Page 99 -- Waiting for Spring by R.J. Keller

Page 99 from Waiting for Spring Amazon:
A novel
By R.J. Keller
Reprinted with permission. © 2008 R.J. Keller, all rights reserved.

Book Description: A recently divorced woman trudges out of one small, Maine town and into an even smaller one, hoping to escape her pain. Instead she finds herself surrounded by people who are trudging on, just like her. Waiting for things to get better. Waiting for spring.

Waiting For Spring takes readers beyond the lighthouses and rocky beaches tourists visit and drops them instead into a rural Maine town that is filled with displaced factory workers who struggle with poverty and loss, yet push onward with stubbornness and humor.


I listened to his footsteps thudding toward the bathroom
while I stared at a tiny crack in the ceiling. His room was directly
below mine. And I wondered, for the first time, how my own
footsteps had sounded to him from down here. If he had ever lain
awake, right here, right in this bed, listening to me.

He sauntered back into the room and plopped down beside me
on his back, pulled me over to him. I rested my head on his
shoulder, played with the hair on his chest while he caressed my
back lightly with his fingers. It was the best feeling in the world.
But there was a can of worms I had to open. The one I hadn’t
thought about until I’d heard Crinkling above my head. I watched
the clock on his night stand, trying to build up my courage. It
glared back at me in bold red numbers for seven full minutes.
Both of us were silent the entire time. Finally I managed an,
“Ummm...”

He waited for me to continue and when I didn’t he asked, “Are
you humming to yourself or are you trying to tell me something?”

I laughed, and it made me brave enough to tell him about my
prescription. Then I asked him That question. He smiled and said:
“Yeah, I have been. And I’m clean. I’ve never done it without a
rubber anyway.”

I smiled back, relieved. Then there was something else.

Never?

It had been so long since there was something new. Even if it
wasn’t my something new. So I climbed on top of him and kissed
him, deep and hot and slow…

Ready again. Twenty-five. Gotta love that.

--
http://www.rj-keller.com
http://rjkeller.wordpress.com
http://www.backwordbooks.com

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