No Novelty
Autor:© WebNovel
Capítulo 1: Chapter 1
1
“Son of a…” The huge stuffed monkey blocked her view of the carpeted floor too effectively to make finding her keys easy, which was par for the course, considering the day she’d had at the hospital. She stepped away from her apartment door, hoping to clear her line of sight, but the side of her heel knocked against something hard and heavy, nearly making her stumble.
“That’s it.” Unceremoniously, she dropped the gorilla to the floor, snarling in frustration when her watchband caught on the toy’s knitted sweater. She wrenched her arm free and glared at its jet bead eyes. “You are officially a menace.”
Her keys rested innocently next to the gorilla’s lax paw, like it offered them as a token apology. Sydney snatched them up, but not before she got a good look at what exactly she’d almost tripped over.
A package.
She tilted her head sideways to read the label.
Addressed to a certain Steven Teller.
Just the sight of her neighbor’s name was enough to make her heart skip a couple beats. Though he had lived across the hall from her for nearly three years, all Sydney knew about him was that he was a writer, he worked a ton of hours because she rarely saw him, and he got more packages in the mail than anybody she had ever known.
Oh, and he was gorgeous. Long, elegant features, dimples the size of Montana, and the prettiest blue eyes off the silver screen. Which made the fact that he seemed so solitary even more unusual.
Curiosity won out over her bad mood, and she picked up the long box, turning it over in her hand to try and see where this one might have come from. Like all the other misdelivered boxes, there were no identifying marks, and the return label just had an address in Spokane. Someone in Spokane sure loved Steven. He got several boxes a month from there, and those were just the ones that got delivered to her door instead of his. There was no telling how many might have actually made it into his long, talented hands.
Talented because of the writing, of course. Sydney didn’t think about how flexible his fingers were, unless she was safely ensconced in her bed with her favorite vibrator. And once in the nurses’ locker room at the hospital.
She sighed as she straightened. It was truly a sad state of affairs when she was reduced to fantasies at the completely uninspiring sight of a brown box.
Unlocking her door, she grabbed the gorilla by the ear and dragged him inside, abandoning him at the end of the couch to set the package down on the coffee table. She needed to get it over to Steven as soon as possible, but not before she had a chance to clean up. Her shift had been horrendous. The sooner she got off the pediatrics rotation, the happier she would be. Not because of the kids, of course, the kids were great, wonderful even. No, her nightmares came from the parents, and their never ending whining, and their stubborn refusal to believe anybody on staff was actually a professional and—horrors!—could do their job. Today’s winner had been the father who had shown up before breakfast was even served with the gorilla now hanging out in her living room. He’d scared his three-year-old so badly, the child had woken up every other child in the ward. He’d blamed it on Sydney, of course, because that was the way the world spun.
And now she was stuck with another stuffed animal a sick child didn’t want or need. It would be time to hit the local elementary school again with a donation. Her apartment was starting to look like a toy factory exploded.
She stripped out of her uniform in record time, then stood, frozen, in her bra and panties, staring into her closet. She had no idea what to wear. Something casual without being frumpy. Something that said, “Hi, I’m not desperate, but please notice me. But not my ass. Or my thighs. But really, I’m not trying to impress you. This is how fabulous I always look.”
After five minutes of discounting half her wardrobe, Sydney retreated to the bathroom. Hair and teeth were easy. She’d do those first. A quick glance in the mirror made it obvious she needed at least a little bit of makeup, too, if she didn’t want to look like something to be wheeled down to the morgue, and ten minutes later, she was back in front of her closet, saying to hell with it and pulling on her favorite pair of jeans and a soft blue blouse that made her breasts look perky and her blonde hair brighter.
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