Dean sat across the table from Lauren in the heavenly smelling cafe, nursing a to-go cup of dark roast coffee with milk, steam floating in misty swirls from the opening in the lid. Lauren hadn’t been planning to order anything, but Dean insisted. His treat, he said. She had been about to persist and decline again, but felt she may need something else to focus on should their conversation take an unexpected turn. She was Sarah, after all. She had to watch what she said while also taking note of Dean’s remarks and his mannerisms. She may be able to use them later when she sat down at her computer to continue writing her novel. Lauren shrugged, her bare hands clutching the small coffee in front of her. “That piece was different, unlike anything I’d written previously. Call me crazy, but I guess you could say I knew there was something different about it, something personal, stripped, and overwhelming. You and I both were unable to ignore the urgency of it as we tried to perfect it.
