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Dan lit the soy candle, placed it carefully in the center of the little dining table, and stood back to admire his work.
They never used the dining room, really, but when Alex had moved in, she’d brought with her a small cherry wood table. It stood in the window with its two matching chairs, often decorated with a vase of flowers, looking beautiful.
Most of what Alex had brought with her was beautiful, Dan thought, and he grimaced to think of the paper bag on the kitchen counter, containing the ceramic pieces he’d swept into it a few hours earlier.
He shoved that thought out of his mind and smoothed down a corner of the table runner he’d dug out of the linen closet. It matched the place mats he’d been sure to lay beneath the dinner plates, and he’d placed two wine glasses on teak coasters burnt in with patterns of foliage.
If that didn’t say “I respect the nice things we own and I know how to take care of them,” he didn’t know what would.
Content with his handiwork, Dan returned to the kitchen, where the smells of slow-roasted tomato and basil were wafting out to fill every corner of the house.
The kitchen was sparkling clean. The dishwasher was humming softly, and the cooking dishes sat drying on the rack. Dan had wiped down the counters. He’d put away the groceries—properly, the way Alex did it, without just shoving everything onto one shelf in the fridge. The cheese had gone in the cheese drawer. The new carton of eggs went underneath the old one. He’d even washed and trimmed the herbs and set them out in little jars of water to keep them fresh.
Making dinner had been his plan today, anyway—Alex was out with her family, helping her youngest brother move into his dorm. That had been a big occasion his freshman year, but he was a sophomore now, and it wasn’t like the college was very far away, they’d be seeing him often enough. Alex would be back home for dinner.
No, it was everything else that was the bright idea. Everything Dan could do to get her in a good mood. All potential pet peeves addressed and eradicated. Every “nice touch” on full display. He’d even cleaned the burners on the stove—when was the last time either of them had done that?
Alex had texted about ten minutes ago to say she was on her way, and Dan was a ball of nerves. He remembered with a jolt that he’d planned to make a salad. Cursing to himself, he raced to the fridge and started removing the ingredients he’d so methodically stored.
He rinsed the lettuce and gave it a whirl in the salad spinner, and he was just whisking up a vinaigrette when he heard the sound of the garage door opening. His guts twisted into a knot.
There was a long, nerve-wracked pause, punctuated by the slam of a car door and the rumble of the garage door closing again.
Then Dan heard the door to the mud room swish open, and the jangle of Alex’s keys as she hung them on their hook, like she always did.
“Oh, my god,” came her voice. She sounded tired, but not unhappy. “It smells amazing in here.”
Dan took a deep breath to quell his mounting anxiety. “Hey, babe,” he called.
She entered the kitchen with a pleasant smile. Her dark hair was coiled up into a practical bun. She’d kicked her sneakers off in the mud room—and, Dan knew, set them neatly in their pair on the little rubber mat by the door. She stood in ankle socks, baggy athletic shorts, and an oversized sweatshirt. She held out the hem so Dan could see the logo of her brother’s university printed in large format on the front.
“We hit the book store on the way out,” said Alex. “I got you a pint glass.”
“Oh, nice,” said Dan. “Thanks!”
Alex was surveying the kitchen. “Babe, it looks great in here!”
She came around the island, and he dried his hands on a towel before wrapping one arm around her and pulling her up for a kiss.
She didn’t disengage right away, but leaned her head into the side of his chest. “What are you making?”
“Salad,” he said stupidly, then caught himself. “Oh! And—eggplant parmesan.”
She nearly squeaked. “My favorite!”
She peeled away from him, found a knife and a cutting board, and started slicing up a cucumber. “Dan, seriously, it looks gorgeous in here,” she said. “Did you wash the floor?”
“Yeah,” he said, trying to sound casual.
“And—” Something had caught her eye from the next room. She ducked into the dining room, and Dan heard her give a little gasp.
When she reappeared in the doorway, she was still smiling, but now there was a look in her eye.
A suspicious look.
Dan’s stomach did three somersaults and a back-handspring.
“Okay, mister,” she said. She sounded playful, but the jig was definitely up. “What’s going on?”
Dan focused intently on the garlic press in his hands. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.
“Did I forget an anniversary or something?”
Despite himself, Dan laughed. “Yeah, you forgot our anniversary, and I remembered it.”
She put her hands on her hips. “Well?”
“Can’t I just do something nice for my favorite girlfriend?”
She blinked at him. Her smile thinned. “Yes,” she said slowly, and even though her tone was still pleasant, Dan could hear the no-nonsense undercurrent she was so good at lacing into her words. “Are you just doing something nice?”
Dan considered lying. She hadn’t noticed the paper bag. He could sweep it into the trash. She wouldn’t have to know. Until…
He sighed. Until she went looking for her favorite coffee mug tomorrow morning and found it missing, and Dan would have to say he hadn’t seen it, and she would remember that she’d just used it, and that he was the one who’d done the dishes, because she was so good at remembering annoying details like that, and he’d have to pretend that he’d put it in a weird spot, or lent it to a neighbor, or…
“Daniel?”
