His Inspiration (Book 2)

Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten

Natalie climbed out of her bed at the sound of the doorbell. Who could be at her house at eight in the morning? She thought, grabbing her light blue shawl and throwing it over her bare shoulders as she headed down the hallway of her apartment.

The bell wrung again and she grew agitated. "Hold on, i'm coming." She yelled, trudging through her tiny living room. She honestly felt like she was slowly dying on the inside, and leaving her bed to go answer her front door this early in the morning wasn't helping.

When she finally made it to the door, she twisted the knob and pulled it open.

There stood Sara with a slightly annoyed look on her face. Natalie shifted her eyes to her left to see Thomas hovering besides her, smiling brightly.

Sara held out a box of cough syrup, along with another bag that she could not see inside of. Natalie scratched the back of her head, trying to figure out if her sickness was causing her to hallucinate.

"Uh..I thought you said you were coming at twelve?" She asked bewildered.

Sara placed the box of medicine in Natalie's hand and moved past her, plopping down onto the couch with her bag of goodies. "Yeah, I didn't have anything else better to do, so I figured you wouldn't mind if I came a little earlier to hang out." She said, pulling a snickers bar out of her bag, "oh, and I brought company."

Natalie watched Sara, still not believing that this was actually happening. She pressed a hand to her warm forehead before looking back at Thomas. He was as handsome as ever, even this early in the morning, and she, well she was sure she looked exactly like she felt on the inside - dead. 

"Go ahead and come in, Thomas." She motioned, shutting the door after he walked passed her and sat beside Sara.

Natalie took the cough syrup and sat it on the kitchen counter. The three of them sat in silence until Natalie finally spoke up.

"So, what exactly did you guys want to do?"

- - -
Thirty minutes later

     "You are such a freaking cheater." Thomas muttered under his breath.

Sara grunted, pushing Thomas away from her so he couldn't see the rest of her uno cards. "It's not my fault you can't tell the difference between red and green. If I didn't know any better I'd say you were color blind."

     Thomas threw a card at her. "Shut up. I saw you switch out your cards. Once you put one down, you can't just take it back."

Sara shrugged. "Don't hate the player, hate the game."

      Natalie sneezed loudly as she sat down her next card. "I hate you both." She replied, sneezing once more into her elbow before dropping her cards and pushing herself up from the floor. "Okay, I'm out."

     Sara glanced up at her. "You're such a buzz kill." She pouted just as her phone began to ring. She looked down at the caller id and smiled deviously. "Um, I'm gonna go take this outside. It's important." She spoke up, heading out of Natalie's apartment, leaving Thomas and Natalie alone. They sat in silence, not really sure how to approach one another. They hadn't spoken in two days since he had confessed, and neither one really knew what to expect.

    "So," Thomas trailed, "You're actually sick." 

Natalie nodded. "Yeah, that seems to happen sometimes." She replied. Ten minutes passed and Natalie pointed towards the door. "She's not coming back, is she?"

Thomas dropped his head after noticing the car keys he had sitting on the table earlier were now gone.

"Nope." He said almost pained. "And she's got my car keys."

Just great. 

Natalie calmly nodded, taking everything in. 

Everything would be okay, she told herself. She had firmly told Thomas the other day that she wanted a friends only relationship and he had seemed to have agreed with her. So what should she be worried about? They were just two friends... hanging out, alone, at her apartment. What could possibly happen?

      "So.. you want to watch a movie, or something?"

- - -

Sara took another bite of her ice cream cone as she sat at the ice cream shop across from Natalie's apartment. She couldn't help but grin to herself as she imagined what was going through Thomas's mind after realizing that she had stolen his car keys. She took another bite of the cold dessert, rolling her eyes as Dane's panicked voice came through the other line of her phone.

"You left my best friend alone with that woman?" He practically yelled, "Go back over there and get him right now, Sara." He demanded.

Sara licked the ice cream that fell to the side of the cone before replying. "Honestly, I don't see what the big deal is. Thomas likes the woman and she seems to like him, she's just holding back for some reason. I'm just speeding the process up a bit."

"Are you crazy?" He shouted, "You're putting his bachelor hood on the line. If they actually get together who's going to come scope out the chicks with me?"

"I will." Sara said nonchalantly, making Dane gag.

"Yeah, no thanks." He replied, "You're like the devil, always ruining everything good."

"Oh, stop being so dramatic. If things go according as planned, those two should be going out by Monday. Aren't you happy?" She teased.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

Sara finished her cone, throwing her napkins in the trash. "You'll be fine." She assured, "Just let Thomas have this, Natalie seems like a nice woman."

"No offense, honey, but I don't give two craps about your opinion of her." 

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." Sara sung loudly. Dane shifted his phone away from his ear until she was finished.

"Just stop trying to taint my best friend, you witch."

"He's my best friend too."

"And? I saw him first." Dane said.

      "What are you, five?" Sara asked incredulously.  

"At least I don't look it." He shot back.

Sara chuckled. "You know, recently Lee  told me something funny about you. He said if I said one certain word three times you'd disappear."

    "And pray tell what that word is." He said sarcastically.

"Commitment. Commitment. Commitment." She taunted. 

        "Okay, Sara, go ahead and play your little matchmaker game and be all frilly nilly," he said slowly, "but if I come down there and find out that my best friend is dating that woman i'm going to kill you." He concluded. "This time I really mean it." 

"Yeah, yeah." She waved, glancing down at her watch, "Well, well, well, look at the time. I've already been gone for thirty minutes, might as well head over to the mall to give those two love birds some extra time by themselves." 

      "Sara," Dane warned. 

She ignored him and headed outside to Thomas's rental car. "Gotta go, Dane, but don't worry, I'll buy you something nice while i'm there." 

"Sara." He said again, this time louder. 

"Bye, love ya!" She chirped, clicking the end button and shoving the phone back into her pocket.