I turned the black cylindrical volume knob up and my feet moved to the steady rhythm of Stevie Nick's voice. I raised my arms and twirled, thinking of how she danced on stage before she'd retired, her silks and lace surrounding her. My eyes closed as I rose to my tip toes and softly lip synched to her melodic voice. "We need more maranera sauce!" My spinning stopped at the call of Taylor's voice, and I opened my eyes. The urge to tell him to shove it was great, but I deeply breathed in the vanilla scented air of my living room and walked to the basement where I kept the jars of tomato sauce.

"Did you turn on the oven?" I questioned the apprentice of the kitchen, who was wearing an apron with a huge lobster on the front. He was staring into the depths of my refrigerator, with a look of confusion.

"No, where's your yeast?"

"Why? We don't need yeast." I turned as I entered the kitchen and turned the oven on.

"I thought we would, why do you have history books with your cookbooks?" He pulled out an Early European history book out of the shelves of cookbooks above the built in desk. He flipped it open and looked to me with amusement.

"Hey I was planning on being a historian, don't start with me."

"You actually read this? I mean regularly?" I smiled.

"Of course, you haven't seen the library yet. I pick up a couple of those every month, I'm always in a book. My profession happened to deal with the written word Taylor, if I'd never decided to start writing then I'd be a history teacher."

"You got a speciality?"

"Dark Ages, Middle Ages, High Middle Ages... the Renaissance.. anything early, up to the 1700s. I love that stuff."

"That would explain your furniture."

"And what's wrong with my furniture?" My hands went to my hips.

"Nothing, it's just.. I feel like I'm in a mix of a college dorm and a museum."

"Thanks." I reread the recipe and started to get out the remaining ingredients.

"No problem. So do you know everything about all this old stuff you have?"

"Uh huh." I rechecked the recipe and got out the oregano.

"Okay so I can ask you about anything in here."

"Yup." I didn't notice that he'd left the kitchen until I looked up from chopping up a fresh tomato. He returned in five minutes, as I continued the stombolis, with a small cat statue. It was a remake from the Late Dynastic period.

"Okay what's this for? And don't say that it's Egyptian, that's obvious." I rolled my eyes.

"Late Dynastic period. A symbol of the cat goddess Bastet, the protector of home, mothers, and children. She's by my front door, she protects the house."

"Cool."

"Put it back. And move it, I have these almost done." Two minutes later he came back with a scarlet flapper's dancing shoe.

"What's up with all these shoes on your walls?"

"It's a flapper shoes, from the thirties. Watch it, that thing was expensive. I like shoes, they're cool."

"You hang them on your walls?"

"Yeah, I get them from collector's, antique places, wherever. Shoes are great."

"Okay, and you write on your walls too, next to the shoes."

"What about that? Hey c'mon I'll take you around the house later, I've got to get these in the oven, don't get your hands on the cloth, it'll mark it up." He turned and started walking back to where he'd found the shoe.

"I can't believe that you don't have posters up somewhere." He murmured to himself. I decided to show him my paintings after dinner. I put the strombolis in the heated oven and set the timer. I lowered the lights and began to light more candles. It was dusk outside, and the candles let off a golden, soft glow that relaxed me. My thoughts began to stray, thinking of writing, and Taylor. As he came back into the kitchen, quietly, Stevie Nick's voice turned soft and loving, her piano smooth and steady like waves. I leaned to my sink and looked out the three windows above it, breathing calmly. Taylor's arms wrapped around my waist, snugly, his chin on my shoulder.

"Has anyone ever written anything for you?" I slightly turned to him, still looking out the window to the sunset.

"Girls have. Letters. Poems."

"No, you know what I mean. Something that you can't give back." Taylor paused, thinking.

"No. You gave me something, but I haven't heard it since then."

I broke through his hands and ran up the stairs to my bedroom and into my great grandfather's chest. I carefully reached in and brought out a shoebox with the pictures of him that I had taken and the original copy of his poem. I brought the box downstairs with me, my fingers erasing the brownish dust on the top. I placed the box in his hands.

"This is yours." Taylor opened the box, seeing the poem in the slightly yellowed napkin with the aquamarine crayon. He shook his head.

"No... this is ours."

"Then you still need something written for you, don't you?"

"I guess so." I lightly kissed him, almost solemnly.

"Go get your paints."

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