“Yes.”
“How?”
He looked offended.
“I have other skills.”
She laughed.
He stared at her.
Then smiled.
She climbed from bed and wrapped herself in the robe he had left nearby.
It fit.
That stopped her.
Not approximately.
Not a standard garment stretched as far as possible.
It fit comfortably across her shoulders, chest, waist, and hips.
She looked down.
Then toward him.
“You made this?”
“No.”
“Who did?”
“A seamstress in town.”
Her expression sharpened.
“You gave her my measurements?”
“No.”
He suddenly seemed nervous.
“I estimated.”
“You estimated my size?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
He looked toward the stove.
“Photograph.”
She stared.
“I was wrong twice.”
“What?”
“The first one was too small.”
“I paid her to remake it.”
The woman looked around the cabin differently.
The chair beside the fireplace was unusually wide.
The bedframe reinforced.
The path between table and wall wider than necessary.
The step beneath the bed low and sturdy.
Even the outhouse path had been cleared broader through the snow.
She had noticed all of it without connecting anything.
“You changed the cabin.”
The mountain man’s shoulders tightened.
“Yes.”
“For me.”
“Yes.”
“Because of my weight.”
He turned slowly.
There it was.
The moment he had clearly feared.
The woman’s face became unreadable.
He placed the skillet down.
“I didn’t know what would be comfortable.”
“So you reinforced everything.”
“The old chair already cracked.”
“You assumed I would break it.”
“No.”
His answer came fast.
“It broke under me last year.”
She paused.
He pointed toward himself.
“I’m not exactly built like a reed.”
Despite herself, she almost smiled.
He continued:
“The bed was narrow.”
“The chair arms too close together.”
“The table left little room.”
“I thought…”
He stopped.
“What?”
“I thought you had probably spent your whole life adapting yourself to things made without considering you.”
The woman went completely still.
No one had ever said that.
People said her body was the problem.
The chair was normal.
The dress was normal.
The carriage was normal.
She was the excess.
This man had looked at the same world and wondered why the furniture had been built as though everyone came in one shape.
He glanced toward the robe.
“If any of it makes you uncomfortable, I’ll change it.”
The woman walked toward him.
He braced as though expecting anger.
She wrapped both arms around his waist.
The mountain man froze.
Then slowly rested his arms around her.
Not squeezing until she did first.
She buried her face against his chest.