“Right. You mentioned your mother. And sisters?”

She nodded. “I have three sisters. I think they’re all married by now.” Thinking about them made her eyes feel scratchy. “I hope they’re happy. I really do. I hope that there’s happiness to be had in all of those things my mom taught us, but I just couldn’t find it. I wanted different. And I couldn’t stand living a life that mistrusted the world so much. Not when I was so interested in all the things in it. And when I think about it... I’m sure that something happened to her to make her feel that way. I mean, I know my father left her, but I wonder if there was more. But she never talked about it, and I could never ask. I never felt like I could ask. I was never brave enough to ask. I was brave enough to leave. But that’s a whole different thing, isn’t it?”

“There’s not always anything good to be had from confrontation,” he said, fixing his own plate. “Sometimes that just ends in bullet wounds.”

There was a comfort in those words. And he was right. There were things that couldn’t be fixed. Gulfs that were too wide to cross. Forgiveness might be possible, but if you and another person woke up every day, looked out at the same sun in the same sky and came to wholly different conclusions, maybe there was only so far it could go.

“My mother wasn’t going to shoot me,” she said.

“You don’t really know.”

“I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t have. But she probably would have yelled. Disowned me. Which I know she did anyway, but I never had to see any of it. It’s awful to have to cut everybody off so entirely though. To protect yourself.”

“It’s too much work,” he said. “Living a life where you have to protect yourself. You ought to live with someone who protects you.”

She looked down at her food. “That’s a very nice sentiment. But I’ve always been my own hero. I wouldn’t say no to Captain America... But he hasn’t shown up yet.”

“Not very American of him.”

She laughed. She couldn’t help it.

He was still shirtless. And she didn’t wish that Captain America was there. She just wanted Clayton. Wasn’t that the darndest thing?

“How old are you?” she asked.

The question just sort of spilled out of her mouth. She wanted to know more about him.

“Thirty-two.”

“Do you have any kids?”

He laughed. Actually laughed. “No.”

“And you don’t want them.”

“No,” he said. “Like I said, I don’t have a place in my life for another person.”

Well, up until this she thought the same about herself. But sitting with him at the kitchen table eating dinner, coming home to a cooked dinner, to chopped wood, to conversation...

It didn’t matter. It didn’t much matter, but she was thankful for this moment that defied her plans all the same. And though he didn’t say it, she had a feeling that he was too. That this moment, with companionship, mattered to him just as much as it did to her.