It was no use trying to lie to her. She’d see right through him, and then he’d be in even worse trouble than he already was.
Dan set down the garlic press. He bit his lip.
“I have to tell you something,” he said.
She waited.
He ran a hand through his hair. “Sure you don’t want a glass of wine first, or…?”
She raised her eyebrows at him, and he deflated.
“Okay, okay.”
He looked at the paper bag on the counter.
“So I was doing the dishes earlier,” he said. “And, um…” Deep breaths. “You know the, um… that green mug? The one your brother made?”
Alex followed his gaze to the paper bag on the counter. Her eyes went wide.
“It, um… it kind of…” he swallowed. “Broke.”
Alex breathed out a mournful, “Ohhh,” and a shower of misery drenched Dan from head to toe. Not just for the ire that was sure to come his way, but… well, Alex had really loved that mug. She had particular instructions: it was never to go in the dishwasher, and Dan was allowed to use it, of course—he was an adult, and this was his house—but it was not to sit in a pile of dirty dishes for three days; it was to be washed immediately after use.
“It just slipped out of my hand,” said Dan as Alex moved toward the paper bag. “And I had the cast iron pan in there from breakfast, and it just… well… it did not win.”
Alex peered inside the paper bag.
“I thought maybe we could glue it back together,” said Dan. “I saved the pieces. I think I got all of them.”
She had pulled out the wreckage and was surveying it. Dan’s heart twisted to see the detached handle and the two halves of what used to be a lovingly handmade piece of pottery.
Alex turned them over in her hands. “We probably can,” she said. “Looks like it was a pretty clean break. Don’t know how water-tight it’ll be, though.” She sighed. “That’s too bad. Thank you for telling me.”
Dan nodded. He waited with mounting dread for her to pass down the sentence.
Alex looked around, examining her uncharacteristically immaculate surroundings with a slightly puzzled expression. “Is that it?” she asked.
“Um,” said Dan. “Yes?”
She cocked her head at him, and to his astonishment, she gave a little laugh. “All this over a broken mug?”
He fidgeted. “Well, yeah, I mean… I know how much you liked it, and…” He felt a cold prickle in the back of his neck. “And I thought you would… you know…”
She stared at him. “Spank you?”
He grimaced and nodded.
“Dan…!” She put down the pottery pieces and came to stand opposite him, leaning forward on the kitchen island, dark eyes boring into his. “Why would I spank you over a broken mug?”
“But it was your favorite mug, and…”
“Did you do it on purpose?”
“Of course not!”
“Did you disobey me somehow? Did you lie to me about what happened?”
He felt a rush of relief that he hadn’t gone down that route. “No.”
“That’s right.” She pointed a finger at his nose. “You had an accident, and you told me about it, even though you knew I might be hurt. Do we have a rule that says you get spanked just because I’m feeling hurt?”
Most of their rules were fairly specific and involved things like bedtime on work nights. Dan shook his head.
“If we don’t have a rule,” said Alex, “you don’t get spanked. Accidents happen, babe. I’m sad about the mug, but I’m not mad at you.”
His heart lifted. “Really?”
She made an incredulous noise. “I mean, now I’m kind of annoyed that you seemed to think I would be. What do you take me for?”
He opted not to answer that.
She sighed. “No… that’s my fault, not yours. Come here.”
He met her around the counter. She reached up to take him by the shoulders. “I am not mad at you,” she said firmly. “Got it?”
He nodded.
“It was an accident,” she said. “You were being responsible. It’s hard enough to get you to do the dishes—I’d be out of my mind to spank you for it.”
Dan gave a relieved little laugh. “You’re really not mad?” he said.
“No.” She looked around at the sparkling clean kitchen. “Although,” she said, and a devious glint came into her eyes. “In the future, if you have earned yourself a spanking, trying to butter me up like this—” she twirled a finger around, indicating the room at large— “is not going to help your case.” She raised her eyebrows. “You got that?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said quickly.
Alex grinned up at him. She went up for another kiss, and he returned it gratefully, relief pouring over him in waves.
“Okay, get that thing out of the oven,” she said, and she gave him a sharp little swat that he did not mind at all. “I’ve been moving dorm furniture around all day. I’m starving.”
A few minutes later, they sat down to a lovely dinner. Alex had removed the coasters—you didn’t need coasters with wine glasses, silly, but she appreciated the thought. She regaled Dan with stories about move-in day, and how the students all looked so small, and all about the new buildings they’d built since she’d been a student there.
Dan listened and laughed along, absorbing every moment of her, eternally grateful to be enjoying this romantic dinner with no threat of a spanking anywhere on the horizon.
His bottom would live to see another day.