Things You Save in a Fire - Katherine Center Page 0,32
back before I looked away.
Too late. Those broad shoulders—and that little butt in those red boxer briefs—were burned permanently into my corneas. I blinked my eyes over and over on the drive home, trying to blot the image from my memory.
I left that first shift completely flummoxed. And it wasn’t the hazing, or the sleeping in the supply closet, or even the mental visual of the captain’s johnson in a splint made of tongue depressors.
It was the rookie.
I’d just spent an entire night with the guy, and he hadn’t done even one annoying thing. He hadn’t farted, or hocked a loogie, or even snored. The worst thing he’d done was try to come up with ways to keep me warm in the cold night air. I already suspected he was easygoing, and then last night he couldn’t seem to stop being considerate, and now, as of first thing in the morning, I knew for certain that he had an adorable butt.
Disaster.
I needed some flaws on this guy, stat.
Otherwise—seriously—I was in trouble.
Eleven
WHEN I GOT back to Diana’s after shift, it was eight in the morning, and I was exhausted. In many different ways.
Diana was having coffee at her kitchen table with a friend—a cute African American lady with poofy hair, maybe ten years older than me. Their cups were full, with steam rising, and they both cradled the mugs in their palms, savoring the warmth. They looked up and smiled when I walked in.
Diana had changed her patch to a blue-and-white gingham.
“Meet my friend Josie,” Diana said. “She owns the yarn shop next door, and she reviews movies on her blog.”
I had the weirdest feeling they’d just been talking about me.
It’s strange to say, but it surprised me for Diana to have a friend. I’d created an idea of her in my head as a lonely old lady, isolated in her house, making pottery all day with her eye patch on. Like, if I’d been mad at her for ten years, the rest of the world must have been, too.
I lifted my hand. “Hello.”
But Josie was already plunking her coffee down on the table and scooting back her chair and launching into an excited jog—almost a prance—to come over to me. She held her arms out and up, and her whole face was a smile. “OMG!” she said. “It’s you!”
Getting a good look at her, I suddenly wondered if she might be a little bit pregnant. Just a hunch. I had a knack for spotting pregnant people. Though, if she was, it was only barely.
I didn’t ask.
Then she was hugging me—tight, and with no hesitation, the way you’d hug a dear friend, even though we’d never met before.
I wasn’t a fan of hugging, but I held still and endured it, anyway.
She let go but kept smiling at me. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m a hugger.”
“You’re good at it,” I said. “I can see why.”
Then she hugged me again.
I didn’t protest—even mentally. Who could resist all that enthusiasm and warmth? Plus I loved her style. She had a polka-dot bandana and blouse with a Peter Pan collar. Big, bangly bracelets, too.
She was, in a word, adorable.
“I love your shirt,” I said.
Her smile got bigger. “I made it,” she said.
“You made it?” I said. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen a piece of homemade clothing.
“She’s very crafty,” Diana said from the table.
Josie was still standing very close to me. On impulse she grabbed my hands and squeezed them. “I’m just so happy to meet you,” she said.
It was off-putting in a way. Growing up with my dad, who was not exactly a talker, life was pretty quiet. We each spoke mostly when spoken to, in a kind of negative feedback loop. He was not a person you’d describe as effusive, unless he was watching sports. In everyday conversation? A minimalist, for sure.
Maybe I’d absorbed too much of his reserve, without ever intending to.
But I already liked Josie.
“Josie’s heard a lot about you,” Diana said, taking a sip of her coffee.
I looked at Josie. “That’s worrying.”
“We’re in crochet club together,” Diana said, “so, as you can imagine, we chat a lot.”
Nope. I could not imagine a crochet club.
“We’re actually the only two people in the crochet club,” Josie added.
“Co-founders and co-presidents,” Diana chimed in.
“Unless you’d like to join,” Josie offered.
“No, thanks,” I said.
Diana went on. “I’ve told her about the time you yanked out your tooth on the playground at school and tried to sell it to another kid in your class.”