Love This Life - Chapter 1

Chapter One

Part 1 - Freshman Year of College 1986

Chapter 1 - Home

Sebastian carefully pushed the bedroom door open with his foot, while he precariously balanced the wooden tray in his hands. He walked to the bed and smiled. Tess was curled up in a ball, her arm draped over his pillow, sound asleep. He still couldn’t believe they were living together, sharing a home, a life. He had never felt such contentment or joy in his entire life. 

“Good morning, beautiful,” Sebastian said sitting down on the edge of the bed.

Tess slowly opened her eyes and spied the breakfast fest that sat on the tray. “Are those Alice’s pancakes?” she asked, her spirits lifted even though Sebastian woke her from a deep sleep. She hated when he did that.

“Yes. Are you hungry?” he teased.

“Yes,” she replied sitting up in bed. “You’re going to make me gain ten pounds if you keep cooking like this.”

The tray was laid out with a stack of fluffy pancakes on a china plate, flanked by a linen napkin and sterling silver place setting. A single stemmed rose was placed at the top of the tray and there was two glasses of orange juice and coffee.

Sebastian leaned in and kissed her. “I haven’t brushed my teeth yet,” she protested.

“I don’t mind. The first thing I used to do in the morning was smoke a cigarette and drink a cup of coffee.”

Tess wrinkled her nose at the thought. “Thank goodness I cured you of that habit.”Sebastian chuckled, sitting back in bed with her. He cut the pancakes and speared a few pieces with the fork then fed them to Tess. She actually moaned as she chewed the pancakes they were so good. “How did you get Alice to give up the recipe?”

“I didn’t. She made the batch up for me this morning. I did cook them, though.”

“I don’t think I’d ever give up the secret recipe if I were her.”

“Oh, it’s not that she won’t give up the recipe, the problem is it’s not written down?” Sebastian explained.

“What?”

“I’ve watched her makes these things time and time again. She doesn’t measure anything. She just throws a dash of this and pinch of that and suddenly, she has pancake batter. Alice says she knows they are ready by the smell.”

“Thank you for this,” Tess motioned to her breakfast fest. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” He took a sip of his coffee and unfolded the Sunday edition of The New York Times. Out of habit he took the crossword section and handed it to Tess. The first section Sebastian went for was Art and Leisure.

“I think you’ve brought me breakfast in bed every Sunday since we moved in. You spoil me.”

“And I intend to continue to do so to for rest of our lives.”

“Even when we have kids and a dog and a cat....”

“Who said anything about a cat?” Sebastian playfully teased.

“We’ll need a bigger bed,” Tess mused. She polished off the remaining pancakes and reached for the pen. Instead of starting the cross word puzzle, she reached for the want ads. One by one Tess pursued the advertisements and began to circle ones she thought might be interesting.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking for a job.”

“You don’t need a job,” Sebastian reiterated. “I promised to take care of you.”