Page 33 of Until Joy

His smile was slow and had me tingling in all my girly parts, making me want to wiggle, but that would have given the game away. Instead, I tossed back my braid and smiled back. “Did you bring me something?”

“I brought something for us, Doll. You going to let me in?”

“Depends on what you brought. I might not like it.”

Graham threw back his head and laughed.

I pretended to frown. “What’s all the laughter for?”

“I have yet to see Miss Laverne put one thing on your plate that you haven’t devoured.”

“She’s a great cook,” I defended myself.

“And the burned pork chops with the apple glaze where you only tasted nutmeg. Are you telling me that was good?”

I giggled. “Okay, so she had an off day.”

“But you ate everything she put in front of you. I was waiting for you to ask for seconds.”

“Even I couldn’t do that.” I shuddered.

“Anyway, I’m thinking it’s a sure bet you’ll like what I brought.”

Now I was excited. I got up on my tiptoes to see if I could look in the bag, but he was holding it close to his chest and he was just too damn tall for me to peer in.

“Tut. Tut. Tut. You’re going to have to let me in to see the food.”

I went to the wall and disengaged the alarm, then opened the door. As soon as Graham walked in, I smelled the rich aroma of Chinese food.

Score!

Not just with the food, but with Graham showing up. I’d been really bummed not seeing him this week. Now here he was. In my domain. The thought made me rejoice.

I went back to the wall and reengaged the alarm. As we started down the hall together, I turned back and checked the alarm once more.

Good, I’d set it right.

As I walked back to Graham, his eyebrow was raised. “Everything good, Joy?”

I smiled sheepishly. “Everything’s great.”

He put his arm around my shoulders, then we continued down the long hall. “Are we going to eat with the animals?” he asked. We could both hear the sound of the puppies and dogs barking as we got closer to the end of the hall.

“No, I learned my lesson after the first night. They all made sad starving-puppy and kitty faces like they’d never been fed before, which was a total lie, because I’d just fed all of them. But they sat there and whined and meowed until I gave away my entire sandwich. When I told July what happened the next day, she told me that human food wasn’t always good for some dogs and cats. Man, did I feel horrible. From there on out, I eat in the break room and browse through my phone. Or FaceTime with my family.”

“In that case, lead the way.” Graham smiled. “I even brought drinks.”

We turned the corner and walked down the short hall to the break room door. There were two little tables, not that we ever used both, since we all tended to gather around just the one.

Graham started pulling paper plates and plastic utensils out of the bag, followed by cans of soda, then came the good stuff.

“What did you get?” I asked as I started to open up the white boxes.

“Two egg rolls. Four crab wontons. Four steamed dumplings with pork. Beef with scallops and vegetables. Crispy honey chicken. Sesame shrimp. Mongolian beef. And finally, vegetable lo mein.”

“Oh, no!” I cried out.

His head whipped around. “What, Joy? What’s wrong?”