Love Me Once, Love Me Twice

"Again, nothing worth doing is easy," Anna pointed out. Then, softening, she said, "No one's saying you have to do it all at once. Change is hard. It's always hard. If you could adapt in an instant, you'd be a force to fear."

"You think so?" Alex wondered if it was really okay for him to be the way he was. From what she was saying, he should probably put some more thought into how he treated himself, but the idea that he was taking advantage of his wife's image to punish himself made him feel guilty.

"Don't you?" Anna answered him with another question. "It's not what I think that matters. I can tell you whatever it is that you think you need to hear, but at the end of the day, it's whatever is going on in your own head that's going to matter." With a wry smile, she added, "For most people, their greatest enemy is themselves."

And hadn't she experienced that firsthand only a little while ago? She'd experience it over and over again, perpetually in a cycle of growth, evolution, collapse, and more growth.

Alex wasn't sure how to reply to her, given that she'd made several really good points in succession. It was impressive, but also nerve-wracking. Wasn't he the one that was older? And by many centuries on top of that? Why on earth was he being schooled by someone that hadn't even broken three decades yet? And still, he couldn't protest the sense in her speech.

Perhaps he'd been getting too wrapped up in repentance to really see the way forward. He wasn't sure. There was too much here for him to absorb.

The scent of melted butter and marinara drew him from his thoughts as David approached with a carefully balanced tray in his hands. With practiced hands, the Eastern man was quick to place the plates before them on the table, just out of reach of the curious puppies. The glasses were placed, then the silverware.

"Let me know if you need anything else!" he said cheerfully before swiftly stepping away.

Alex narrowed his eyes at the young man. Was that wisdom? Had he detected the strange atmosphere? Was he just a strange kid?

Anna squealed with glee and he was drawn from his train of thoughts once more as she immediately pulled out her phone to take a picture of her plate.

"Oh my gosh, look at this, it's so cute!"

Bemused, he looked.

Ah.

The grilled cheese sandwich had come neatly sliced in half with one half artfully leaning on the other. Both halves had been stamped with paw prints. Now that he knew to look for it, he saw that his sandwich also had paw prints neatly imprinted into the bread.

"It's cute," he acknowledged, a glimmer of amusement slipping back into his tone now that the conversation had changed topics.

She put her phone away, satisfied with her images, even as she beamed at him. "It's almost a shame to eat it! But man, they really know how to stick to their theme, don't they? Even the soup bowl has cute little paw prints around the edges!��

"It's safe to say whoever chose the dishes did a better job than whoever, ah…" Alex stopped himself from continuing, not wanting to offend anyone, regardless of whether they knew or not. Things that weren't kind weren't worth saying, right?

"Yeah, the menus are insane," Anna picked up right where he left off. "I wonder if that was a contractor job or if they just kind of slapped it together. I bet they regretted it! Still, it doesn't take too much away from the overall color scheme of this place, you know? Bright, happy - it kind of makes sense."

He hummed, not wanting to outright declare an opinion, and instead picked up the rather sizable mug of coffee David had brought. It was accompanied by several miniature tubs of creamer and packets of sugar, but he ignored them both. He'd long since grown used to the flavor of black coffee.

"You're probably the type that thinks cilantro tastes refreshing, aren't you?" Anna accused him as she took a delicate sip of her milk. Her classy image lasted for a whole five seconds before she picked up the first half of her grilled cheese sandwich and dunked it into her tomato soup. Pleased with the taste, she hummed in contentment.

"It's very refreshing," Alex agreed. "I assume it's bitter for you?"

"Super bitter," she agreed immediately. "I can't handle asparagus either. Some things just weren't made for regular people's taste buds."

"I would argue that most people find cilantro to be tasty than not," Alex put forth his argument.

"The opinions of the tastefully challenged aren't valid," she said loftily as she viciously chomped another bite out of her sandwich.

Alex laughed outright, startled by this part of her. "I'm sure all of your opinions are valid," he teased.

