“Well, same,” I mutter.
“Good.”
“Great.”
Landon shoots me an annoyed look, and I can’t help but roll my eyes again.
Six more days with Dr. Dead-To-Me, I think to myself.Just six more days.
But it doesn’t fill me with the relief I expect it to. I glance at Landon out of the corner of my eye, trying to understand why.
NINETEEN
Don’t drop it. Don’t drop it. Don’t drop it.
In an act that would make a Cirque du Soleil acrobat jealous, I balance the Tupperware in my left hand, my purse, phone, and coffee on top of it, and dangle the surprisingly heavy bag of unused ingredients from my right wrist. As I fumble for my keys, it’s clear I’ve done this all backward, and when they drop from my hand to the ground, I just stare, wondering how the hell I’ll get out of this without spilling my six-dollar coffee or snapping my wrist in half.
“Craaaaap,” I groan.
“Why didn’t you just make two trips?” comes a voice from behind me. I jump, my arm suddenly unstable. The Tupperware tips and the coffee starts to slide, along with everything else. Landon’s hands shoot out, steadying my coffee and catching my phone before it smacks the stone steps, which I very much appreciate. Not that I’d ever tell him that.
“Because I’m a one trip kind of gal,” I say. He scoops up my keys and reaches past me to open the door.
“It was open,” he says.
“Of course, it was,” I mutter and step inside. I shuffle toward the kitchen, my arm about to break, and dump everything on the counter with a huge sigh of relief. Landon tosses me the keys, which I struggle to catch.
“Next time, make two trips,” he says.
“Yeah, I’ll be sure to do that,” I mutter, rubbing my wrist.
“What’s in the box?” asks Eli, who’s sitting at the island drinking one of his patented protein shakes. After we returned from the ER, he slept the day away. We all did. But come Wednesday morning, he was right back to his usual self. His nose is banged up and bandaged, the bruises still black and blue, but at least his mental state seems stable.
Pushing my purse and phone to the side, I open the container to show him the goods.
“I madeGet Well Sooncookies for you. And for Parker,” I look at Landon, “since you said he wasn’t coming by because his ankle’s still messed up.”
I haven’t seen Parker since the day at the skate park. His ankle turned out to be a sprain, which I feel enormously guilty about, so he’s been spending all his time at home until it heals.
“They smell fucking amazing,” says Eli. “And that’s saying something since I can barely breathe through my nose.” He points to the elaborateGet Well Soonscript written across the carefully iced tops. “You wrote that?”
I nod. “Yeah, something I was trying out.”
He whistles. “Damn. Well, they look professional.”
“Thanks.” I smile at him, holding out the box. “Take one. Hell, take ten. You deserve them.”
He doesn’t need to be told twice. Eli grabs a cookie and takes a careful bite, chewing slowly because of his nose. It’s not long before his entire face lights up, filling me with that warm and fuzzy feeling I get when people love my baking. “Well, I’ll be damned, Peps. These are amazing.”
“My friend’s oven is a little old,” I say, “so I wasn’t sure if they were overbaked or not. Looks like they came out okay.”
“Why didn’t you just bake them here?” asks Eli through a mouthful of frosting. “This kitchen’s practically brand new.”
Don’t look at him. Don’t look at him. Don’t look at him.
Unable to help myself, I glance at Landon before quickly averting my gaze. “It was just easier to bake them there,” I say, not wanting to start something. I think I see Landon shift in discomfort out of the corner of my eye, but I’m not entirely sure.
Ever since my first Instagram post, Sienna’s been urging me to keep up with the account. After Landon threw a bit of a wrench in her brilliant influencer dreams for me—her words—she offered up their kitchen for any and all of my baking needs. Today was the first day I took her up on it.
