I run my finger over the handwritten recipe again, grabbing my phone and turning the camera around so my mom can see it.“Can you just tell me what this says? I feel like I’m reading it all wrong.”
“You’ll find out what you need when you need it most,” she replies, in that annoying, older-and-wiser witchy voice.
“Mom, this isn’t a Disney movie. Just tell—”
The line goes dead.
Great. This is great. This is exactly what I need to add to my already stressful plate of things I need to organize.
The entire kitchen is covered in flour, my wrists ache from kneading the dough, and I’ve never been this up close and personal to homemade ricotta in my life. I feel like I’m going to be dreaming of pistachios when I eventually close my eyes tonight.
I’ve never been a good baker or good at cooking. It’s unfortunately the one skill I don’t have. Whenever we do cook at home, Wren and Kennedy are usually the ones in charge, and I handle all the taste testing.
As I’m cleaning up as much of the mess as I can, the door swings open and the sound of Wren and Kennedy’s voices filter into our apartment. It feels like they’ve been living on campus for the last few days, and we haven’t hung out properly since the hockey game.
“It looks like a crime scene in here,” Kennedy says, standing at a safe distance in the living room, far away from the mess, as she peels off her layers of clothing.
“Don’t say anything mean or I’m going to cry,” I say, and my bottom lip juts out on instinct. I can’t even look at the pistachio paste without wanting to hurl.
“What’s going on?” Wren asks softly, sitting at the breakfast bar.
I sniffle, wiping my nose with my sleeve, which just gets more flour on my face. “As you guys can tell, I’ve decided to face the list head-on. I’m trying to make pistachio cannoli. It’s mynonna’s recipe, but none of it make sense.” I lift up the paper, waving it at Wren. “Like, what is a dash of love? I can’t add a dash oflovein there.”
Wren smiles. “Maybe it’s her way of telling you to calm down.”
“Yeah, you’re turning red,” Kennedy adds. “Ooh! Maybe you’ll get on the front page of a newspaper if you burn down the building. That’d be another thing crossed off the list.”
“That’s not helping!”
Kennedy makes her way toward me, gingerly reaching out to me so she doesn’t get covered in whatever I have on me. “Okay, I’m sorry. How about you go in the shower and freshen up. We’ll clean the kitchen, and we can start again from scratch.”
I sigh. “You guys—”
“We can’t help, we know. We’re just going to . . . guide you.”
I can tell they mean well. And they’re right. I do need to calm down. I can never get any work done when I’m like this and this isn’t any different.
“Okay, fine,” I say eventually. “Thank you, guys.”
“No problem. Just go relax,” Wren says, and I nod.
I strip my clothes off the second I get into the bathroom and run a bath.
I’ve been trying to take everything one day at a time, but there are days like today when everything catches up to me. When I realize I don’t exactly have tons of time to fuck around with this list.
I want this more than I’ve wanted anything in my life. To prove to myself and to my parents that I’ve changed. That Ideservethis.
As per the list, I’ve also been working on a few designs for the winter line too, but none of them are nearly good enough for what my parents will expect of me. Trying to fit in time to sketchamid my already busy schedule isn’t exactly easy, and the more stress I’m under the worse my designs are.
I’ve got things in place for number three on the list too. A charity gala being held in Denver this weekend will be the perfect opportunity to present a speech and tick that one off.
Only problem? I haven’t written a speech since my valedictorian speech in high school, which Wren practically wrote for me. And because I can’t ask her for help, I’ve been through ten drafts already and I hate all of them. Writing something lighthearted but also serious isn’t one of my strengths. I have no problem with talking in front of crowds, but stripping away my academic and professional tone is something I’m still working on. I need the practice and I know I can do it. Eventually. Maybe my parents are on to something with that one.
When the bath finishes running, I slip inside, covering myself with soapsuds and relaxing into the water. I trace my thumb over the Leo symbol on my arm, simultaneously proud and disappointed in my fifteen-year-old self for the random array of tattoos across my body.
Between working on the list and finalizing phase one of my class project, I’ve hardly had time to sleep this week, so I’m not surprised when I doze off for a couple minutes.
After I’ve slipped into my favorite pair of pajamas and brushed my hair, I feel more like myself, and the smell coming from the kitchen tells me that they might’ve gotten started on dinner already. It’s only when I step out of the bathroom that I realize it’s just oil and pastry that I can smell.
