20

Still, she couldn’t resist responding sourly to Mario’s malicious delight: “Of course.” And in her thoughts she added that he, too, was quite a friend to have.

So even today, Mishi did not have it easy with Mario. Even at fifty, Mario could be irresistibly charming and boyishly enchanting when he tried to captivate the fairer sex. After all, there had been little in life he devoted himself to more. And the fact that Mishi had ultimately stayed with Tay did not sit particularly well with his vanity. Even now, after Sheena’s birth, he would occasionally test whether he might still be able to capture Mishi’s attention. But his lingering compliments lacked their former determination and felt more like shots fired into the dark.

…

Mishi therefore preferred not to comment on their rivalry and continued with the evening when she spoke with Tay after returning from Rohn: “Well, in the end I figured it out myself, so… when I said that Tay never looks at me as openly as he does at Sheena, I was lying a little.

That evening, he looked at me like that. It was only for a moment, but it was enough for me to understand how things really were. I would never have found that side of him if he hadn’t shown it to me himself. But even then, he didn’t tell me anything more. He just agreed that he still wanted us to see the agreement through to the end—and then he left.

But that put a terrible little worm in my head. From his silence I had the feeling he was expecting some kind of step from me,” she looked down and smiled sheepishly. “And that’s where the funny part came in: I wanted to get a bit closer to him in some non-intrusive way, but I had no idea how. He was always terrified whenever I so much as touched him. I started doing incredibly subtle things that he managed to wriggle out of even more subtly. Even knowing how shy Tay is, you wouldn’t believe the absurd situations. His mind is just too sharp—he can’t be caught. He immediately knows what you’re planning, it’s absolutely impossible. I wouldn’t wish chasing a Taris on any woman. The biggest adrenaline rush of my life,” she giggled, her cheeks reddening all the way to her ears.

She pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head in disbelief. Shyly she wondered why she was telling all this to Mario as if he were some girlfriend. Probably because she no longer had any. She had never confided their history to anyone, and in truth she hadn’t even been allowed to. There was so much she had to keep secret with her new life situation. She felt so uncertain among old acquaintances that she had cut off all the friendships she still had. In the end, that left Mishi with only Mario. He was the only one who could know their story. She felt great relief in finally being able to unburden herself to at least him.

…

But absorbed in her storytelling, she forgot how the Taris happy ending actually affected Mario. She had never really wanted to admit it to herself either. She didn’t believe Mario’s courting back then had been truly serious. Mario was a notorious fox. She interpreted his behavior as having proposed to her at the ball merely to teach Tay a lesson. At times she had seen Mario deliberately provoke Tay, testing whether he would feel jealousy. She thought he only wanted to prove to Tay that his “friendship” toward her wasn’t just friendship at all. Mario’s actions thus felt more like assistance meant to bring her and Tay closer together—albeit in a rather peculiar way.

That was why she didn’t even notice now that Mario grew somber during the story.

“So you really got together right after the ball where I offered you—” he began.

“Yes. Exactly on the very last day.”

“And if that hadn’t happened, would you have reconsidered?”

Mishi frowned at him reproachfully for bringing it up again.

“No,” she dismissed it gently. “You know what I told you about that, Mario.”

Mario took a deep breath and, staring at the ceiling, let it out, as if his wounded soul went with it.

“Yeah, I know. Lucky bastard,” he cursed quietly.

Then he stood up and put one arm around Mishi’s shoulders.

“I truly don’t understand how he managed to win you over, Mishi. But I love you kids. May it never fall apart.”

“Thank you, you’re sweet,” Mishi kissed him on the cheek and patted his chest. “And don’t say it so sadly. We love you too, Mario. You’re basically our wonderful, admirable patron. Without you, we wouldn’t have any of this.”

“Well… if you say so,” he replied and sighed again. “But I’ll need a lot more of those excellent pies to get over it.”

“I’ll bake you as many as you can eat. And then Sheena will help me with it. I’ll teach her this very one—the way you like it. All right?”

Mario smiled dreamily at her vision. Instead of answering, he stroked Mishi’s cheek with the sense that he was touching something fragile. He fell silent for a moment, lost in thought. It didn’t look like he was thinking about anything they had talked about today. His mind wandered somewhere else, and he had no intention of sharing.