Thomas brewed Tatum's warning for a good moment.<br/><br/>Before she had laid her warning out, Thomas’ biggest concerns had revolved mainly around the distance to Tatum’s house. Soon they would reach her doorstep, and the small moment they had now would be past. The simple joy of company was being replaced with anxiety of the brief journey together would likely meet its end too soon. Or would it? Maybe she’d ask him in.. to talk. Or to share warmth?<br/>The even-not-so-innocent thoughts that revolved around sharing warmth were blown away by the cold breeze of her warning.<br/><br/>The awful thing was, that she was right. Something horrible would happen to Wullie if that old geezer didn’t shut his trap, and boy did Thomas know that the old man had no shutters on his lips. The geezer would continue to nag against all the medieval things this out-back cut-off town was brewing until someone would shut him up. And definitely someone would do it if he’d remain as the sole voice of reason in this town. The sole voice of reason. Was he?<br/>Tatum caught Thomas’ wrinkling nose and crunching brow with her quick peep. The gears on Thomas’ head were spinning and he had the face which told when something was being cooked under the lid.<br/>If we let them to muffle out Wullie, we have let them to muffle out all of us. Someone needs to say that this is nonsense and we ain’t playing along in this little game. And someone needs to say it before things go out of hand. The question is, are we already too late?<br/><br/>Tatum shivered.<br/><i>Should I ask her ‘are you cold’ or should I state that we should stand next to Wullie in this? That we shouldn’t gag ourselves and pretend to be sheep in the flock?</i>, Thomas thought. Are you cold? No, just casually shivering. Damn you’re a fool, Tom. Don’t state the obvious here, say something smart. You're smart.<br/><br/><span style="font-family:Amaranth">"Sorry, it's just so cold lately. I almost feel as if I can't get warm anymore. It really makes a person miss real heat, doesn't it?"</span><br/>She struck first. Suddenly he had a bottomless pit in his bowels. Hunger for attention and affection gnawed his intestines with Tatum’s perfectly pearly teeth.<br/>A swell of bold, fluffy, and most of all manly counters swarmed on his tongue ready to gush out as snappy counters of Tatum’s longing of warmth. It took willpower to swallow them down. He wouldn’t want to ruin the moment by saying something stupid.<br/><br/>“You need wood? Uh, I mean -”, congratulations, Thomas. He chuckled at his blunt blurt. “Oh my god, I meant that- what I meant-”, he had to move his free arm to solidify his thoughts she had scrambled. “You got enough dry cordwood for the night?”<br/>You are incredibly stupid. Just don’t tangle in your words and try to navigate yourself into dry land from the dank swamp you just threw yourself into.<br/>He couldn’t help not to laugh nervously and shook his head. She made him incredibly nervous, like he’d never talked to a woman before. Like he was a mere teenager ricketing with too weak knees. But he was not: he had the guts to laugh at himself.