The Recipe Book Guy

Chapter Five

I was not a morning person.

Yet here I was at six a.m. cooking a full course meal.

I had potato patties in the oven, eggs and bacon on the stove, and I was currently rolling out dough to make cathead biscuits.

The past week had been complete hell. Every second was a waiting game. Would he wake up? Would he survive? Those two questions were constantly circling through my mind.

Every day was a repeated cycle for me. I would wake up at nine, shower, get dressed. Leave by nine-thirty to arrive at the hospital by ten. I would tell dad all the latest buzz, despite if he could hear me or not. I still talked to him. At twelve I would leave his room and head down to the hospital's kitchen. They had offered me a job there after I had baked some chocolate chip cookies for the entire staff on the third floor. It had taken me days, but what else was there to do after I got home?

After my three hour shift in the kitchen, I would go back to say my goodbyes to my dad, before leaving to go to the book store to work. 

The same monotonous thing, every day.

However, today, they had taken dad to get tested for meningitis and said that visiting was closed for today.

Suddenly my thoughts were interrupted by a continuous rapping on the door.

"What the heck?" I muttered to myself. I placed the dough down and rinsed my hands real quick before heading to the door.

"Em, I'm so sorry." I had barely finished opening the door when the voice of Jared rang in my ears. He looked stressed, his short hair was messy, and his clothes were wrinkled. Like he had just gotten out of bed.

"About what?" I said, furrowing my brows while gesturing him to come in.  He walked straight into the kitchen and sat down at the bar.

"Mom just told me about your dad. I swear if I would've known sooner I would've been here." The regret was apparent in his tone. Where had he been? I hadn't seen him this whole week.

"It's alright, I'm coping." I said, sighing. It really wasn't alright. I wasn't sleeping or socializing, and I hadn't gone anywhere besides the hospital and work.

"I should've been there." He raked his short hair and sighed, looking to the ground.

"It's fine, really."

"It isn't. I should've been there to comfort you. My mom, she's a big girl. But you, you needed someone to comfort you and I wasn't there." Anger struck through me.

"I appreciate your concern but, no. You didn't need to, be here to comfort me. You haven't been for the last three years so what changed?" I retorted, surprisingly sounding calmer than I expected.

"Em, I thought you forgave me and we were done with that. And I know you won't admit it but your dad just got in a wreck for christ sakes your going to need comfort. It's in human nature!" His voice raised and I winced. I didn't like it when people yelled at me. I know, I really need to grow some balls.

"I did have comfort Jared. There is other people in my life besides you." I couldn't believe he thought he could just show up one day after three years and pretend we were back to where we used to be. We weren't, and I don't know if we ever could be.

He seemed surprised by my words. His eyes were wide and mouth open a bit. Even I was surprised at my words, I was an introvert. I didn't have a backbone most of the time. But for some reason something sparked when he said that.

"Oh. Who?"

"A friend."

"What friend?" I sighed. So nosy.