“Oh my God, I l—”Shit.“I mean…thank you.”
JJ shakes his head, an amused look on his face, as I take the candy bar. He digs into the bag again and hands Audrey two Twix.
“That’s our snack!” Noah says excitedly.
“Thank you, JJ. You didn’t have to do all this.”
“Hard to say no to Noah. He’s kind of cute.”
“Kind of?” Noah asks, grinning from ear to ear.
“Fine.Verycute.”
He grins, then turns back to his mom. “Don’t eat mine, okay? I got one for you and one for me.”
“Promise,” she says.
JJ puts the bag of flour on the counter and I wink at him, my heart nearly bursting at this gesture. Not only did he hang out with my nephew, taking him to the store because he asked to tag along, but he bought everyone something. He’s so thoughtful.
“Okay, now that we have everything for pizza, let’s start making the dough.”
“I’m just going to…” JJ gestures to the corner of the room, where the dining table and chairs are. I laugh as he takes a seat but pause what I’m doing to grab him a beer and give him a quick kiss. I want to kiss him all the damn time.
I say nothing about my almost-admission because it wasn’t really an admission. I don’t love JJ, not like that. I like him, a lot, and I enjoy spending time with him, but it was just one of those things you say to people when you’re excited. It’s like the next level of you’re welcome. If it was anyone else, it wouldn’t have mattered. But I don’t want to scare him away. Not after he’s slowly making his way in.
Audrey gets to work making the sauce, using a can of tomato sauce as the base and then adding her own ingredients and seasonings to make it better. Noah and I work on the dough until we get it just right. Even if JJ wanted to help, I’m not sure what he could do… separate the pepperoni slices?
Noah helps me add flour to the dough, which is his favorite part. When we get it to the right consistency, I plop it into a bowl, cover it, and slide it away to rest.
“How you doing over there?” I ask Audrey.
“Done.”
“And you?” I ask JJ.
“Just enjoying the show. It’s like a real-life cooking program in here.”
“Can we watch Bluey?” Noah asks.
“Of course,” I say. “Go put it on and we’ll be out in a few.”
He hurries out of the room. JJ gets to his feet. “You want me to clean this up?”
“Wow, is he perfect or something?” Audrey asks under her breath, but loud enough he can here, nudging me with her elbow.
“No, we can clean—it’s our mess.”
“Speak for yourself,” Audrey says. “My feet hurt.”
“Your feet always hurt!” I call after her as she walks out of the kitchen.
JJ comes over to help me clean the counters.
“You don’t have to do this,” I say.
“I didn’t do anything else, so it’s the least I can do.”
“It’s not a big mess.”
