Page 35 of The Best Little Christmas Shop
‘What’sthe proper form for waking him up?’
Giselle’s tinkly laugh, unlike my own head back, belly laugh, drifted down the phone.
‘What’s the problem? You have a male best friend, three brothers, and worked with a tonne of blokes. I’ve seen them dozing in the garage on the television. Surely you must have had to wake one of them up before.’
‘Of course. All of the above I just give a shove and tellthem to wake up.’
‘So?’
‘So. That doesn’t seem appropriate here.’
‘Why not?’
‘I … don’t know.’ And that was the truth. I had no idea why this was such an issue. Cal was like any other bloke. Except I already knew that wasn’t entirely true. Which was exactly the problem.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake this is ridiculous, I should just –’
‘Kiss him,’ Giselle offered.
‘What?’ I squeaked. This wassomething I very rarely did. Especially not in a whisper.
‘Kiss him. I can categorically say he won’t mind.’
‘I might!’
‘Liar.’
I didn’t have an answer for that.
‘It’s not appropriate.’
‘Says who? Honestly, hon. I’m telling you he really wouldn’t mind. And I don’t think you would either. Maybe it’s time to –’
‘OK. I think he’s waking up anyway. Talk to you later. Bye!’ I hung up and glancedover to Cal who was still completely sparko. It wasn’t an outright fib to Giselle. Cal had actually moved slightly but his breathing stayed deep and steady and rhythmic and whatever I’d hoped, he wasn’t about to wake up. Damn.
‘Cal?’ I called, quietly.
Nothing.
‘Cal?’ I tried again.
Nope. Bugger. I wrapped my hand around a bicep that even under his squidgy jacket still felt pretty prominent.This time I gave him a gentle shake as I called. There was movement but no definite result. I shifted position, leant over a little more, and tried again. Cal’s head moved and thick-lashed, heavy-lidded eyes opened sleepily and looked directly into mine.
Oh crap. That’s so not a helpful image to have in my mind right now! I sat back quickly and gave the rogue thoughts of Cal’s “just woken uplook” starring in other possible situations the good hard shove they deserved out of my brain.
‘Hi.’ He smiled. His voice had that sleep-roughened edge. The thoughts I’d dismissed previously sniggered and crept back in. I did my best to ignore them.
‘Hello!’ I said brightly. ‘Nice sleep?’
Cal shoved himself up a little, noticing the scarf under his head. He caught it as it slid down.
‘I’mpretty sure that wasn’t there when we started out. In fact –’ he looked at it and then me ‘– I’m almost convinced it was around your neck.’
‘It was. But your head was making some rather unsettling bumping sounds against the window.’
He was looking at me in that world-disappearing way again. ‘Thank you.’
‘No problem,’ I replied, trying to keep my voice sounding casual as I took the scarf backfrom him.
