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Tim has been exceptionally accommodating since Lucy moved in.
He’d made space for her in the closet before she even had her apartment packed up. He let her put her throw pillows on the couch without a word about how bright they are. He doesn’t complain when she wants to change the sheets - even when she pulls out the set is definitely, yet very subtly, floral. He doesn’t mind the extra pillows and blankets on the bed. He hangs all her artwork wherever she wants it, not judging the pieces, not even the ones from her kitchen that now hang over their fireplace, even though he’d always found them… interesting.
He doesn’t say a word if she leaves her shoes out, or leaves her jacket hanging over a chair instead of in the closet.
He only playfully gripes at her for bringing the Cop-Cake poster into the house – she thinks part of him is secretly pleased that she kept it all through the breakup.
In return, she tries to be respectful of the things he’d had there before her. She doesn’t rearrange their bathroom drawers, adds her things to the shower without misplacing his, doesn’t remove any of his things to make space for hers but simply adds hers to the mix.
She begins to establish routines in their home. They begin to split chores, or alternate who does what. They figure out who showers first and how to work around each other in the kitchen, which car should be parked first in the driveway based on their routines for the next day.
It’s surprisingly effortless, except for their one hiccup about unpacking her boxes. Sure, he teases her about things that she “doesn’t need,” and she messes with him about why he insists on his shampoo being on the bottom shower shelf instead of the top one closer to his height, but it’s all in the name of their good old fashioned past time of teasing each other.
So that’s why she’s really confused when she wakes up one morning, and the coffeemaker has suddenly moved.
Ever since she’s been dating Tim, since she’s first come to his house, his things have been more or less in the same place. He’s not the type of guy to get the urge to rearrange, he’s a creature of habit and practicality. And the coffeemaker has always been in the corner by the sink.
So, she immediately wonders if she did something to make him move it. Is she in his way near the sink when she’s making her coffee? Does she get it wet when she’s rinsing dishes? Did she unplug it to plug in the blender and forget to plug it back in?
She finds herself staring at it, confused.
He’s left the coffee pods and the coffee mugs in the same spot by the sink, meaning they are now very far away from the coffeemaker - which doesn’t make a lot of sense. Maybe he’s only moved it temporarily?
Granted, they don’t really use the pods since she moved in – they almost always brew a whole pot of coffee so they can share it; Tim can take it nice and black and she can add sugar and creamer to hers. It’s been working just fine.
But why are the mugs still way over there?
Tim appears then, and she jumps when he kisses her on the cheek. “Did you move the coffeemaker?” she blurts out.
Tim gives her an amused expression, quirks an eyebrow. “No, Kojo did it.”
She doesn’t respond to that, too busy thinking. “Why?”
“Why did Kojo do it?”
“Why did you move it?”
Tim doesn’t seem to be bothered at all by this question as he moves around her to start brewing a pot of coffee. “Because you always like to make your coffee over here,” he states, indicating the place where the coffeemaker now sits. “You brew the coffee, then you stand over here while it brews, then you go back over there and pour it in a mug and then come back over here to prepare your cup so you can talk to me if I’m sitting at the table or on the couch, or if I’m cooking so my back isn’t to you.”
“Oh,” she says simply, realizing that he’s picked up on a habit she hadn’t even realized that she has.
“And, it’s closer to the fridge for when you grab your creamer. I never add that stuff so I never thought about it being easier to get to from here. Why? Does it bother you that it’s over here?”
“No! No, I was just… confused,” she admits. “That’s… Tim, that’s really sweet.”
She assumes he will move the mugs and the coffee pods later, and she sets about making her coffee for the day, humming happily to herself.
The mugs don’t move.
The pods don’t really bother her, because they don’t use them as much. But they use a mug every single time they drink coffee at home.
She remembers having this particular debate with Jackson, about where to keep the coffee mugs to make things easiest.
Is she the one totally off base here? She thought that makes perfect sense, but she’s now lived with two people who have thought otherwise, apparently.
Tim had even pointed out how it made sense for the coffeemaker to be closer to the refrigerator, but he didn’t think about the mugs being closer to the coffeemaker?
