Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 100207 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 501(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 334(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100207 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 501(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 334(@300wpm)
“Do not move,” she ordered. “Stay right there.”
“Sarai,” I said, frustration making my voice come out lower than normal.
“Alex,” she mimicked in the same tone.
I leaned my head against the couch and scowled. This wasn’t exactly how I’d pictured our evening going. I hadn’t gone to her house so that she could take care of me. I’d wanted to bring her dinner, do something nice because I knew how busy she was. Instead, she was waiting on me.
It took only a few minutes before she had us all set up in the living room, our bowls of soup and glasses of water on a little tray between us on the couch. Sarai sat facing me, her back against the arm of the couch and one leg folded under her.
“How did you hurt your leg?” she asked, picking up her bowl. Both bowls had little Koozies of some sort wrapped around them, and I took a closer look at mine as I grabbed my food.
“I twisted my knee sliding into second,” I said with a sigh. I sounded like an idiot.
“That sounds painful,” she murmured, blowing gently on her spoon before taking a bite of her soup.
“It was stupid,” I confessed ruefully. “I was joking around, and it backfired.”
“What do you think is wrong with it? Are you going to see a doctor?”
“Yeah, I’ll go tomorrow.” I took a bite of my soup, and my eyes opened wide in horror. The liquid was so hot that it was like molten lava. I choked for a second before swallowing it down. “Holy shit,” I gasped, quickly grabbing my water glass and taking a large gulp. “I didn’t realize how hot it was.”
“I’m so sorry,” Sarai apologized, wincing. “I forgot how much the bowl sweaters fool you into thinking the food is cooler than it is.”
“Bowl sweaters?” I asked, my lips twitching.
Sarai rolled her eyes good-naturedly. “Well, what would you call them?”
“Koozies?”
“Those are for beer cans,” she argued. “And these are prettier.”
“Why would you buy bowl sweaters anyway?” I asked, lifting a spoonful of soup so I could blow on it.
“Oh, I didn’t buy them.” She shook her head. “I got them from my secret Santa at work last year.”
I stared at her with one brow raised.
“What?” she asked, laughing a little.
“Santa?”
“They probably don’t know I’m Jewish,” she said with a shrug.
“Why wouldn’t you say something?” I asked with a chuckle.
“Because then I wouldn’t get a secret Santa present,” she said, a mischievous little smirk playing at the corners of her mouth.
“Maybe you’d get eight,” I pointed out.
“I work with accountants,” she replied. “They’re too cheap to buy anyone eight presents.”
I laughed.
“I feel their pain,” I said. “Christmas gets expensive! I have a big family, so it adds up.”
“I just have my aunt and uncle,” she replied. “But we usually do small holiday gifts for the neighbors, too.”
“Pretty tight-knit community, huh?” I asked.
“Understatement,” Sarai joked. “You can’t sneeze without a neighbor yelling bless you from three doors down.”
I chuckled.
“It’s nice,” she admitted. “It drove me crazy when I was younger, but I miss it now.”
“I know what you mean,” I said with a nod. “I used to hate that my family was always sticking their noses into my business, but now I find myself calling them to tell them stuff.”
“Oh yeah?” she replied nonchalantly. “Have you told them about me?”
I smiled, watching her as she looked down and then back at me, waiting for a reply. “Yeah,” I said finally.
“Well,” she blurted, raising her eyebrows. “What have you said?”
“That I met a woman,” I replied slowly. “And she’s smart and beautiful and way too good for me.”
She blushed and looked back at her soup. Damn, she was cute.
“Actually,” I said. “My sister and sister-in-law were convinced that our breakfast date meant you’d put me in the friend zone.”
“Why?” she asked in surprise.
“Apparently, breakfast isn’t a date.” I shrugged.
“It felt like a date to me,” she said quietly.
“Me too,” I murmured, reaching out to give her thigh a squeeze.
We sat there talking long after our soup bowls were empty and she’d cleared the little table from the couch. I learned that even though she was crazy busy, she seemed to sail through academics like they were nothing. She didn’t love the place she worked, but she liked the people she worked with and that was good enough for now. She had only a few good friends in Missouri, and Hailey was her best friend, but they’d barely talked lately, because Sarai couldn’t stand Sean and had a hard time hiding it.
Sarai was funny and sarcastic, but I’d never heard her say anything mean. Intelligent, but she didn’t act like a know-it-all, even though I knew without a doubt that she was smarter than I was.
“You’re beautiful,” I said, leaning my head against the back of the couch as I looked at her.