“No. You have too little confidence in you,” she insists.
“I really have never attempted it without you, Mel,” I tell her now.
“Well, if Luke brings my wheelchair out from the guest room, maybe I can come and offer you some moral support.”
“I’d love that,” I say.
Baking means I’m spending at least a good hour here, probably longer. I know Mom wants me back home right away, but there’s finally something I can do for Mel, even though it’s small, and I’m not leaving until I finish.
While I’m in the kitchen finding Mel’s recipe book and pulling out ingredients, Luke wheels Mel in to a spot beside the counter.
Mel is still insisting that her presence is not needed. “I’ll eat whatever you make,” she says. “I’m already on death’s door. What’s the worst that can happen?”
“Mom,” Luke sighs.
Mel motions for him to bend down in front of her. She holds his face in her palms and says, “At some point it’s okay to laugh about it.”
I see Luke swallow, and I can tell he’s trying hard to fight tears.
He straightens and turns to me. “What do you need me to do?”
“You wanna help?” I ask, surprised.
“Of course he’s going to help,” Mel says. “Honestly, if I didn’t think he would accidentally poison us all, I’d have gottenhimto make the cupcakes.”
Luke rolls his eyes good-naturedly and comes to stand next to me, looking expectant.
“Oh, um, okay,” I say, then glance away from him as, unbidden, a memory of his hands all over my body flashes through my mind. “Do you wanna beat the butter and sugar?”
“Sure.”
I’m clumsy at first, distracted, and still replaying last night in my head way too much. But before long, we fall into a rhythm of mixing and beating, then spooning batter and cleaning up.
Luke insists on washing up because he feels his contribution has been “minimal,” so I plop down on the counter and talk to Mel the way I did so many times when I was growing up, the way I always wished I could with Mom. We talk about my jobs, about Sydney and the videos her new family has sent Mel. We talk movies and books and music. The only difference is that tonight Luke is listening in. I wonder what he thinks, whether he’s silently judging me. Whether he feels like I’m monopolizing his time with his mother, the way Rowan seemed to sometimes.
We pull the cupcakes out of the oven, let them cool down, and get started on the frosting. Mel doesn’t believe in making cake out of the box, but she’s all for buying premade frosting. Luke and I stand side by side as we slather the cupcakes with an excess of vanilla cream cheese. Since neither of us is particularly gifted in the area of putting on frosting, we decide to have fun with it, trying to make patterns and write words.
“Mom, yours is gonna have your name on it,” Luke tells Mel.
“What? I’m making Mel’s!” I protest. “This one has been hers the whole time.”
“Nope.”
“Yes,” I insist.
“Guys, there’s enough of me to go around,” Mel says.
“Let’s offer both to her and see which one she wants,” Luke suggests.
I hustle across the kitchen, and I’ve almost reached Mel when I feel myself being lifted from the ground and plopped back down a good five feet away from where I was.
“Hey!” I protest.
Luke laughs as he hurries toward Mel, who is laughing. I tug at the back of his shirt in an effort to stall him, but he outmaneuvers me and is soon holding his cupcake out to her. Scowling, I catch up and offer her my own.
“Sorry, baby, but Jessi’s actually looks edible,” Mel says.
“Wow, the truth comes out,” Luke says. “All this time and she’s still your favorite?” I’m relieved he didn’t call me the chosen one.
