AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“This is so perfect. Clara is coming over to Northern Lights tonight—”
I whip back around. “I’m sorry, what?” I must not have heard her correctly. After months of a long-distance relationship, I’m back and she’s telling me my girlfriend is spending the evening at the old folks’ home? “Why is she going there?”
“She’s reading us some excerpts from books.” She nods at the piles of books in their hands.
“You can all read, why does she have to read to you?” I ask impolitely. I’m surprised my grandma hasn’t smacked me on the head by now.
“Because some of us have cataracts and the font is small. But now that you’re back early, you can come too. You two could act it out.”
I stare blankly because Grandma better be joking. “Act out an entire book?”
“No. We’re picking out excerpts to compare and contrast,” Dori fills me in.
I glance at the books. From the covers, they look like romance. “What are you comparing and contrasting?”
“The poetry of the words, of course,” Grandma says.
“I think you should all read the passages yourselves.” From the look on Grandma’s face, I picked the wrong thing to say. “Just give me a moment to say hello to Clara. She doesn’t know I came home early. It’s a surprise. You know, so we could spend the night together.” I turn to walk to her office.
“We’ll be right here waiting for you.”
I give her a wave, not turning around. Clara’s office is in the back of the library, next to the bathrooms, which we’ve made plenty of jokes about through the years. I slide in the office door and shut it behind me, locking it so the grandmas don’t come in.
She looks up and screeches. “X? You’re here?”
“I am.”
I don’t wait. She stands and I round her desk, taking her into my arms, pressing my lips to hers, and kissing her so hard she feels how much I’ve been thinking about doing this for weeks. I close the kiss before we get too carried away, knowing we can’t go any further with the three grandmas in the library.
“Oh, I missed you.” She stares up at me with that look I can’t get enough of, as if I’m her everything.
“Me too, but we have a problem. I was all set to dress up as a clown or elephant tonight, but I hear you’re reading them romance at Northern Lights?”
She laughs. A full belly laugh. “Well, I’m sure some of them would enjoy it if you dressed up.”
I put my hands on my hips, staring at her.
“I’m sorry, but you weren’t supposed to be home until tomorrow. But now you can come with me.”
“They want me to act out the scenes with you. From a romance book.”
“Romance? They told me I was reading the facts of Lake Starlight and how it became a city and what it’s known for. And if we have time, we would do Sunrise Bay and Greywall. No one said anything about romance. I’m not doing that.”
“Well, they’re hanging out there picking out books for the two of us to act out.”
She walks by me, and I stare at her ass, happy that I’m not saying goodbye to it anytime soon. Opening the door, she storms down the hall.
The three grandmas are at a table, laughing and carrying on with the books open in front of them. Clara stops about ten feet away from them.
I come up alongside her. “Want me to tell them?”
The minute her shoulders fall, I know the answer. “They look so happy. If they want me to read a few romance excerpts, so be it.”
“You’re too nice.”
She turns and kisses me on the cheek. “Get ready, because you’re coming with me. Welcome home, X.” She saunters back to her office.
How did my night go from screwing to getting screwed over?
