Fifty Second Secret

Zach put down the phone. He felt better about the situation now. He had no deadline and Darien was willing to pretend that it had never happened.

His mind calmed down and he remembered that he had been in the midst of dinner preparations when Darien had arrived.

He dumped the folder onto his bed and returned to the kitchen to continue with cooking. Emilia was now sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of tea in front of her.

“I was hoping you would start making dinner soon,” she said with a grin. “If you didn’t, I would have to make it and we both know that’s a bad idea.”

Zach picked up from where he had left off and was glad that he had chosen something so complicated to make. Forcing his attention to focus on cooking helped distract him from everything else.

He fried the chicken carefully. He didn’t like to use too much oil as it was a pain to dispose of. He let his attention wander briefly to Darien and