Read Something Fierce for Free Online Page B

opportunity. And she did get the job. Filming started right after their honeymoon.”
    “What a bitch.”
    “Nah,” he said, adjusting a small flame under each of the pans. “I’m sure I was no picnic to be around at that time. The Eye Doctor played it well. He got a damned good director and a good-looking wife. She’ll eventually see him for who he is. And by that time, she’ll have a couple movies under her belt. I wish her the best.”
    “But you still miss her.”
    He cracked eggs into a fresh bowl. “Can we talk about something else now?”
    “It’s okay. You can tell me. I understand.”
    “Yes. I still miss her sometimes.”
    “Do you think you will get back together with her someday?”
    “Nope,” he said, beating the eggs with a fork. “Our time has passed. She made her choices. I made mine. That’s that. Life goes on.”
    “That’s sad.”
    “It wouldn’t have worked between us anyway. She loved L.A.; her future was there. I hated it; my future wasn’t there.”
    “So where is your future?”
    He shrugged, emptying the eggs into the small frying pan. “I have a job here till May, then…no clue.”
    She grinned at him. “You’re having a blast here, aren’t you?”
    “Making you breakfast?”
    “Being the jewel of Northeast.”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Oh, please! The students love you. Your novel is required reading in two courses and everyone thinks it’s great. And let’s not forget all those cute little co-eds who refer you as Professor Hotness.”
    “Professor Hotness?”
    “Like you don’t know.”
    “That’s news to me.”
    “Well, maybe so, but don’t even pretend you don’t know the girls are all gaga over you.” He couldn’t help but smile and she pointed her finger at him. “Look at you! You love it!”
    He laughed. “It’s fun.”
    “I can’t believe that last semester was the first time you ever taught; you’re really good at it.”
    “It doesn’t feel like work. Not the lectures, anyway. I show them what I love about a piece…or if they hate it, I invite them to tell me what they hate about it and—”
    “And you dare them to stay disconnected.”
    “I do?”
    “Totally. You challenged us to say we’ve never been in love or at least wanted to be. Never done something crazy or felt whatever we were reading about: hate, embarrassment, anger, confusion, hope, depression, whatever. And,” she continued, “you reminded us that writers didn’t write this stuff to get famous or to have it picked apart by professors and students, but because they were caught up in some serious shit and writing about it was the only way they knew to get through it. Which, of course, made us want to write because, Lord knows, we were all going through our own serious shit.”
    “I’m not as calculated as you seem to think,” he said, stirring the eggs, adding pepper.
    “Not calculated. Honest. You wake people up. Make them aware of themselves. That’s your thing.”
    “It is, huh?” Seth poured enough batter into the large pan to make a monster pancake.
    “Totally. I’ll never forget the second day of class when you caught that dude sleeping and asked him what the hell.”
    “Don’t remind me.”
    “Why not? You woke him up. Literally and figuratively. When he said the only reason he was in college was to keep his parents off his back, you told him he might as well be in prison for a crime he didn’t commit.”
    “That was over-the-top.”
    “It was great,” she laughed, “when you opened the door and told him to make a run for it!”
    “That could have backfired. Big time.”
    “But it was obvious that you meant it. You weren’t the least bit condescending.”
    “I should have let him sleep. He never shut up after that.”
    “That’s what you get,” Kerri said, running her hand along the smooth counter, exploring the kitchen. “Waking people up can be dangerous.” She pulled a butcher knife from the block and looked at her