I didn’t know why I was so into creating things in the kitchen, but I always had been, and so had Juju. No one in my family liked cooking as much as me, not even Grandma Nancy, who really enjoyed it. Juju had more special family recipes than we did, but even at her house, she’d already taken over the baking for holidays and family dinners. Sometimes when I was at their house, we would try to figure out what we all wanted to watch, and Juju and I would vote for a cooking show. Jackson griped about it, but he’d play with his Switch if we insisted on watching one. We’d make it up to him later by letting him pick what we made to eat.
I turned on the music, and we lined up our ingredients on the island. Before long, the kitchen smelled like olive oil, garlic, and sugar. Juju put graham crackers in a plastic bag, so they wouldn’t make a mess, and pounded them with the bottom of a glass.
Eventually, she pounded so hard that she made a hole, and graham crackers went flying in her face.
“So you wanted to wear the graham crackers, huh?” I said, throwing a towel at her so she could wipe them off.
She pretended to be annoyed and crumbled another small piece of graham cracker in the mixing bowl with the end of a knife. When she leaned over to grab the powdered sugar, I caught the scent of her strawberry shampoo. She always smelled like either sugar or berries.
We worked, sometimes chatting and sometimes humming along with the music. I asked Grandma Donna if she wanted any food, and she said she’d let us enjoy it first, while she worked up an appetite. I thought maybe her soap opera wasn’t over yet.
When we plated everything and sat down at the table, we looked at each other and grinned.
“I’m so hungry,” I said.
“I can’t wait to eat it. This pasta looks so good.” She took a bite, and she tilted her head from side to side. “Oh, that is delicious.” She covered her mouth and said it with her mouth full. “That little bit of lemon…” She nodded. “I love it.”
I felt a surge of pride. I liked feeding Juju more than just about anyone. She always appreciated what it took to make something delicious, and she wasn’t one of those picky eaters like most of the girls at school. Jackson liked good food, but he didn’t always want to try everything.
We talked about what we wanted to do with the rest of the summer, and then we put huge slices of pie on our plates. My eyes practically rolled back when I took the first bite.
“That’s even better than the last time,” I said.
“Thank you,” Juju said, her cheeks pink.
I was thinking about taking a second piece of pie when the back door swung open.
Jackson stepped inside, his hair plastered to his forehead from the bike ride over. He stopped in the doorway, looking between us. We were so shocked that he’d stormed in, we just stared back at him.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“We’re—” Juju started.
“We made some food,” I said. “Want some?”
Juju held up the pie proudly. “I made that raspberry cream?—”
“Thisis where you guys have been all day?” Jackson said, cutting her off.
“Not all day, just a couple hours,” I said.
He looked at me, his eyes narrowing. “Dude, it’s weird.”
“What’s weird?” I asked, instantly defensive.
“That you want to hang out with my little sister? I don’t know. It’s just weird, okay? Why do you want to hang out with her all the time?”
“You like to hang out with her too. She’s—” I paused.
His words hit harder than I expected, and not because I thought he was right—until my thoughts last night and the earlier conversation today with Mom came racing back. With Jackson’s voice layered over hers, all I could hear was the warning.
Suddenly, everything felt off.
I looked at Juju, and a wave of sadness hit me. I picked up my plate and carried it to the sink.
“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. “It is weird for us to hang out without you.”
I glanced at Juju and wished I hadn’t because I saw her face fall. She blinked at me, confused and hurt, like she was trying to figure out who I was and what had just happened.
