Late, as in choco-late *

In which our Hero is left feeling holding the bag but completely without a Clue

As much as I am able, I do my very best to be thoughtful for my Nocturne, which just means paying attention. Like anybody else, I achieve varying degrees of success, mostly because when she’s working on her stuff, there are long gaps in the conversation that I don’t mind, but inevitably fill with my own efforts. And if I’m doing something, I just don’t always hear what she’s said in the last 10 seconds or so. Context-switching time.

Still, I do good. She’s constantly surprised when I pick out a treat or a surprise or even something mundane like a particular color of pen. She doesn’t remember saying anything, but I try to catch things like that because then I know what to get if I’m trying to get her something. (Or I can startle the heck out of her, like the time I asked her out of the blue, “Are you eating strawberry ice cream?” She was. I just heard the bowl noises, and had a good guess about the state of her pantry. (Please note the “R” in that last word.)

But there are limitations. I can’t ship all that much, all that far, and anything I ship will be opened by the local mail people, and there’s no guarantee she won’t have to walk the package home so… I have to be very selective about what I send her. And generally, “what she needs” takes huge priority over “treats.” Which sucks because caramels are *way* more interesting than freezer bags, if you ask me. I’d have sent her an office chair if I could figure out a way to get one to her that was good enough to send, but also light enough to break-down and reassemble.

The one that really frustrated me was her very sad voice as she complained about this quarter keeping her from the tastes of the fall, like pumpkin spice or thanksgivingy things. How do I mail her a pumpkin when it’s likely to rot before it gets there, assuming it doesn’t get pulverized in transit. Or cost a million dollars which would probably lose me my permission to send her treats anyway.

But I had a package to assemble, and I had other things to get her, like a stick-on shower-hook. (2 for $2, score!!) Which is how I came to be I walking by the Godiva stand and I slowed down because they had these things on display. Clear boxes of truffles that were… orange? So of course I went to investigate. And there they were… little pumpkin truffles in orange foil with green foilfelt leaves and even wire vines.

Perfect! I know she likes truffles and a little bit of pumpkin spice would be a great way to give her a little taste of fall. And getting the rest of the package together around my top secret surprise, I then counted, almost hour by hour, the days until her package showed up.

And show up it did. Full of random treats to delight my sweetheart. I’d been teasing her with the knowledge that was a special treat in the box, and as she found things that excited her, she asked me if it was the treat. Until she got far enough into the box to find the chocolatey treasures. Well, the pumpkiny chocolatey treasures. (As distinct from the caramelly ones or the mocha-y ones)

Eventually, we had a bit of a date night, some luxury to treat ourselves. And she had one of the pumpkin truffles, and I having got an extra one, joined her. I thought it was a reasonably tasty treat, but I’d probably stick with other flavours on my own choice.

Nocturne thought it was reasonably tasty too. She told me so, coughing a little. And then a little bit more. And then a little more. At which point, she’s thinking, “Oh no, am I having an allergic reaction.” Which was probably more constructive than my reaction: “Oh no, did I just kill my girlfriend?” Because she’s very very far from here, and I have no ability to get her help if she needs it. So she had some medication while I frantically tried to find out if despite my check there were some hidden allergens.

Never did find anything to explain her reaction. We agreed that she should toss the rest of the package rather than experiment with her airway. It’s just chocolate, after all. But I’m very disappointed, because it should have been a silly triumph, and instead was close to being a need for an alibi.

*Edit*

Demonstrating how much nicer than me she is, Nocturne informs me that she didn’t throw them out, but instead gave them to the cleaning staff for the glee of just surprising them.

No word on how many survived. (She’s going to kill me for that last extra sentence. 🙂

(In the office, With a pumpkin truffle)