Blooming All Over Read Online Free PDF

Susie said. “I want lunch.”
    “Besides that.” Julia sat on the other bed, crossed her legs yoga-style and rested her chin in her hands. “I know you, Susie. I know when something’s troubling you.”
    “My sister is troubling me,” Susie retorted. “And my grandmother. Let’s get some food. Joffe must be bored waiting for us in the lobby.”
    “Joffe is probably in the motel restaurant, stuffing his face,” Julia said. “And you’re going nowhere until you tell me what’s wrong.”
    “Who died and made you president?”
    “Dad died and Grandma Ida made me president. Come on, Susie. I’m your sister. And I’m so sick of obsessing over my damn wedding. I’d much rather obsess over you for a change.”
    Susie sighed. Julia might have certain Grandma Ida tendencies, but she was the only person in the world Susie wholeheartedly trusted. She wasn’t prepared to discuss her Casey situation with anyone yet—but if shehad to discuss it, Julia was the one to discuss it with. “Casey asked me to move in with him,” she said.
    Julia’s eyebrows shot up. “You’re kidding!”
    “Why should I be kidding?” Susie asked indignantly. “We’ve been seeing each other for a year.”
    “No—I mean, he just strikes me as kind of…” Julia seemed to grope for the right words. “I don’t know. I would have expected him to ask you to marry him, not move in with him.”
    Susie made a face. “You think I’d spend a year with the kind of guy who’d ask me to marry him?”
    “No, I guess not.” Julia toyed with the lace of her canvas sneaker, but her gaze remained on Susie. “What did you tell him?”
    “I said no.”
    “Susie!” It was Julia’s turn to make a face. “You’re living with two roommates in that teeny-tiny disgusting walk-up in the East Village where the stairway always smells of fried onions, and he’s got a great big apartment!”
    “In Queens,” Susie reminded her. “In Forest Hills.” Light-years removed from civilization.
    Julia nodded. “Exactly. He lives in Forest Hills. A nice middle-class neighborhood. That’s why he’s the kind of guy who’d ask you to marry him.”
    “He lives there because you can get more square footage for the dollar. Plus, he grew up in Queens and he has friends there, for some reason.”
    “And family,” Julia pointed out.
    “I don’t think that was a deciding factor.”
    “I think it is.”
    “Yeah, like you know Casey better than I do.”
    Julia smiled. “I know he’s got long hair and a stoner smile. He’s still a family man. He refused to have sexwith you until he’d spent a lot of time with you, remember? He’s a traditional sort of guy, Susie.”
    “More traditional than me,” Susie agreed dolefully. She couldn’t argue with Julia. Casey did have long hair, and his smile did have a vaguely druggy appearance, although in the year they’d been together the strongest drug she’d ever seen him take was Tylenol Plus. And he loved Susie’s tattoo, and he hadn’t been inside a church since his great-uncle Mike keeled over while watching WWE-Raw last October, and even at the funeral Casey hadn’t taken communion. But other than his hair and his agnosticism and his professed adoration for Susie, he harbored some pretty old-fashioned values. When they’d met, she would have happily jumped his bones within minutes of catching his eye. She’d walked into Bloom’s, made her way to the bagel counter and spotted him standing behind it, all six foot two inches of him, with his dirty-blond hair pulled back in a ponytail and his hazel bedroom eyes glittering as he’d handed her an egg bagel, and the saliva filling her mouth had been for him not the bagel. He’d been the one to insist that they spend some time learning about each other before they got naked.
    She’d been intrigued. She’d never before met a man who actually cared more about getting to know a woman’s mind than getting her to spread her legs, but she’d admired his