Page 79 of Babies for the Boss
“Igor.”
“There is also a collection on mid-century theater,” he continues, “which seemed more directly applicable to her background, given?—”
“Igor.”
He looks up. His face is exactly where it always is, which is composed and attentive and giving nothing away, except that I have known this face for eleven years, and I know that he’s hiding something.
He likes her.
I consider saying more. I look at Igor’s face doing its careful nothing, and I think about the fact that he hasn’t shown interest in a woman since his wife died six years ago.
“The photography collections are excellent. Good recommendation.”
Something in Igor’s expression shifts by a fraction—not relief exactly, but the adjustment of a man whose perimeter has been approached and not breached. “She was also asking about the property,” he says, returning to his notes. “Whether there were other houses nearby, what the community is like. She seems to be considering the area.”
“Is she?”
“So it appeared.”
I pick up my pen again. “That would be good. For Molly. The kids.”
“Agreed,” Igor says, and we return to the morning’s items, and neither of us says anything further about it.
We work through the remainder of the operational items, and then Igor sits back in the chair with a slight change in posture that signals we have transitioned from business to the marginally less formal territory. He looks at the brownie on the corner of my desk, which Molly left there this morning.
“You’ve gained weight,” Igor says.
I look up from the page I’m reviewing. “Not significantly. But some.” I look at him with the look I give situations that do not require a response. “You bring this up because…?”
“It’s the brownies,” he says, with the thoughtful consideration of a man working through a problem. “I’ve noticed you take one every time she makes them, which has been—” He appears to calculate. “Considerable frequency, lately.”
“Igor.”
“I’m simply observing?—”
“Igor.”
“You should tell her.”
“Tell her what, exactly? That I hate chocolate? That the thing she loves to make to blow off stress is the thing I cannot stand to eat most in the world?” I set the page down. I look at the brownie on the corner of my desk. I’ve been eating Molly’s brownies for four months. “No. I will say nothing, and I will cram those things in my face until I die.”
Igor looks at the brownie. He looks at me. Something moves through his expression that on another face would be called delight. “You have to tell her.”
“Fine. I’ve changed. I like brownies.”
“You have never voluntarily consumed chocolate in the eleven years I’ve known you.”
“People change.”
“Pavel.”
“She makes them for the household,” I say with the dignity of a man who has committed to a position and will see it through. “I’m part of the household. It would be notable if I didn’t?—”
“You would rather gain weight eating something you dislike than tell your wife you don’t like chocolate?”
“I would do anything to make her happy. If that means I gag through a snack, so be it.”
Igor grins. “You are completely whipped.”