It’s not really that big of a deal, though, because the mugs are already accessible enough on the counter instead of being in a cabinet, anyway.
And half the time Tim is the one who makes and pours the coffee anyway, and he doesn’t seem to have issue with it.
One day, when she opts for tea instead of coffee, Tim walks across the kitchen to get a coffee pod for himself rather than brewing the entire pot for just one person.
“Why are these all the way over here?” he mutters to himself, and she watches from her seat at the counter as he moves the entire stand next to the coffeemaker.
“Why’d you do that?” Lucy asks with a crinkle of her brow, considering.
“It was inefficient,” he states simply.
She takes a beat. “But… the mugs are efficient over there?”
Tim shrugs. “I mean, a lot of the time we use the travel mugs,” he says, pointing to the cabinet above where they keep them.
She muses over that. It’s true. They often take their coffee to go in the morning.
She must be the one off base.
While Lucy’s on medical leave after the officer involved death, she finds herself making her own coffee and tea throughout the day.
She’s got the whole day to herself – after the first few days that Tim took off to be with her – so she finds herself brewing a cup of coffee when she wakes up, a cup of tea later on in the afternoon – especially if she’s having a particularly rough day, emotionally.
She finds herself rinsing her mug and leaving it near the coffee machine instead of putting it on the rack.
It’s not even intentional, she just does it for ease.
Tim never moves it.
Of course, he’s particularly attuned to her lately – trying his best to do anything and everything she lets him to help her get through this, careful not to upset her about anything, and leaving her mug alone is probably one of the easiest tasks he can do. But she knows he notices, because when he wipes down the counter top he’ll move it slightly to clean – but never puts it back on the rack.
One morning, a few days after she returns to work, she’s sitting at the counter while Tim makes coffee. She watches as he picks up a mug for himself – from the rack – and then picks up the mug she’s left by the coffeemaker once again.
She must be visibly distracted, staring into space with her thoughts as she watches him, her eyes tracking the mug the whole time.
“Lucy.”
“Huh?”
“Do you want to move the mugs?”
She blinks at him, thinking the question has come out of nowhere but really, he’s probably been picking up on this for weeks, if not months. He nods at her mug on the countertop and that’s all he has to do for her to understand.
“It’s just… they should probably be next to the coffeemaker. For efficiency.”
“So, you do want to move them.”
“You brought the pods over here.”
“Yes.”
“And we keep the cooking utensils right next to the stove.”
“Sure.”
“For efficiency.” She tilts her head and looks at him. “So should we move the mugs?”
“Do you want to move the mugs?” he asks again.
“Yes.” It slips out of her without her realizing how strongly she must feel about the placement of the mug rack.
“So, move them.”
“Is this some kind of Tim test?”
That actually makes him burst out laughing, to which she can’t help but laugh, too. “No, Lucy. If you want to move the mugs, you can move the mugs.”
She blinks at him, and she understands what he’s telling her without saying it: this is your home, too.
“Well?”
“What, you want me to do it like, right now?”
Tim shrugs, and she gets up from her seat and walks over to the corner, keeping an eye on him the whole time. She picks up the mug rack and carefully carries it across the kitchen before gently setting it down on the opposite counter, near the coffeemaker. She steps back, looks at it, then steps forward and readjusts it.
Finally satisfied, she turns to Tim with a smile. “There.”
“Why didn’t you move them before?” he wonders, genuinely curious.
“I… don’t know.” It’s an honest answer, because she really doesn’t know. It’s not like she thought he’d be upset about it. “It’s just that, most of those are your mugs, and you’ve always had that stand over there.”
He steps forward and kisses her softly. “I meant what I said. I want you all the way in my life. Everything here is ours.” With that, he steps around her, squeezing her hip. “I’m gonna take a shower.”
“Well…” Lucy says, and Tim turns to look at her. “If the shower is ours, too…” she begins and she hears Tim laugh, already knowing where this is going. “We should probably use it together.”
“Let’s go.” He points a finger at her. “But no trying to convince me to move my shampoo.”