Mr Grant, Please Be Gentle

Blanca took up the lunchbox and walked over to the tea table.

Setting down the meal, Blanca said, “I’m heading back for now. Take your time.”

She was about to leave and had just turned when Matthew grabbed her wrist.

“We’ll eat together.”

“Eh? I’m eating here too?”

Blanca had thought that she was coming and going just like that, but she never thought that Matthew would actually invite her to have lunch with him. After all, he’d complained about how she didn’t pay attention to table manners and kept talking while eating. He should have disliked eating with her.

“Isn’t it normal for a wife to eat with her husband?”

Matthew’s tones were flirtatious and his gaze was teasing.

Blanca’s ears burned. It was true that she was married, but terms like “husband” and “wife” still made her embarrassed.

“Oh.” Blushing, she dipped her head, tucked her dress in, and sat down on the soft, silky rug.

“I’m not comfortable eating on the sofa. You don’t mind me sitting on the rug, right?”

Matthew smiled lightly. “The rug gets dry-cleaned every week and it’s clean. Feel free.”

Blanca beamed. “You’re actually quite nice, Matthew!”

“Oh?” Matthew was somewhat in high spirits, and he looked at her with some interest.

“Yeah! You’re like my Granny!”

“…”Property of Nô)(velDr(a)ma.Org.

What sort of metaphor was that?

Matthew Grant had been lauded with innumerable praise, but that was the first time someone had praised him this way, and his face looked a bit unnatural.

Blanca took the food out and explained. “When I was small, my Granny and I would just eat around a little square table. Granny didn’t have the right chair for me and they were all too tall for me to sit on. It cramped my belly. So Granny just let me sit on the mat and eat and never told me to mind my table manners. Like how you’re spoiling me now.”

As Blanca babbled, Matthew couldn’t help but imagine what kind of life she’d lived with her Granny before.

As he looked at his honest, straightforward wife, an inexplicable tenderness welled up in him.

“While the situation outside may call for it, and you do need to restrain yourself, there’s no need for that before me.”

“All right.” Blanca took up a bit of vegetable on her fork and her eyes shone. “Man, Mrs. Brown is a great cook!”

“Then eat more. I can feel you out better if you get some meat on your bones.”

Blanca was about to nod when she stiffened. Did he mean that she didn’t feel good on the hands now?

Wait, when had he felt her out in the first place…

Blanca thought back to that night she’d first met Matthew. She couldn’t remember what had happened back then. Had they done it or not?

“Er … Matthew, I’ve got a question.”

“Fire away.” Matthew set down his utensils.

As she saw how formal he was, Blanca grew nervous. “You can still eat while we talk.”

“Not my style. Speak. What’s your question?”

Blanca had to set down her own utensils. “So, uh … that night, did the two of us … did we…”

“We did.”

With that, Matthew took up his knife and fork, eating slowly. Then he seemed to remember something and he looked at Blanca, whose face was bright red just likean apple. “If you can’t remember, I don’t mind helping you jog your memory.”