“Oh my god, you areso—”
“Smart?” he offers. “Cunning.”
“Annoying!”
“I’mthe annoying one?” he says, laughter in his voice. “You’re the junior developer with five levels ofDinoCodeunder your belt who thought they could build a new reporting function in twenty-four hours.”
I want to hit back at these claims, prove him wrong in some elaborate way, but I don’t know how. The glint in his eye says he knows exactly where my thoughts are going.
“FINE,” I say, admitting defeat. “But I’mnotbuying you a cookie.”
“That seems fair.”
“Since this wager is now forfeit, you have to buy your own.”
“I will even buy you one,” he offers.
“It would serve you right if I made you go to the back of the line.”
“But then who would you talkto?”
“Anyone but you.”
“I did get up early and bring you a coffee. That has to count for something.”
“Well, it doesn’t.”
“Liar.”
I am lying. It does count for something. That Connor came all the way to meet me here is doing things to my insides.
Lucky for me, I don’t have to admit it. There’s movement at the front of the line. The bakery has opened.
Fifteen
It’s like we’ve crossed the threshold of another dimension when we step out of the bakery and into the bright morning sun. The city is waking up around us now, the area a chorus of balls bouncing and children laughing, the hum of people out enjoying the weekend. The whole morning has taken on a surreal quality, like I was living my life when I walked into the bakery and living someone else’s by the time I walked out ofit.
The rules at Krumes were absolute: strictly one box per customer.
As per the conditions of our wager, I buy a box of cookies that will be saved for our team meeting tomorrow. Connor’s box is for eating today.
He points me toward a stoop across the street, and we dodge traffic as we wander toward it, settling down with our two cookie boxes keeping a respectable distance betweenus.
“Well, Annie,” Connor asks me, “are you ready to be changed forever?”
“I’m not sure,” I say, peering inside the box as soon as he tips open the lid. “They do look good. But they also just look like cookies.”
“We’ll check back on that opinion in five,” he says.
Not sure if I mentioned, but these cookies areenormous.Famously almost half a pound of dough goes into each one. They look more like mini hamburgers than your garden-variety cookie. Every inch of space is covered in something, like chocolate chips, or cookie crumbs. I’m certain if you tried to eat a whole cookie in one sitting you’ddie.
We agree that for the purposes of taste testing, we’ll break each cookie into quarters and sample them all one piece at a time.
“What do you want to start with?” Connor asksme.
“Which flavors were the guys fighting over?”
Connor points into the box. “That one is white chocolate, Martin’s favorite. And the one with the pistachio bits is Ben’s favorite.”
