Joy Argento - Carrie and Hope (12 page)

“It’s not that bad. No one will notice.” Carrie said, with a straight face that broke out into a grin.

“Liar.”

“Why don’t we stop at my house, seeing
it’s
closer and you can wear one of my shirts,” Carrie offered.

Hope’s eyes briefly drifted down to Carrie’s chest protruding slightly through her winter jacket. Carrie noticed the glance and felt her face get hot.

“I’m not sure I can get into your shirt,” Hope said. “
Fit
into your shirt,” she corrected as a blush spread up her neck.

“I have a few shirts that I’m sure you will fit in,” Carrie’s face still felt flushed. “Or you can just wear your bowling shirt.”

“Okay, let’s stop at your house. A tight shirt would be better than this thing,” Hope said.

Back at Carrie’s house Hope followed Carrie into her bedroom. Some of Carrie’s friends had been in her bedroom before, for various reasons, but it felt a little strange having Hope standing behind her as she peered into her closet, her bed only a few feet away. Carrie couldn’t quite put her finger on what she felt.

“Anything strike your fancy?” Carrie asked her. She stepped out of the way so Hope could get a better look.

Hope pulled out at maroon pull over shirt that looked like the material would be a little more forgiving. “How about this one?” she asked Carrie. “This one might fit.”

“Great choice,” Carrie said with a smile. Go ahead and change, I’ll wait for you in the other room. Carrie left Hope in her bedroom to change. She tried to push the image of Hope removing her shirt from her mind.
What the hell is wrong with me
, she thought and shook her head.

Carrie picked up a magazine from the end table and flipped through the pages while she waited for Hope. She looked up as Hope entered the room, wearing Carrie’s shirt and holding her bowling shirt in her hand. It was definitely snug over Hope’s breasts. She was at least a cup size larger than Carrie.

“Well, how does it look?” Hope asked doing a theatrical turn.

Carrie thought the snug look made Hope look incredibly sexy. “It looks fine,” she said out loud. “Are you ready to go?”

“All set.”

Carrie threw the magazine down on the couch and got both of their coats. They headed out the door to Hope’s car.

“We never decided where to go eat.
Any preferences?”
Hope asked Carrie, looking across the car at her.

“Anywhere is fine.
How ‘bout you?
Any places strike your fancy?”

“My fancy can be
striked
or is it struck…by a restaurant with seafood. Are you in the mood for seafood? How about
The
Lobster Shack?”

“Sounds good to me,” Carrie answered.

Thirty minutes later they were sitting at a table at the Lobster Shack waiting for their food. Hope tied a plastic bib around her neck. A cartoon outline of a big red lobster graced the front.

“You were afraid of looking ridiculous in that bowling shirt, but you have no problem with how you look in a plastic bib?” Carrie tried not to laugh.

“I am trying to keep your shirt clean. I don’t want to get lobster juice or melted butter on it.”

“I’ve seen you eat and I’ve never seen you get anything on your clothes.”

“You’ve never seen me eat seafood. It’s best to sit back and not get too close to me. Shells and butter go everywhere.” Hope gave a small chuckle. “It can be very dangerous. When the waitress comes back I’m going to ask her if they have any goggles. It might be a good idea for you to wear eye protection.”

Carrie shook her head and smiled. “If it gets that bad, I’m going to ask the waitress to seat me at a different table…across the room.”

“No, don’t leave the table.
All right.
I’ll be careful. But, I’m keeping the bib on. Besides, I think it is very fashionable.” She lifted the edge of the bib and glanced down at it. “And just look how sweet this little fake lobster looks on here.”

“I can’t argue with that. Okay, wear the bib. I’ll stay. Just eat slowly and carefully.”

“All right.
I promise,” Hope said with a straight face, but a hint of a laugh in her voice.

Before too long, the waitress came back to the table carrying a large tray, filled with food.
Hope rubbed her hands together in anticipation. Carrie smiled at her and leaned back. She enjoyed watching Hope get so excited about eating.

