“How’s Gage?” she asks, like she can’t help it.
“Annoying,” I say automatically.
“Emotionally.”
“He’s fine. Worried about you. Threatened me with violence if I let anything happen to you.”
Her lips curve. “Classic big brother energy.”
The guilt spikes again.
If he knew I had his baby sister half in my lap last night, kissing me like I was oxygen?—
Stop.
I drag my mind back to safer ground.
“He also suggested I might be going stir crazy here with you.”
She brightens. “Oh? And are you?”
“Not yet.”
“Liar.” She pushes herself upright, t-shirt slipping off one shoulder. She fails to notice. I noticetoo much.“Since we’re stuck here,” she says, “I’m making breakfast. You look like you need eggs.”
“We don’t have eggs.”
“Then you get… whatever the canned-goods fairy gifted us.”
“That fairy’s name is Ranger, and he has terrible taste.”
She strides into the kitchen like she owns it, blanket still tangled around her waist like a cape. I follow, because the living room feels worse without her in it.
She rummages in cabinets with cheerful determination.
“Okay,” she narrates. “We’ve got canned potatoes, canned corned beef—oh my God, who hurt him—canned beans, canned fruit cocktail, and… instant pancake mix.”
“Pancake mix?” I echo. “You can’t cook.”
“You don’t know my life.”
“Lark, last time you made toast at Gage’s place you set off the fire alarm.”
“That toaster was faulty.”
“You put a fork in it.”
“I was retrieving the bread!” she protests. “And for the record, I can follow instructions on a box.”
She squints at the back of the pancake mix. “See? Just add water. Even you could do this.”
“I’m very good at adding water.”
“Then we’re a team.”
She pushes the box into my hands, then starts pulling out bowls. I find a measuring cup, read the instructions, and, with the kind of focus I usually reserve for tracking criminal IPs, measure water and mix into the powder.
Lark leans on the counter, chin in her hands, watching me.
