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“Templeton, please.” Her silky, smooth voice laced itself through his ears, down his spine, spurring his legs back to her. A banging in his head and an ache in his joints made him want to burrow in his home, but something in her voice always brought him back to her.
He rolled his eyes. “What is it, Charlotte?”
“Come with us.” She almost whispered, her tone soft and warm.
A searing heat cut through his chest. Yes. “No.” He said.
She smiled. “Are you sure?”
He tilted his head, giving her a little smile himself. No, I’m not. “Yes, I’m pretty sure.”
She laughed, and his ears perked up. It rang like bells, like music. “What if I have a good reason?”
“And what would that be, Ms. Charlotte?”
“I’m worried.”
“And that’s supposed to spur my old, aching heart for this cause?”
She smiled again. “No… I’m not expecting you to share in my worry, or to worry over my worry.” The glint and shine in her eyes told Templeton that she was amused. By her own little spiel, no doubt. He found no humor in it, but derived pleasure from the effect it had on her.
You’re wrong. “You’re right.”
Her smile only brightened at his verbal confirmation, and he idly wondered, for a second, if he liked that, or if he didn’t. “It’s Wilbur that I expect you to worry about.” She simply said.
He shook his head. “I could not care any less for that creature.”
“Oh, but you run errands for him.”
“For food.”
“You suffered peckings for him.”
“For food.”
“You spent a long night finding that perfect word for him.”
For you. “For food.”
She smiled. “Then what if I say that there is food?”
Then my answer would not change. “That certainly makes it tempting.”
“So you say yes, then?”
I would have said yes, regardless. “Yes, I say yes.”
She smiled at him, and he stared at her. At her happy eyes. At the curve of her mouth. At her lips.
“Why do you worry for him so much?” He asked, the words slipping out of his mouth faster than the thoughts processing in his mind.
“How could I not?”
“Why should you?”
“Why shouldn’t you?”
“What about…you?”
Be selfish…like me, for once.