Chapter 13

Three days later the traffic was light as Carrie drove to Hope’s house. She was looking forward to a pleasant evening watching a movie with Hope. She had spent a little time visiting her grandmother after work and had grabbed some leftovers to eat at home before heading out.

She pulled into the driveway of Hope’s large two-story house. Carrie had been here before when she picked Hope up for some of her bowling lessons, but she had never spent any real time at Hope’s house before.

She walked up the short sidewalk to the house, a brown paper bag in her hand. She pulled her jacket up higher around her ears to protect her from the cold wind and rang the doorbell.

Hope opened the door with a bright smile. “Hi, Carrie, come in.” She stepped back to let Carrie pass by her.

“I come bearing gifts,” Carrie said as she handed her the paper bag.

“Oh, what’s this?” Hope asked. “Take off your coat and I’ll hang it up for you.” Hope reached into the bag as Carrie removed her coat. She pulled out a bottle of cranberry grape juice.
“Aw, how thoughtful of you.”
Hope smiled. “I got some wine for you,” she laughed.

Hope took Carrie’s coat and hung it on a wooden hanger in the closet. “I’m glad you’re here. I picked up several DVDs after work today. So, we can decide what we want to watch.” She led the way through the living room and into the kitchen. Carrie looked around the large room and up at the high cathedral ceiling. Real stonework covered most of the walls from the counter tops to the base of the natural oak cupboards. A large butcher-block island with a second sink sat in the middle of the room. A round pedestal table with four wooden chairs was off to the side near a double set of sliding glass doors that opened onto a large deck. A blue tablecloth with tiny white flowers covered the table.

“Wow,” Carrie said. “This is a wonderful kitchen. I especially love that.” She pointed to a pot rack hanging over the stove with a collection of polished stainless steel pots and pans. “I thought you said you didn’t cook.”

“I cook a little, very little.” Hope scrunched up her face. “They are kind of just for show. I usually use the same two pans all the time. They are in the cupboard by the stove. I’m really good at take-out though.”

Carrie laughed. “Well, I’ll have to have you over for supper more.
Get some home
cooking into you.”

“I would like that,” Hope said in a low voice and with a smile.

Carrie loved to see Hope’s smile light up her face.
Yes
, she thought.
I should definitely have this woman over more often.

 
Hope put the bag containing the bottle of juice on the counter and retrieved a tall glass from one cupboard and a wine glass from another. “I have red wine and white wine. Which would you prefer?” Carrie looked at her with raised eyebrows. “Yes, I bought two bottles of wine for you so that you could have what you wanted,” she said answering the unasked question.

“Aw, that was so nice of you,” Carrie said. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I wanted to do something nice for you.” She walked to the refrigerator and took out the bottle of white wine and picked up the bottle of red from the counter. She held them up.
“Red or white?”
She repeated holding up each bottle in turn.

“I would love a glass of white.”

Hope put the bottle of red wine back on the counter. “White it is then.” She took a strange looking mechanism out of a drawer and handed it to Carrie along with the bottle. “I’ll let you open this.”

Hope took the tall glass and pushed it against the ice dispenser on the refrigerator door. Several half-moon shaped ice cubes clinked into the glass.

Carrie was struggling with the strange wine opener when Hope turned back to her. “You don’t know how to use that do you?” Hope smiled.

Carrie shook her head.
“Nope.
I’ve never seen anything like this before. I’m assuming that the corkscrew part goes into the cork, but I don’t know how to do that.”

Hope put the glass with the ice in it on the counter. Carrie attempted to hand her the opener. “Oh no,” Hope said. “I’m not going to do it. You get to learn how to do it. Pull those little things that look like rabbit ears apart. Set the corkscrew thing on the top of the bottle and pull down that lever.”

Carrie attempted to do what Hope said, but it still wasn’t working. Hope reached out, her hands covering Carrie’s. Carrie immediately felt warmth and softness. The warmth spread quickly through Carrie’s entire body. It turned to heat as it hit her face. She felt a tingle in her belly and below. The feeling surprised her and her first instinct was to pull her hands away, but she fought the impulse. She didn’t want Hope to know that she felt something from her touch.