"Naturally," she told him happily. "Otherwise I wouldn't share them!"

He blinked at her, even more surprised by this.

Seeing that he didn't understand what she meant, Anna went on to explain, "I try not to make bold statements if I can't back them up," she told him. "Or else I'd just look like an idiot all the time, you know? So I might not talk about a whole lot of things, but it's probably because I don't know enough about it to have an informed opinion. There's no point in just throwing feelings into logical debates, so it's better to just observe and learn things!"

Well.

She wasn't wrong about that, but that perspective in and of itself wasn't exactly a common one.

"You don't ever get tired of listening to others?" he asked her curiously. "That seems like it would be tiresome."

"Better to be a quiet sage than a loud fool," Anna shrugged. She took a sip of milk and licked her lips to catch the droplets of milk that might have made a mustache if she wasn't paying attention.

Which, okay, she wasn't wrong about that either. "You're too smart for me to keep up with," Alex sighed. "How am I supposed to win you over if you're so quick-witted?"

Astonished that he would declare his intentions so openly, Anna stared at him in shock. How bold!

She carefully put the bite of grilled cheese she'd been angling to pop into her mouth back down on the plate and neatly wiped her fingers on a napkin. Then, she took a moment to gather her thoughts so she wouldn't open her mouth and start rambling.

Noticing the sudden quiet, Alex asked, "Too much?" From the gentle tone he was using, it was obvious to her that he was nervous, afraid that she might react in a way unfavorable to him.

"Too blunt," she said after another pause. In a more stern, serious voice, she told him, "I didn't expect you to say something like that so soon after I told you not to treat me like your deceased wife."

He smiled at her. It was a small smile, but genuine. She was shocked at the way it transformed his expression, adding a boyish charm to his typically angular face.

"I don't intend to," he reassured her. "But you're a very interesting young woman, both intelligent and attractive. Your strength of will is not bad."

Anna wasn't sure which part of that she wanted to address first and so she asked him, "Isn't it a bit quick to be making that sort of judgment call about me?"

"I'm very confident in my choice," Alex said smoothly. She stared as dimples appeared in his cheeks. It simply wasn't fair for anyone to be able to go from a classy kind of attractive to straightforwardly cute. "You have been sincere in all of our interactions and I can see that you are not a bad person." He shrugged. "I think I could have done a lot worse than you, but you're the one that agreed to live with me. I've got three years to win you over."

Anna didn't know whether to laugh or cry. She'd been talking with him every day and they'd exchanged many thoughts and stories, but she certainly hadn't intended for this kind of result! She wasn't even looking for a boyfriend! She just wanted to get through the next three years without too many troubles! And dating the person that's practically your boss is! Never! A! Good! Idea!

She'd gotten enough glimpses of terrible dramas to know that it was a bad idea! And she had more important things to focus on! Like herself!

Anna had already decided that she was going to cultivate herself in to a better person, bit by bit. This was… a major distraction! Naturally, she wasn't happy about it, but she also didn't want to be rude or cruel.

"I'm not interested," she said hesitantly. "I've got a lot of things on my plate right now."

"That's okay," Alex replied quickly. "I'm willing to wait."

Too swift! His answer was too swift!

Worried that he was still fixating on her, she pointed out, "Three years is a long time. You could meet a lot of people in that time."

"So could you," he smiled at her with those same dimpled cheeks. "And I only have three years, so I must make my intentions known right away and earnestly pursue you."

"But I don't want to be pursued," Anna said, appalled.

"I won't ask you for anything you don't want to give," Alex promised her. "You said we could start as acquaintances and then maybe work our way up to friendship and more. We're acquaintances right now, just like you said, but I don't want to leave you with any misconceptions about what my goal is."

What misconceptions?! He'd just made it very clear what he wanted!

Anna had the strangest sense of terror slip through her, as though she were a small creature looking up at a massive snake.

"Y-you—" she stuttered out, not sure what words were trying to crawl out of her hapless mouth.

"Don't worry," Alex told her earnestly. "I'm going to do my very best."