2008 November 05

After leaning back into me for a moment she moved away to get back to the food. Not seeing anything obvious to help with I asked what I could do to help and was told to just go and shower, it was going to be another 20 minutes at least until food was ready and she preferred to see me wearing casual clothing. So I kissed her cheek and went to clean myself up.

After coming back to the kitchen I found Veronika just standing in the middle of the floor looking at her cell phone. I couldn't recognise the expression upon her face as I walked up to her but I stood beside and behind her to hug her and look at the phone. What I could read of the message appeared to be someone offering her quite a bit of money. Asking about it brought her out of the dazed state she was in and she told me she'd been wanting to sell a collection of books she'd accumulated during her time at High School.

I asked what collection she was talking about, as I'd never seen a lot of books on her book cases and wasn't aware of her having boxes full of them the way I had for my first few months away from my parents place. It turns out she'd been buying new copies of a lot of books that hadn't had particularly large print runs and were becoming rarer because of that. Having grown out of them, as most of are wont to do when we pass beyond our teenage years, they were still at her parent's place and Veronika saw no need to keep them so had started trying to find out how much she might get if she sold them. Someone online had seen a listing and was offering nearly double what Veronika had expected to manage, partly because she had expected to have to send them out in smaller lots.

It was at that point food became an issue again, one of the pots started boiling over so we started taking care of the final little things that were necessary and then dished things up. As with my earlier thoughts that having someone to share the house would be good if they cooked, I decided again that sitting down to eat with someone was nice. Over the past year I'd almost always eaten alone at home, only rarely visiting my parents to eat with them and I could probably count on one hand the number of times I'd eaten out with Veronika.

We talked about a few things as we ate, mainly the books she was intending to sell and the extra info I had about my new job at work. She wasn't happy about how little warning I'd have when I had to go in after hours but we both got the distinct impression I wasn't going to be going in very often so it would hopefully be a non-issue most of the time. Her books on the other hand she was now thinking might be worth even more than she'd hoped, if one person was willing to pay that much without even seeing them first there was a good chance another collector would be willing to pay even more.

After finishing our meal I said I'd deal with the dishes, and as I was clearing them up from the table Veronika headed off down the hallway. It was no surprise to me that she came back with a book, and as I'd predicted the night before it was a different book to the one she had been reading then. I've always tuned out a little while cleaning things so it was a surprise when I felt arms going around my waist, and heard a voice in my ear asking if I had plans for the weekend. At that point I'd only been thinking about cleaning the mess that had piled up in the garage so I told Veronika that whatever she was planning would probably be easily managed. When she didn't start telling me what I'd just agreed to I got a little worried and looked at her ready to ask the question.

As I turned to her however I noticed that there was someone in the lounge, apparently I'd also missed hearing the knock at the door and one of Veronika's flatmates had come around to visit for a little while. The lack of power was proving quite annoying to them as well but they didn't have such an easy way to get away from things so they'd been spending more time at the Uni than they normally would. I asked if that was helping with study and got told that even if it was it wasn't worth the inconvenience. The actual question about the weekend had been because Laura and the others were wanting to hold a little "The Power is back on" party and I was invited. I promised I'd be there and asked what the two of them wanted to do now, surprisingly I was asked to teach them how to play one of my board games. Some of their other friends had been telling them how good it was so they wanted to try it for themselves.

The teaching of games was something I'd had trouble with, even with people that had experience with the sorts of games I was trying to teach, so I made sure to let both Veronika and Laura know that I might make mistakes. Both of them picked things up very quick which wasn't really surprising to me, they're both intelligent women. What was surprising was the fact they both wanted to play another couple of games before Laura decided it was late and she should head off back to their flat.

At that point Veronika asked if she could talk to me privately for a moment so we went down the hall. Because she hadn't wanted to put me in the awkward position of saying no to her suggestion she was asking me first if I would mind Laura staying at my place that night. I had no reason to say no, so we went back out to find Laura packing up her stuff with the game already sorted. I told her that she was welcome to stay the night if she wanted, the couch, while being uncomfortable as a couch because of its height, was almost as good as a bed for sleeping. I was hugged by both of them and Veronika went off to find more sheets for Laura to use.