Hope moved her hands over Carrie’s hands, showing her how to operate the contraption. The cork slid smoothly out of the bottleneck, with a slight popping sound.

“There you go,” Hope said. “Isn’t that a neat little device?”

Carrie cleared her throat. “It is.” She poured the wine into her glass. Hope did the same with the juice.

Carrie was still thinking about the reaction her body had had to Hope’s touch when they brought their drinks into the living room.

Hope sat on the soft leather couch and patted the spot next to her for Carrie to sit. She had a fresh bowl of popcorn sitting on the coffee table in front of them. “I thought you didn’t cook,” Carrie said, breaking the momentary silence.

“Oh, I cook microwave popcorn. In fact, that is my specialty.” Hope smiled that smile again.

Carrie couldn’t help but smile back. She took a sip of her wine. “
Mmm
, this is good.”

“I’m glad you like it.” Hope pulled her bare feet up under herself and turned her body to face Carrie better. “So, how was your day?”

“It was fine, mostly paperwork today, so not too exciting. How about you? Did you do anything exciting today?”

“Every day is exciting where I work. I cleaned teeth and then cleaned some more teeth. And oh yeah, did I mention I cleaned teeth?” She took a swallow of her juice. “Actually, this is the most exciting part of my day.”

“Your day must be boring if I’m the highlight,” Carrie smirked at Hope.

“You are the highlight. I really enjoy your company. I mean that.” Hope had a way of making Carrie feel really good about
herself
.

“Ditto.
I really enjoy your company, too. So what movies did you get?”

Hope got up and picked up five DVDs from the large solid wood entertainment center. She handed them to Carrie. “Here you go, take a look. Let me know what looks good.” Carrie put her wine down and shuffled through them. All of them were recent releases except for
The Sound of Music
.

“Did you have any one of these that you wanted to see?” Carrie asked her.

“No, any of them would be fine with me. Just pick
what ever
looks good to you.”

Carrie turned one DVD box over and read the back. “This one sounds pretty good.” She placed it on top of the pile and handed them back to Hope.

Carrie continued to drink her wine while Hope started the movie. She turned out the lights before returning to her seat next to Carrie.

Carrie had a hard time concentrating on the movie. Her thoughts returned again and again to the woman sitting on the couch next to her. She turned and looked at Hope several times during the course of the movie. Once, Hope caught her looking and smiled. Carrie smiled back, but didn’t dare another look. Her own thoughts and feelings were beginning to confuse her.

An hour and forty minutes later the credits rolled. The bowl of popcorn was empty as were the glasses that both women had long since abandoned.

Hope turned the forty-two inch television set off and switched on the lamp on the end table next to her. “So what did you think?” she asked Carrie.

 
I think you look beautiful in this light
, was what came into Carrie’s head. She startled herself with the thought. “It was a good movie,” she said out loud after she composed herself.

“You okay?” Hope asked her.

“Yes, I’m fine. Why are you asking?”

“You just seemed far away for a minute.”

“Sorry. I guess I’m a little tired.” Carrie looked at Hope and the way the light picked up the gold flakes in her eyes.

“I’ll bet you are, with work and visiting your grandmother and being kind enough to teach me to bowl.” Hope reached over and rubbed Carrie’s arm. “I really appreciate that by the way. You made a big difference. I would have been totally embarrassed bowling nothing but gutter balls if it weren’t for you.”

Carrie stopped hearing the words as soon as Hope touched her. She struggled to ignore the electric sensation that was coursing through her arm and to listen to the words Hope was saying. “Yes.” Carrie said, trying to figure out the conversation.

“Yes what?” Hope asked looking a little confused.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Very funny.
Never mind. Just know that I appreciate all the help and time you put into it,” Hope said removing her hand.

Carrie felt the loss of it immediately and fought the urge to reach out for Hope’s hand again.

“Of course.
Anything for you.”
She still wasn’t sure what they were talking about. “I really should get going. I know you have to work in the morning. I guess I do too.” She stood up.

“I really had a nice time,” she said walking to the door followed by Hope. “Thank you so much for the wine.”