Warming Trend

/ Liz H-H

The challenge? Write a story in exactly 6 sentences based on Denise’s one word prompt: BEAM. Visit, comment, and write & post your own on Six Sentence Stories 

She’d stepped outside the cabin “to get a breath of fresh air,” she’d said, and pulled the door closed behind her with a soft hiss and snap — something like a snake rattling warning before it bites.

He checked that the coffee maker was fed and ready to go, and wondered at her hurt look when he’d insisted on the “real thing,” decaf being completely unnecessary when you didn’t have to worry about staying up late; it was his vacation, too, after all, and he wasn’t about to brew two separate pots.

“Right…compromise,” he muttered and banged his forehead, just once, on the cabinet door, and with a sigh, reached for the glass jar of decaf to replace the caffeinated grounds he’d already put in the coffee basket.

***

Warmth, golden light, and the rich coffee scent disappeared as soon as he closed the cabin door behind him to step outside, his boots crunching across the moon-silvered snow, his coat crackling in the cold as he sat next to her on the bench.

His heavy snowmobiling mitts felt as clumsy around the hot cup as his own – many — attempts at making amends; had he totally blown it with this woman by acting the surly bear, just like his old man had with his ex-wife?

Wrapping her thin, bone-cold hands around the cup, she offered the smallest smile at its contents, and his heart beamed and lightened with hope.    

© Liz Husebye Hartmann (2023)

Part One

28 thoughts on “Warming Trend”

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