Page 29 of A Roommate for Christmas
Had he noticed her staring?Great, she thought.How long was I gaping at him?
“This is bad,” Carter said.“Very bad.”
“No shit, Sherlock,” Paige replied.“At this point, we are completely snowed in.”
“So, no flight for you then.”He was still looking out the window.
“Again, your detective skills are unparalleled,” Paige said.
Carter turned toward her, jaw muscles clenched.She was getting under his skin again.
He began walking across the room to where she stood, but he walked right past her to the coffee machine.
“Ahh thanks, roomie.I was really craving a good cup of joe this morning.”Carter picked up the mug and took a sip, maintaining eye contact the whole time.
Paige couldn't believe he had the nerve but was finding it hard to summon words as she looked into his eyes.
She had never seen them this close in the daylight before.They were such a light shade of brown they almost looked yellow.
“If you’d like to take a picture, it'll last longer.”Carter leaned back against the counter with a smile.
“Oh, don’t flatter yourself,” Paige said, snapping out of her second trance of the morning.“I’m just trying to understand where you get off being such a prick.Move,” she barked at him, and she stepped to the coffee machine, nudging him firmly with her shoulder.
See how he likes being ordered around.
“Geez, can’t a guy have his coffee in peace?”he said after regaining his balance.
Paige didn’t humor him with a reply.
As she made herself another coffee, Carter spoke again, “Look, I don’t like this either.I’d much rather go out to the gym, the coffee shop, the grocery store—heck, I’d even rather go into work than be stuck inside an apartment where it looks like a Christmas bomb went off.But here we are.”
“Why do you hate Christmas so much, anyway?”
Carter looked down into his now half-empty mug, his face taking on the solemn look she had seen a couple of times before.“I just think it’s overhyped is all,” he said with a small shrug.He proceeded to take another sip of coffee.
Paige wasn’t sure she was buying it.Could he really havethatbad of an attitude because he felt the holiday was overhyped?But she was still annoyed that he had stolen her first coffee so she didn’t press any further.As she walked toward the couch to turn on the news, she simply said, “If you say so.”
She heard the door to his room close shortly after, followed by the news anchor’s advice for everyone to stay indoors until the blizzard subsided.
With that, she wrapped herself up in her favorite blanket, hit play on a cheesy Christmas movie, and soon after closed her eyes for a nap.
***
A couple of hours later, Paige was startled awake by the sound of rummaging in the refrigerator.
“Can’t you see I’m napping here?”she groaned.As she said it, her stomach did the same.
“What the hell are we going to eat?”Carter said, ignoring her.
Shit.Paige hadn’t thought that far ahead.This morning she had been so worried about coffee and being snowed in with her Christmas nemesis that she hadn’t even thought about meals—and she had used up the last of her groceries the day before.
Paige got up and walked over to the fridge.She and Carter stood side by side looking at nearly bare shelves, save for a bag of shredded cheese, butter, condiments, and a carton of a dozen eggs.
Carter pulled out the freezer drawer, and the prospects weren’t much better.One frozen pizza, a bag of breakfast sausages, two half-empty tubs of ice cream, and a bag of veggies.
The pantry cupboard had pancake mix, syrup, pasta noodles and sauce, an already opened bag of tortilla chips, and most everything needed for baking.
Paige took stock of the options and figured they had about three meals at best.
