The next week passed quickly for Gray since he had a lot to do. Starting off with signing papers to lease the apartment that Sara had shown him and then paying the first two months rent just in case. Shortly after which he had spent some time putting his things away, getting the lay of the land, figuring out where to get everything he needed.
Medicine, food, and some new non formal clothing and shoes- since his normal attire didn't exactly make him seem approachable- along with some other necessities that he had possibly forgotten to pack. Like his favorite cologne, cigarettes, brush, and toothbrush.
Though how he had managed to forget any of them was absolutely beyond him. But then again...he had been a mite frazzled.
He had even managed to purchase a few personal items that he took a fancy too. None of which were anything big or flashy. Just stuff to give his home away from home a nice personal touch that others would find welcoming. Not that he intended to invite anyone but Sara into his home.
But he hoped that she liked his nick-nacks .
Especially since they were little crystalline figurines of butterflies, flowers, and small animals that he found cute. So far he had collected five Kimodo dragon's, four baby seal sets, nine colorful butterflies, three cats and six sets of colorful crystal flowers.
He had also gone a little crazy buying some dish sets and some herbal and floral blended teas and some coffee.
So when the end of the week finally rolled around and he still hadn't seen or heard anything from Sara, he began to worry that perhaps he had frightened her off for good.
Something he excelled at sure, but he didn't want to excel at it right this moment.
Sighing, Gray wen to check on how low he was on food and found that he was out of pretty much everything but a couple of carrots and a small bowl of fruit from the other night.
Alright, it looks like I need to go out and get groceries again. He thought to himself as he walked over to the door and grabbed his jacket off of the hook hanging on the wall and shrugged it on before snatching up his wallet and apartment key and then slipping out the door.
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Sara stared blankly at the display of oranges in front of her and nearly cringed at the sight that she beheld. Just what the hell was wrong with the produce in this store? It was like it had already been eaten and shit out by something and then picked up and rinsed off and put on display for people to buy.
Turning her head to glance towards the veggies that she'd seen earlier she really did cringe this time. Especially since they weren't much better.
The only good ones were the tomato's, avocado's, carrots, and maybe some broccoli. She hated broccoli. No wait- hate was too tame a word for what she felt towards the vegetable. It was something akin to how she felt about chicken gizzards.
Ew. She thought as she looked down at her basket contents.
So far she had cereal, milk, honey turkey sandwich meat, some chees and bread. It was official- between the angry phone call that she had gotten while at work today from one of her brother's and this fiasco- she had finally come to the conclusion that; god hated her.
Holding her head with one hand, she closed her eyes for a moment to think. She needed at least a month's worth of food since she had only been interesting in grabbing some odds and ends here at the corner mart.
"Obviously coming here was a bad idea." She muttered to herself as she wondered for a moment if she should put everything back and just leave or go ahead and get what she had and simply go to the other grocery store in the area since they usually had more plentiful and fresh stuff to sort through.
She was half way down the isle when she slammed into something hard enough to send her stumbling back a few steps before she managed to twist one of her ankles and started to fall. Not noticing that the figure that she had run into had turned to catch her until she found herself almost picked up off of her feet completely and blinked down at gold colored eyes and wanted to slug her newest neighbor in the jaw out of sheer frustration.
But managed to still her hand by simply pinching the bridge of her nose with one hand while her neighbor stepped over the- what she now assumed was a mess of milk, bread and carrots- before he oh-so-carefully placed her on her feet before asking, "Are you alright?"
It was the somewhat weird feeling that she got from him in that moment that made her earlier irritation dissipate almost instantly. Perhaps because she could not only hear but pick up on his genuine concern and startlement towards the current situation.
So it was safe to say that he had done nothing as of yet to warrant being punched since he was genuinely surprised to see her here. Much less trying to mow him down while no paying attention to where she was going.
"I-I'm fine," She said as he took a moment to look her over from head to toe before slowly nodding his head at her response. "I'm sorry I ran into you. I didn't see you standing there."
He cocked his head a little bit to the side as he stared at her as if trying to gauge whether or not she was lying before deciding that she wasn't. Blinking his golden eyes at her, he wondered to himself what had occupied her mind so much that she had missed the fact that a six foot four inch tall person was standing just a few inches from her.
Whatever it was- it was still occupying her mind. He noted as she absently chewed on her lower lip as she glowered at the basket of things that she had been carrying up until their collision.
"That's quite alright Miss Ambers." He said politely in an attempt to keep conversation going a bit more. But it was difficult. The blasted girl didn't really want to speak.
Suddenly she stopped glowering at the remains of her basket and turned those piercing teal eyes to his person and asked in an almost demanding tone, "You know my name? Oh that's right- I forgot that you had talked to Gene a little bit before I came down to get you to see the apartment."
He nodded his head slowly before she sighed and muttered something along the lines of, "Gene's a damned traitor." And went on to state that his 'punishment' would be swift and merciless. Making Gray's lips twitch in amusement as he made a mental note to warn Gene as soon as he next saw him so that the kind elderly man could avoid Sara's wrath.
"Forgive me, it was never my intention to cause you distress Miss Ambers. I'm new to the country and only wanted to make friends. If I overstepped any bounds before, please feel free to inform me." Gray said politely.
Sighing again, Sara realized that if he really was just being friendly then there was nothing much to be worried about. Especially if he was as new to the country as he had just implied.
It would certainly explain why he had been sitting outside of her apartment building last week. The poor guy had probably gotten lost or something and simply wound up in the area.
"No. I'm sorry," Sara said awkwardly as she waved his apology off. "I was far ruder than I should have been..."
"Was there a reason for that or was it just me?" Gray wondered aloud causing her to flinch slightly as he glanced at her.
"N-No. It wasn't you." She lied, hoping that he wouldn't question her words any further. Gray however could smell the taint of a lie as well as heart her accelerated heart rate at the moment and knew that she was lying to him about her reaction to him during their first meeting.
Deciding not to react to the lie she had just told him, he looked around the store and sighed before setting his basket down next to a display of grapes and said, "There seems to be slim pickings here. Do you know of anywhere else I can get my groceries?"
"Oh, uh, yeah. I was actually about to head that way myself. Do you want to ride with me?"
"Ride?" Gray asked curiously wondering if she was referring to one of those dreadful, terrible smelling multi colored machines that were everywhere in the city.
"Yeah. I didn't feel like walking to work this morning so I took my car."
"Ah." Gray said deciding that if she would be using one of the damndable contraptions then he could as well. And if she was offering the use of her vehicle then he should accept since it was the gentlemanly thing to do. "If you would not find my presence too taxing on you, then I would like to accompany you." He said as he reached out and took her small hand in his and lifted it to his lips so that he could brush a kiss along her knuckles but was unable to complete the action because she pulled her hand from his grasp and gave a nervous laugh.
"Please don't do that."
"Do what?" Gray asked curiously as he dropped his hand back to his side.
She looked like she was about to say something to him, but then stopped herself and merely shook her head. "Nothing. Well come on if your riding with me." She said as she abruptly turned and began moving towards the registers not bothering to look back and see if he was following or not.
