor and some element of self-satisfaction is a more honest thing in them. Later, when things have grown uneven and lopsided, he'll find the sometimes urge to touch (to cling to) her difficult to master.
But not today.
"It should cover the debts for the refit, in any case." It's better than that, says the certain curve of his mouth. But the particulars are specific to the crew, and there's no need to bore her with them.
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"I have not," she agrees, letting the words sit lightly between them as she sets the kettle on the pothook. The last brick of tea is not more than half gone, each little crumble of leaves having been steeped and resteeped more than once; the price is too dear, and James' comings and goings too unpredictable, to risk using it up quickly. She learned that lesson in the first year.
Leaving the water to heat, she comes back to the table, and to the gift he's brought. The pointed envelopes bear the names of plants, written in a careful hand; she lifts and looks at each packet in turn before setting it back on the tabletop. When she is finished, she looks up at Flint, one hand smoothing over his coat, and the familiar chest beneath it. "Thank you. I trust it was a good voyage?"
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But not today.
"It should cover the debts for the refit, in any case." It's better than that, says the certain curve of his mouth. But the particulars are specific to the crew, and there's no need to bore her with them.