Spend the evening with Claire

"Plans?" you repeat, and realize, saying it out loud, that you don't have any you'd rather have than the obvious one. "Honestly? Going home with you, if the offer's still open. I believe I was promised tourtière."

Claire stops walking. For half a second her face does something small and surprised, and then it breaks into a smile so uncomplicated that you feel faintly guilty for having hesitated at all. "Seriously? I figured you'd have a queue of people to see."

"The queue can wait. I've had enough of strangers for one day."

"Ben voilà. That's the correct answer." She hooks her arm through yours and steers you toward the tram stop. "But I'm warning you, I only said I'd *make* tourtière. I didn't say it would be good. Ask my mother, she still brings it up."

---

The apartment smells of cinnamon and cloves long before the oven has finished its work. Claire has banished you to the table with a glass of red wine and strict instructions not to help, which is how you end up watching her move around the kitchen with a wooden spoon tucked behind one ear, humming something in French under her breath, entirely at ease.

"This is my grandmother's recipe," she says, without turning around. "Pork, a little veal, potatoes, way too much clove. She'd have been horrified that I'm making it with Austrian pork. But then she'd also have been horrified by Vienna, so we're even."

"What would she have made of me?"

"Oh, she'd have fed you until you couldn't move and asked when you were getting married." Claire glances over her shoulder, eyes bright with amusement. "It's an unfortunate side effect of being fed by Québécoises. We get ideas."

You take a very long sip of wine.

The tourtière, when it arrives, is golden and steaming, cracked open with the side of a spoon at the center of the table. It tastes like a place you've never been and feel strangely homesick for, warm and heavy and spiced, and you have to put down your fork for a moment just to say, honestly, "Claire. This is incredible."

"Don't lie."

"I'm not lying. I'm having a religious experience."

"Oh, stop." But she's pink to the ears, grinning down at her plate. "It's just a pie."

"It's a very good pie." You nudge her ankle under the table, lightly, the way she once did to you, and she looks up, caught, and doesn't move her foot away. "Thank you. For cooking. For asking me along today, even."

"You're welcome." She says it quietly, a little less teasing than her usual voice. "I'm glad you came home."

The candle she lit without telling you flickers between the two of you. Neither of you quite looks away.

It's Claire who breaks the spell, abruptly, by pushing back her chair. "Right. We are not going to sit here being sentimental over pie. I have a game."

"A game?"

"Scrabble. And before you say anything, yes, I own a French edition, and yes, I intend to use it against you." She pulls the box from a shelf and sets the board down between the dirty plates with a flourish. "Here's the rule. English words count normal. French words count *double*. Since you claim you're learning."

"That seems extremely unfair."

"It's pedagogy, John. Pedagogy is always a little unfair."

The game goes on far longer than either of you planned. Claire plays like a woman with a vendetta, snapping down *QUAI* on a triple-word square and sitting back with the air of a queen, while you scrabble, appropriately, for anything that isn't *CAT*. She laughs at your attempts, corrects your accents, and when you finally lay down *BAISER*, with enormous pride, she goes absolutely still for a moment, then bursts out laughing, one hand pressed to her mouth.

"What? It's a word. It's French."

"It's a *very* French word, John. It means 'to kiss.'" She's red to the roots of her hair, eyes sparkling, shoulders shaking. "Also another, rather less polite thing, depending on how you use it. In Québec it's mostly the second one."

"Oh no."

"Oh yes." She wipes her eyes, still laughing. "Don't worry. I'll allow it. Double points, as promised."

You stare at the board in mortification, and it's only when she reaches across to count your score that you notice how close the two of you have ended up, her knee tucked against yours, her fingers brushing the back of your hand as she tallies the tiles. She doesn't withdraw them. For a moment the game seems to drop away entirely, leaving only the candle and the warm yellow light of the lamp and her face, a little flushed, very near.

"You're not terrible at this," she says softly. "For a beginner."

"I have an excellent teacher."

"Flatterer." But her hand turns, just slightly, until her fingers are resting against yours rather than merely touching them, and she doesn't pretend it's an accident. "Four hundred and twelve to three hundred and eighty-six. I win. Obviously."

"Obviously."

"You can have a rematch another night." Her eyes flicker down, then up again, steady. "If you'd like."

"I'd like that."

The apartment is very quiet. Somewhere outside, a late tram rattles past and fades. She doesn't move, and neither do you, and the air between the two of you feels thick with something neither of you has said aloud.

Then Claire draws a long, slow breath, squeezes your hand once, and stands, gathering a handful of tiles in her palm and letting them fall back into the bag one by one.

"Okay," she says, a little unsteadily, not quite meeting your eyes. "I'm going to take a shower now. I try to do that every other evening, et j'ai peur que, si nous continuons comme ça, je finisse par oublier de prendre ma douche."

She gives a mirky smile. {if game:Claire >= 3} "And you wouldn't want that, now, would you? Having a roommate who is... filthy."{endif}

[I have stsrted experimenting with conditional text, this chapter should have a different final line if your Claire score is above 3]