Page 54 of Untying the Knot
“How so?”
“Accepting of all is how I would describe you, even the deceased. So yeah, they would try to communicate with you.”
“I’m assuming you’re a believer.”
“Eh, take it or leave it.”
The timer dings and Myla hops out of her seat and squats down in front of the oven. She holds her hand to the sky. “Mitt me.”
Chuckling, I slip an oven mitt on her hand. I watch as she carefully opens the oven and lets out a tiny squeal when she pulls the pastries out, then sets them on a trivet on the counter.
Golden-brown pastry logs are puffed and look delicious on the baking tray.
“Oh my God, look at what we did.” She turns toward me. “Ryot, they look amazing.”
“They do. We actually did it.” She loops her arms around my waist, and I take that opportunity to drape my arms over her shoulders.
“Look at our little babies. Once mere ingredients, and now, they’re all grown up and ripe for us to eat.”
“Well, not quite. They have to cool, then we’ll stuff them, and finally coat them in chocolate.”
“Bet you can’t wait to stuff them. Bet you’re good at all kinds of stuffing.”
I chuckle. “If only you had firsthand experience.”
She sighs and then smiles up at me. “If only.”
* * *
“I’m nervous.”
“Why are you nervous?” I ask Myla as we sit at our counter, each holding an éclair in hand. The filling was a breeze—a few blowouts, but that’s okay—but the chocolate, that was a bit of a nightmare. We kept dropping the éclair into the bowl of melted chocolate and then squeezing the filling out. Yeah, there are a few mangled ones.
“Because what if they taste bad?”
“What if they taste good?”
“Great point.” But she doesn’t move to bring the éclair to her lips. “But if they taste bad, that’s an omen.”
“An omen for what?”
“That we don’t have good chemistry.”
I lower my éclair and give her an amused look. “Are you really going to base our chemistry off an éclair and not the fact that every time we’re around each other, we have no problem holding a conversation?”
“I could hold a conversation with a paper clip if you asked me to,” she says. “So yes, I’m basing our chemistry off an éclair.”
“Wow, well then, if that’s the case, I’d like to say that these smell like absolute heaven.”
Her expression falls. “You have just relinquished your opinion.”
I pause and then nod in agreement. “I accept the punishment.”
With a smirk, she lifts the éclair and takes a large bite. And for some weird reason, as if this really matters, I wait on bated breath to see what she thinks. Just to see if her reaction is valid or not, I take a bite of my own as well. The chocolate combined with the cream center and the baked outside is fucking awesome on my tongue. If she says these are bad, I’ll know she’s a goddamn liar.
She chews.
I chew.
