LIFE Interrupted
Page 50
“Enjoy your lunch with Jagger,” Sophie told her trying to be positive.
“I will.”
**
Sophie found Kai already seated at their normal table. Her friend rose when she approached. She hugged her hard then they took their seats.
“I ordered water for you.”
“Thanks.”
Slipping out of her jacket and laid it on top of her purse. She reached across the table and grasped Kai’s hands. “Stop.”
“What?”
“Looking at me, like I’m going to disappear.”
“You are kind of disappearing. You were tiny before, but you are frail looking now.”
Sophie chuckled. “I’ve only lost ten pounds. It’s not that bad.”
Sophie explained what was happening to her appetite. How food tasted differently even though she no longer felt sick. She didn’t really feel like eating anything.
“Soph, we have to find things that taste good enough to you that you eat. That is important to keep you as healthy
as possible.”
“I know.” Sophie chuckled. “Marcy brought me rice pudding. It tasted good but the store, bought kind didn’t. Go figure. Josh tried to recreate the recipe from a google recipe.”
“Oh no.”
“Josh can grill like nobody else but keep the man out of the kitchen.”
She smiled at the thought of her husband trying to make rice pudding and the mess her kitchen was in when she found him doing it. Before cancer, she might have reacted differently. After cancer, she turned around and walked out, letting him handle things.
Sophie had changed. She decided not to sweat the small, things like her kitchen that was a disaster.
She shoved a spoonful of her usual cobb salad in her mouth and chewed. After a few more bites of tasting like the silverware, she just couldn’t do it. “Maybe, I’ll just skip to dessert.”
“What can I do?”
She didn’t know. Sophie shrugged her shoulder. “Josh keeps shoving protein drinks in my face. They aren’t horrible, but they aren’t great either. I’ll have one when I get to the office.”
When their server came to check on them, Sophie ordered the fudge brownie with vanilla ice cream and hot fudge. She loved this dessert. When she brought the bowl overflowing more than usual to the table, Sophie dug in while Kai finished her Cobb salad.
The more bites she ate, the worse it tasted. She laid the spoon in the bowl and shoved it aside. “Even that doesn’t taste right.” She almost cried.
Kai reached across the table and squeezed Sophie’s hand. “Come on, I’m done. I’ll pick up lunch today.”
Sophie grabbed her jacket and slipped her arms in. She still had to get to the post office. She couldn’t believe she was about to cry over a Hot Fudge Brownie Delight. “I’ll meet you outside.”
She went straight outside and threw her purse in the front seat of the truck by the invoices she had to drop at the post office. The keys she stuck in the ignition. Then she leaned on the seat and waited for Kai.
When she finally came out, Sophie glanced at her watch. “What took you so long?”
“I’m pregnant, Soph. I’m old and I had to pee.”
She shook her head at her friend. Then they hugged. “Promise me you’ll be around when we’re eighty. I’ll need you to shake the stupid out of me when I’m doing something foolish,” Kai told her while hanging on tight.