Beatty & The Beast

SEVEN: Where the Beauty and the Beast Compromise

The same day

It's like night and day, Keefe thought as he watched Andie work.

When he thought back to his first impression of her (kicking the snot out of the Wolf Pack) or even to just the day before (when she was an enraged metal-pan-chucking monster) it was strange to see her now.

She was just so...nice.

Though the walk home and the run-in with Benny had proved that the sharp-tongued tough girl was still there, when she was just in Keefe's presence she was a completely different person. She was funny, sarcastic, and even obliging.

He pondered this as he sat at the gargantuan island in Whistlebeck's busily-decorated kitchen. Its theme was Old Hollywood and was covered from wall to wall with memorabilia and pictures from silent movies all the way to the classics of the 1950s. The cabinets and the appliances were in black and white, along with the tile on the floor (black and white checkered) and the granite counter tops (black with white speckles.)

It was a fascinating room, especially since it was completed. Keefe wouldn't have to be doing any work in it. One less thing to worry about.

He sat on the middle of three tall black barstools. Humphrey Bogart was on his left and a rather stunning Greta Garbo was on his right.

True to his eccentric taste, Whistlebeck had thought it would be humorous to have wax renditions of the actors sitting at the bar, allowing him to say he had Garbo and Bogart in his own kitchen. Bogart, complete in his trenchcoat and fedora from Casablanca, even had a glass of real whiskey in his waxy grip, though he stared somberly ahead, pining for his lost Ingrid Bergman, Keefe supposed.

According to Andie, her uncle also had models of Charlie Chaplin, Vivien Leigh, Carole Lombard, Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, Bette Davis, and Marlon Brando. He switched them out every few weeks to give all the actors their chance to sit and brood at Whistlebeck's bar.

Keefe was beyond smitten.

Andie was on the other side of the island, at one of the massive granite counters, surrounding herself with panini fixings. And it was that, a panini, that had Keefe reeling about this change in the girl called Andie.

When they had reached the house, he had managed to hook his backpack, coat, scarf and hat on the old wooden coat rack near the front door when she said, "Want something to eat?"

Considering she had barely allowed him a glass of water over the last two days, he was a tad startled by the offer. "You want to feed me? When I'm working off a debt?"

"You must be hungry," she replied breezily, almost haughtily, dumping her backpack on the floor and kicking it to the side. "You never eat a lot at lunch, no wonder you're so skinny."

She flung her coat and scarf onto an antique bench in the entryway and headed toward the foyer of staircases which in turn led to the kitchen. She motioned for him to follow. There was the familiar superiority and bossiness, but it didn't seem as harsh this time around.

"How do you know I don't eat a lot at lunch?" He hurried to catch up to her. "We don't sit together save that one time yesterday."

"Yesterday when you didn't eat at all," her tone was scolding. "Besides, it's not like it's a big cafeteria. The last few days I've seen you walk to your seat with your food and it's always a tiny Tupperware container filled with macaroni and cheese or something like that."

Keefe grinned, a little embarrassed, "It's a staple in my house."

It was amazing how long one could make a box of mac and cheese last, almost a week if he was frugal, and the beauty of it all was that it was dirt cheap.