Anything for Her(16)
“Yes, and it always has been. There actually are men who quilt, including a few whose work is cutting edge. But fiber arts of all kinds were traditionally a woman’s task, and her way of expressing herself and, probably, impressing other women. It wasn’t just quilting—there’s weaving, of course, hooked and braided rugs, embroidery... Think about medieval tapestries, which like most other fabric arts had a practical purpose—preserving heat in chilly stone castles.”
Enjoying her enthusiasm, Nolan said, “While the men were decorating their armor.”
Allie laughed. “Right.”
She told him that Burgoyne Surrounded, the pattern that made up Sean’s quilt top, was likely copied from a traditional pattern used in woven coverlets—one woman’s art transferred to another. Nolan found the idea intriguing.
With a little urging, he got her to talk some more about the history of quilting, about how older quilts could often be dated within a decade simply by the fabrics used.
“Although it is getting a little harder,” she remarked, “because these days you can buy fabric that looks like it came from the 1930s, for example. And a really well-preserved one from that era actually wouldn’t look that different from a new one made from a pattern common then.”
“How well preserved is an eighty- or ninety-year-old quilt likely to be?”
“Most were made for everyday use, but not all. Sometimes a particularly prized quilt or coverlet was put out once in a while for show, but otherwise kept in a cedar chest for posterity. There are some really spectacular nineteenth-century quilts in beautiful condition.
“If a woman put enough work into a particular quilt, she wasn’t going to be eager to have her husband come in from the fields and sit on it to take off his muddy boots, then get under it when he hadn’t had a bath in a week. Or put it on a kid’s bed. Imagine how painful it would be to have put hundreds of hours into piecing and quilting, then have to subject it to a scrub board and wind and sun when it was laid out to dry.” She made a face at him. “You don’t have to worry about anything like that, do you? Your work is literally rock-solid. Who could abuse it?”
“Now, that’s not entirely true,” he protested. “A granite countertop, for example, takes some care. And even rock can be chipped, scratched and battered.”
Allie and Nolan agreed that they preferred to think their creations always went to the perfect homes, where they would be treated tenderly forevermore. They both laughed, knowing how unlikely that was.
Unfortunately, a pair of women came in the door and rushed, oohing and aahing, toward a display of ocean-themed fabric that had caught Nolan’s eye earlier, too.
“Dinner Saturday night?” he asked hastily, and Allie agreed with seeming pleasure before going to wait on the women. Nolan bundled up the lunch trash, murmured a quiet goodbye to her and left, aware of the women’s curious gazes following him.
* * *
NOLAN SAW ALLIE twice more in the next week: for dinner on Saturday night, and when he stopped by again with lunch on Tuesday. By then he’d become increasingly aware that trying to get together with a woman, even for a purely sexual relationship, was going to be a greater challenge than it would have been before Sean.
This was partly because he could tell he was shaking his foster son’s sense of security. But there were also the practicalities, starting with the fact that Nolan had to keep a sharp eye on the clock whenever he was out. Not going home at all some night was clearly out. Being really late wasn’t good, either.
Sean had definitely waited up for him Saturday night. He’d mumbled again that it was “cool” Nolan was seeing a woman, but plainly he felt threatened by the loss of Nolan’s undivided attention. And no wonder, when he’d come to live with him so recently and probably already figured, somewhere deep inside, that Nolan was one more person who would ditch him sooner or later.
Then there was the fact that he’d never be able to bring Allie home to his own bed, unless it was during the day while Sean was in school. Since he didn’t have any friends yet, the kid never went anywhere unless he was with Nolan. Thank God Allie didn’t have a roommate, Nolan thought. He had a suspicion, though, that she wasn’t likely to be inviting him into her apartment anytime soon. He doubted she was casual about sex. In one way, he didn’t want her to be, but...damn, he wanted her. He’d been okay with a long stretch of celibacy until he set eyes on Allie. He seemed now to be in a constant state of edgy discomfort.