“You are a chef.”
“Are you a pancake snob, sweetness?”
“No.” I try not to look at the box like I want to toss it in the snow. Instead, I pull out a bowl and the basics of all home baking: flour, sugar, baking powder, salt.
“You going to save me from my boxed mix?”
“Yep.”
“Wanna know a secret?”
I level a smirk at him across the wide kitchen. “You also use refrigerated biscuits?”
“At home, I sure as fuck do. Truth is, give me a protein or some vegetables, and I’m great. Bread, pancakes, cake . . .I’m lost. Science was never my best subject.”
“Good thing I can make pancakes.”
I pull out butter, Matt of course keeps it room temperature. I then go to the easy work of a quick bread. Matt is eyeing me curiously, my hands especially, so I readjust my hold on the utensils.
“Your family cook a lot?”
Shit. Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe I’m letting something slip. Truth is I don’t know how normal people hold kitchen utensils. My first was placed in my hand by a master baker.
“My grandfather, Frank, liked to bake.” Understated by a mile, but true.
Matt keeps watching me. He notices things, especially in the kitchen. I’m thankful pancakes are quick to prepare. I should have thought about how much the simple act of making breakfast would reveal about myself.
Not to mention it is too easy to share Frank Donahue with Matt.
“And he taught you?”
“He did. Well.” I swallow hard, the bile of the next words so difficult to say. Clearing my throat, I move toward the stove, keeping my hands busy. “He wasn’t really my grandfather, exactly. My mom married my stepdad, and he was my stepdad’s father. But my mom died when I was about eight, and to a kid, the blood ties didn’t make much difference. I had the same last name, same interests, seemed like family to me.” It did make a difference, a big one, to Nico, my cousin—or not cousin—whatever he is now.
Matt’s eyes linger on me. That’s the most I have said about myself to anyone in Bear Valley besides Mulder. “And your dad? Stepdad? Where is he?”
“He’s living in another country with his new wife. New wife since I was almost a teenager, and last I heard, she didn’t like teenagers.”
“Oh. I see why you were close to your grandfather. How did you end up in Bear Valley?” Matt hands me a spatula for the pancakes.
Some elaborate lie won’t play here, so I go for the truth. “I was living in Salt Lake City, and when I left, Mirror Lake was the farthest bus ticket with the money I had. Black Diamond was hiring.” I shake my head. How stupid and naive I was, thinking distance from Deny would solve anything. And now, it’s almost time for him to show up again.
Twice as much. That’s impossible, of course. Even with the uptick due to the local ski crowd and the snowy weekends, on top of no rent to pay, I still don’t have it. I won’t have it.
“So Little Rock turned into Salt Lake City.”
“By way of Chicago.” Where I went to culinary school. The truths want to burst out of me this morning. “What about you? Where did you learn?”
Matt smiles, pulling down plates and collecting silverware. “Self-taught until culinary school. I liked doing things with my hands, and someone at my group home suggested the kitchen. When I was a kid, I lived with my grandmother until she passed away, so I knew some things from her.”
“Quinn says you were quiet when you first came to live with the Manns.”
Matt laughs. “Oh, I was. Moving so much in the foster system made me realize people are always judging how you walk, how you talk. I got tired of hearing all the judgments people wanted to make about me. It seemed better to just be quiet, until I met Quinn.”
“You are different, than I thought.”
“Oh,” Matt’s face lights up with curiosity. “Do tell?”
“Well, at first, when I met you, you seemed so unbothered by everything. But I remembered the time you walked in Black Diamond and gave Quinn and earful for heliskiing alone, and it was like this whole other version of you.”
