Focus. Focus. Focus.
It seems to take me forever to work his trousers up his legs and when I reach his waist, I leave them hanging open, my thumbs tucked into the waist, resting on his skin. My heart is thrumming a consistent, hard beat in my chest, but I can feel my emotion squeezing at my aching muscle. It’s going to give soon. My heart is literally breaking.
‘Shirt,’ I say under my breath, like I’m prompting myself with what should come next. ‘We need a shirt.’ I reluctantly remove my hands from his body and confront the rails of expensive dress shirts. I don’t bother flicking through, instead just taking down one of the dozens of bright white ones and unbuttoning it with care, being sure not to create any creases. His breath kisses my cheeks as I hold it and he threads his arms through. He’s silent and co-operative, letting me do my thing at my own pace. I secure the buttons slowly, hiding away the perfection of his chest, until I reach his neck. His chin lifts slightly to make my task easier, the bruise on his neck screaming loud and proud, before I work his cuffs, ignoring my unreasonable mind wondering how he’ll cope with blood on his fine threads. Will there be blood?
My eyes clench shut briefly as I fight to halt my train of thought.
Next is his tie. There are so many, and after perusing the rainbow of silk for a few moments, I settle on a silver-grey silk one to match the stripe in his suit. But when I turn towards him again, the difficulty of my next task hits me. I’ll never knot it to Miller’s high standard. I begin toying with the material as I look up at him, finding lazy blues watching me closely, and I expect that’s exactly how he’s been looking at me the whole time I’ve been in my own little world dressing him.
‘You’d better take over.’ I admit defeat and hold the tie out to him, but he pushes my hand away and moves in fast, picking me up by my hips and sitting me on the counter.
A chaste kiss is placed on my lips before he lifts the collar of his shirt. ‘You do it.’
‘Me?’ I’m wary and it’s obvious. ‘I’ll screw it all up.’
‘I don’t care.’ My hands are taken to the back of his neck. ‘I want you to fix my tie.’
Nervous and surprised, I smooth the silver silk around his neck and let the two sides cascade down his front. My hands are hesitant. They are also shaking, but a few deep breaths and a quiet word with myself pulls me around and I start the meticulous task of knotting a tie around Miller Hart’s neck – something I know for sure that no one has ever had the privilege of doing in the history of Miller Hart.
I faff and fiddle forever, but I don’t care. I feel a ridiculous amount of pressure and despite it being really quite silly, I can’t seem to locate the rationality to be unbothered. I’m really bothered. I pat the knot a hundred times, my head cocking from side to side, checking it out at every angle. To my naked eye, it looks pretty perfect. To Miller’s, it’ll look like a train wreck.
‘Done,’ I declare, finally dropping my busy hands into my lap, but not moving my eyes from the kinda perfect tie. I don’t want to see the concern on his face.
‘Perfect,’ he whispers, taking my hands in his and bringing them to his lips. His unusual descriptive, especially when referring to another’s handiwork, throws me.
I brave looking up at him, feeling his hot breath heating my knuckles. ‘You haven’t checked.’
‘I don’t need to.’
I frown, flicking my eyes back down to the tie. ‘It’s not Miller-perfect, though.’ I’m dumbfounded. Where are his twitching hands, itching to put it right?
‘No.’ Miller kisses each hand and puts them neatly back in my lap. Then he reaches for his collar and pulls it down, rather haphazardly. ‘It’s Olivia-perfect.’
I’m quickly looking at him again. His eyes are twinkling a little. ‘But Olivia-perfect isn’t actually perfect.’
A beautiful smile joins his sparkling eyes and centres my off-kilter world. ‘You’re wrong.’ His answer to that makes me withdraw in surprise, though I don’t argue. ‘Waistcoat?’
‘Right,’ I exhale the word slowly and slink down from the unit, watching him as I pad over to the rails again.
He keeps his smile in place. ‘Chop-chop.’
I’m scowling now and blindly reaching for the waistcoat after a brief glance tells me where it is. I can’t rip my inquisitive eyes away from him. ‘Here.’ I hold it out.