Page 16 of Divorced from Number Thirty-Eight
I pull back.
“I’ll give you some privacy.”
Six
Faye
I smile at the nurse—this one a curvy blond with burgundy scrubs, a badge decorated with a Grizzlies pin, and thank her.
She winks, taps a few keys on the computer next to my bed. “I should be thanking you.” She taps the breast pocket of her top, where she carefully stowed the autograph she’d asked for, and sighs happily. “You’re the one who introduced me to none other than Gray Roberts.”
I know exactly how she feels.
I’ve sighed a time—or hundred—over Gray Roberts.
He’s gorgeous, friendly…and rescues damsels in distress from blazing fires.
What’s not to sigh over?
Being stuck in the hospital, I think dryly.
“You spring me from this room and I’ll see about getting you tickets to the next home game,” I tell her.
“Nice try,” she teases, pausing at the door to look back at me. “But doctor’s orders are to keep you overnight.”
I scowl.
“That’s cute. No wonder Gray likes you so much.” She waves a hand at me, smiles widely. “I’m just so glad he’s moved on from the other one?—”
“Oh”—my face smooths out—“it’s not like that. He’s…”
But I don’t get to finish before she’s disappearing out into the hall and I’m left completing the sentence on my own.
“…just my neighbor,” I whisper.
A neighbor who saved me from being burned alive.
And how the heck can I possibly repay him for that?
I wonder if he likes banana bread.
Then I think I could probably bake him his body weight’s worth of banana bread and I still wouldn’t come close to repaying him.
He broke down my door. He carried me from my burning house.
Yeah, banana bread isn’t going to cut it.
Neither is my homemade fudge cake with rich double chocolate buttercream frosting.
Nor my pretzels with jalapeño cheddar dipping sauce.
Or my salted caramel filled sugar cookies or my zucchini muffins or my peanut butter fudge.
I could even pull out my most finicky and also my most impressive recipe—my chocolate soufflé—and it still wouldn’t be nearly enough to repay him.
Not that I’m going to be baking any time soon.
Not with my house…well, I don’t know what the state of my house is, really, but I can’t imagine it’s going to be soufflé ready anytime soon.
