A View Across the Rooftops: An epic, heart-wrenching and gripping World War Two historical novel by Suzanne Kelman

Author:Suzanne Kelman [Kelman, Suzanne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781838880330
Publisher: Bookouture
Published: 2019-10-24T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter 29

On St. Nicholas Eve, Josef sat at his kitchen table, grading papers with Dantes on his lap, when there was a soft rap at his front door. His heart leaped. Michael. It had been days since his disappearance, and Josef had missed his young friend’s company more than he would have expected. Hurrying through his house, he pulled open the front door with expectancy.

He was surprised to see Hannah Pender standing on his doorstep. For a moment his heart raced with the fact she was at his house, but in equal measure it sank with the disappointment that it wasn’t Michael.

Apparently reading something in his expression, she enquired, “Professor, did I come at a bad time?”

Josef beamed. “No, no, of course not, Mrs. Pender.” Then added in an extremely odd tone, “What a nice surprise. Please, come in.”

“Call me Hannah,” she insisted, with a smile.

He pushed his spectacles nervously up his nose as she stepped inside, and they stood together quietly in the hallway. Hannah looked around. “How nice and, um… tidy,” she finally decided on, apparently attempting to break the silence between them.

As she stood close to him, he felt a thrill run through his whole body. There was something strangely intimate about having her here in his space, away from the safety of their day-to-day visits with her desk between them. His heart appeared to want to thump its way out of his chest and his mind raced with what that might mean.

She turned to him and for a wild second he wanted to kiss her, passionately, take her in his arms and for one moment experience her in that way, pulling her in tightly and losing himself in her soft lips and warm curves, her marriage be damned. It was as he was wrestling with his conflicting emotions that she spoke. Her caring eyes disarming him. Her words tumbling out in a jumble.

“I’m sorry to come to your house in this way. Normally I would give this to you at work, but as you know, we are closed now for the holiday and this book came for you and I wasn’t sure if it was important.”

He felt disappointed; for the briefest of moments he thought she might feel the same way about him and was coming here to confess.

“Oh,” was all he could squeeze out under the weight of his crushed feelings as he attempted to calm his heart as it drummed in his ears like a brass band.

She handed him a package. He looked down at it curiously, then, with the full weight of remembrance, recognized it must be the other book of poetry he had ordered for Michael from the library. He’d planned to watch his young friend’s face light up when he realized that Josef had listened to him about all the poets he loved.

Josef took it from her, reluctantly.

Hannah read the expression. “I’m sorry. Was I wrong to bring it over? Should I have waited until after we were open again?”

“No, no, of course not,” Josef responded, overcompensating.

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