"Just you wait." I laughed as we moved to the next table. "Breakfast potatoes break my damn heart. Every time. I want them to work for me, but they are almost always sautéed with onions and garlic, which is the quickest way to put the irritable in irritable bowel."
"Ew." The server stationed behind the table cringed with her entire body.
"Sorry," I said to her. "We have no filter when it comes to these things."
"With some things, we do," Sebastian said, staring at my legs. "Not with inflammatory gastric diseases."
"This is why we can't go places," I said to him.
"We can't go places because you're picky. Don't change the game while we're playing it." He hooked his hand in the crook of my elbow. "So, no potatoes for you," he said, depositing some on his plate. "Bet we're skipping the sausage and bacon too."
"I can't even think about sausage," I said, moving ahead to the breads and pastries. "That kind of grease is terrible for me, but the idea of sausage—no." My shoulders pitched up as my stomach twisted. I had to press a hand to my mouth. "I can't even think about it."
"Do not cause your own problems, Shap," he called. "We are not doing that today."
"All of this is a problem I've caused," I said. "It's not lost on me that the reward for twenty years of disordered eating is a lifetime of disordered eating, but now it's mandatory, and instead of counting carbs I count dried cranberries so I don't overdo it on acid, all because of what I did to myself in those twenty years."
"I'm all for wallowing in misery, but you gotta knock that shit off," he said. "We all fuck ourselves up in a million different ways. That we live to tell about it is the reward."
"Are you always this moral in the morning?"
He dragged his gaze from my sandals to my shorts and up to my loose top. "Not always," he said.
Since I didn't know what to do with that heavy stare, I gave the pastries a thorough study, using a pair of tongs to peer at items I didn't immediately recognize. "None of this," I said, wagging the tongs. "If I'm not reasonably certain of the ingredients, there's no way I'm touching it. That's how I get fucked over by sneaky citrus."
Sebastian stared at the small helping of scrambled egg on my plate. "One more question. No, no, it's not going to give you anxiety," he said when I glared at him. "Calm down. I just want to know what you usually eat in the morning if this is the only thing you've chosen so far."
"Two, please." I gestured to the basket of white bread and the server dropped the slices into the toaster. "You know when you're young and you get stupid drunk on something like Jäger or some silly kind of schnapps? And you puke up your skeleton the next day? And forever after that, you can't go near that alcohol because if you even smell it, you'll remember the trauma of vomiting up your entire rib cage? That's how it is for me with, well, shit, everything. The list of foods that do not have traumatic memories attached—self-inflicted or otherwise—is short. That leaves me with oatmeal, porridge, yogurt, poached eggs. Maybe some stewed apples. Raw apples require a ton of energy to digest. There's a lot of toast."
He reached for an almond croissant, bit into it while I went on inspecting the baked goods.
I pointed at a basket of grainy bread. "Too much going on here. I love it, actually, but all those seeds would make my belly gurgle for at least two days. Do you have any idea what it's like having a gurgly belly for the entirety of a ten-hour surgery? It's an experiment in seeing how many times I can say, 'It's fine. Don't worry. Really, it's fine. No, I don't need anything. Just ignore it.'"
"You're not picky. You're specific. There's a difference."
"Picky is a simpler word for it," I said as we moved toward the French toast and Belgian waffles. He chose one of each.
"Okay, what about fruit? Ruin my day and tell me what you hate about all of these."
"I love raspberries, but the seeds are a disaster. I can't even look at blueberries without getting reflux. Melon and pineapple are good in small quantities. Same with mango and papaya. Guava and I don't get along. Bananas are supposed to be safe but are not, and grapes fuck me up." I added a few strawberries to my plate along with some cantaloupe. "Plain yogurt with honey is my better-day breakfast. It always does me right after a bad day."
He inspected the carton of yogurt I selected. "Okay. I get it."
I trailed my fingertip over the array of tiny jars of honey. I pointed across the room, to the open-air deck far away from the mingled scents of roasted meats and frying egg. "Let's sit out there."
After we settled at the table, Sebastian glanced at me from under those thick lashes. "Was that okay? Did it make you anxious?"
"Not too much." I opened the jar of honey, gave it a sniff. The smell of honey always made me happy. "I know it looks crazy and it probably sounds crazy, but I don't feel crazy when I'm in control of my options. I can come back here tomorrow because I know I can have toast and there's yogurt along with some of the fruits I like. Even if these eggs don't work out, other items will, and then I know I don't have to obsess over how to get through something as basic as breakfast."
When a server swung by the table, Sebastian ordered juice and coffee for himself and hot tea for me.
When she stepped away, I added, "It helped that you weren't a giant asshole about it. I was prepared for that."
Pouring syrup over his French toast, he asked, "Were you prepared because you expect me to be an asshole to you or because you have experience with people being an asshole when you try to tell them what you need?"
I speared a tiny amount of eggs onto my fork. "Little bit of both."
He watched while I sampled the eggs, gave me a questioning nod. I wiggled my shoulders in response. They were all right. Not my favorite, but not bad. Then, he said, "I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," I said, and I meant it. I didn't know what it was about this cease-fire, but I no longer felt like he was doing something to me. Rather, we were doing this to each other. And I didn't feel as though I had to protect myself from everything. "I mean, you can be whatever you want, but you don't have to apologize for that. For any amount of asshole you've given me, I've given you raging bitch right back."
He jabbed his fork in my direction. "Don't say that."
"No, it's okay. That word is complicated, but it's not complicated for me. I know what it means to me and for me," I insisted, tapping a hand to my chest. "It's probably time I explain to you that I have the heart of a savage bitch and I'm quite proud of her. She tells the perfectionist in my head when to sit down and shut up, and she makes me stand up to trauma surgeons who think the only appropriate method of closure is a staple."
He stared at me with a slight smile, his chin resting on his palm. "Is that who I have to thank?"
I rubbed a hand to my sternum. A warm pressure seemed to build there. It heated my cheeks too. "Yes."
"You should know I like her. A lot," he added. "I like it when you show me how strong you are. I think you like it too. You just don't think you should."