Hazel shifted beside him.
“Is your foot hurting you, Hazel? Do you need to sit down?”
“No, Duncan, but I am scared.”
He looked at her. “Scared of what?”
“What if you don’t love me? What if you can’t? What if I give up my school to simply be a discussion partner and a comfort to you?”
“You do not want to be a discussion partner or a comfort to me?” He was feeling the cracks in his brain again.
“Do you love me, Duncan?”
“Yes.”
She looked at him, surprised. “You are so sure?”
“You think I do not know what love is?” Duncan asked, feeling as though he was starting to understand what Hazel meant.
“I worry that, yes. I worry that I will give up my independence to come back to the life we shared, and it—”
“Love is when I used to wake up in the morning and look forward all day to coming home from the office to see you again.”
Duncan did not like to interrupt people when they were talking, though sometimes he did when he was very excited to say something regarding the conversation. This interruption was different. This was the most important interruption he had ever made.
“It is Da teaching me everything he knew about numbers. And Catherine taking care of me after Da died. And Delores keeping my dinner warm. Love is giving Elizabeth her full portion of fish even when I am hungry for it myself, and forgiving you for leaving Ipswich because I want you to be happy more than I want me to be happy.”
Hazel was still looking at him. “Is it finding a cobbler who can make me a new boot?”
He looked at her feet, but her long skirts covered her shoe. “Do you need a different cobbler? Did Mr. Leavitt do a poor job repairing your boot after you stepped on Elizabeth’s tail and bent the braces?”
“No, the boot is excellent.”
Duncan relaxed. He had interviewed every cobbler in Ipswich to find the one who could best help Hazel. Mr. Leavitt was the most proficient, and Duncan did not know how he would find a better one.
“I love you too, Duncan. As it turns out, the year we spent together was the happiest time of my life.”
“Forty-nine weeks and two days,” he corrected.
“Yes,” she said, her tone lighter. “The forty-nine weeks and two days we spent together was the happiest time of my life.”
Hazel leaned toward him and lifted her chin. He resisted pulling away and instead kept his face very still until he realized she wanted to kiss him. In order for that to happen, he would have to lean down because she was too short to make up the difference, and because of her deformed foot, she could not stand on her toes, which was the typical way a person made up for their personal height deficits.
Duncan bent his head toward her and took a breath a moment before her lips touched his. It was like their wedding kiss all over again, except it was different too. He took a step closer to her, and then his hands were on either side of her face and her hands were holding his wrists, and the kiss changed even though he had not made the conscious decision for it to change.
He moved his arms around her back and pulled her close, and her arms came around his neck, and he pulled her closer still, and the kiss changed even more, and his body became filled with overwhelming sensations he did not want to run away from.
A sound came from Hazel, and he pulled his mouth back from hers, but he did not let her go. “Am I hurting you?” he asked.
She sighed a breathy kind of laugh. “No, Duncan. You never have hurt me, and I do not believe you ever will. Let tonight be a new start for us. Let us build a life we can enjoy to its fullest.”
He kissed her again and let the sensations set the pace of what had become, without a doubt, the very best day of his life.
Someone to see you, ma’am.”
Hazel took hold of the outer wheel of her bath chair and pulled it back sharply, causing the chair to pivot so that she faced the doorway where the nurse stood, holding a bundle of blanket that squirmed slightly in her arms. Hazel engaged the brake so the chair would not shift and put out her arms. “Thank you, Marjorie.”
The nurse crossed the distance and transferred Baby Leon to Hazel’s arms. She looked into the squinched face of her infant son and pulled down the blanket covering his chin.
“How is my darling boy this afternoon?” she cooed. Changing the tone of her voice, she addressed the nurse. “Would you take me into the parlor? I’ll wait for Mr. Penhale there.”
Marjorie walked behind the chair, released the brake, and took hold of the handles before pushing Hazel to the other side of the house where the winter sun shone warm through the western windows.
Hazel and Duncan had talked of acquiring a different house, and yet they were happy enough here at Lavender House that the talk never resulted in action. With Duncan sharing her bedchamber on the main level, the baby and nurse could take the upstairs rooms. Duncan’s green chair was now in the parlor, even though it did not match the other furniture, and Elizabeth’s couch was in the servant’s parlor, where the cat spent a great deal of her time. She and Cook got along quite well.
Though Hazel had sworn she would never use a bath chair, pregnancy had softened the ligaments of her hips and thrown off her center of gravity. She had talked to Dr. Randall about her options, and Duncan had found the bath chair in a single afternoon. She’d thought once the baby was born that she would dispose of the chair, but she loved holding her son when she was sitting. And she found that when she spent some of her day in the chair, walking for the other parts of the day was easier.
She and Duncan took “walks” together on fine days, him pushing her from behind and explaining every detail of the time they had been apart—who he had visited, what work he’d done that day, what updated reports and articles he’d read about the Stockton and Darlington railway system. He still did not have enough work to fill his office hours, but he was content with the work he did have and enjoyed the freedom his lower obligations gave him.
Hazel’s initial awkwardness at having people look at them when they were out of the house faded until she barely noticed it anymore. Sometimes she worried about what her son would think of his odd parents as he grew, but she was increasingly at peace with the idea that if she could see through Duncan’s peculiarities and he could see past her physical limitations and they could love each other well, surely their son would learn to love their beautiful imperfections too.
The nurse left Hazel sitting in front of the window but close enough to the bellpull so Hazel could call if she needed something. With the afternoon light falling on her, Hazel nursed Leon, content in a way that still felt impossible to her sometimes.