Ashton’s POV
“Ashton,” my mom calls as she places different desserts in a pink cardboard box for one of the customers. “Go to the kitchen and start working on making a couple dozen pistachio macarons. I don’t know why they’re so popular today…”
I cringe at the thought of pistachios because out of everything I make, they’re the one thing that I don’t enjoy using in my baking. I’ve only tasted them once and almost gagged from the amount of saltiness, but everyone else swears that it’s the best flavor we sell; I highly disagree.
Even though she is pacing back and forth to attend to the rush of customers, my mom’s short blonde hair still looks completely kempt and not a single strand is out of place. I’m surprised that she hasn’t broken a sweat yet from all that she has to do. And even when some of the customers are rude to her, she always manages to keep a smile on her face, but once they’re out of ear shot, she doesn’t fail to call them “bastards” under her breath.
I love my mom.
I push through the swing door and grab the large bag of shell-free pistachios and pour a few cups inside a food processor to grind them until they turn into fine grains. As I let the disgusting nuts pulverize, I go to stand next to Michael who is currently rolling out a lime green piece of fondant.
“I take it that your favorite nut is just too much for your sensitive nose to handle?” Michael snickers and checks to make sure the fondant is at the right thickness, but from the way his eyebrows furrow, it’s not.
“They’re absolutely disgusting,” I say, and move around the kitchen to gather all the ingredients for the macaron filling and crust. “How do you people like it?”
Michael shrugs and begins to cut out leaf shapes in the fondant. “It’s an acquired taste, I guess. I don’t mind them that much.”
“Then you make them.”
He cackles as he shakes his head at me. “No can do. You know that every time I try to make them they either come out all watery or I bake them for too long and they become as hard as bricks. Just pretend that you’re making the dark chocolate ones.”
I turn off the food processor and hold it as far away from me before pouring a little more than half of the contents along with all the dry ingredients inside a large industrial sized mixer. “It’s kind of hard to do that when the scent is so strong,” I say, flipping the switch watching as everything mixes together.
“Then I guess you’re screwed.”
“You’re such a good friend,” I say sarcastically, but Michael doesn’t pick up on it.
“That’s what I’m here for,” he sings.
I turn off the mixer before going over to the oversized refrigerator and taking out a couple dozen eggs and placing them on the chrome work station next to Michael. “Help me separate the egg whites so that I can finish making these and attempt to convince my mom to discontinue the sale of them.” It’s a long shot, but there’s no hurt in trying.
“Good luck with that.” He drops what he’s doing and begins cracking the eggs along with me. “So how are things with Ruth?” he asks, throwing away an egg shell and cracking open another egg.
“Things are good, I guess. She shoved a cupcake in my face the other day if that says anything.” I honestly wasn’t expecting for her to do that. I thought she was only going to thank me for furnishing her apartment, but instead I got a cupcake to the face.
“That doesn’t sound good to me,” Michael says skeptically.
“She said that I wasn’t that bad of a person afterwards.” Score for me.
“Oh, well then I guess she’s finally taking a liking towards you,” he says almost surprised. “What do you think about her brother?”
Thinking about Luke only irritates me because I’m still not over him insulting me and my baking. He calls me a douche, but he should take a look at himself. He blew up at Ruth and thought that she gave me a blow job, which although it sounds nice in my head, we were far from doing that. He jumped to conclusions and now his impression of me is skewed.
I’m just hoping he’s not going to be around all the time or else I’ll never get to spend time with Ruth, but seeing that they haven’t had the chance to see each other in years, there will probably be no escape from his watchful eyes.
“Let’s just say I’m not his biggest fan,” I say, taking all the egg whites and pouring them into the mixer along with some green food coloring.
“It’s pretty obvious that he doesn’t like you at all,” Michael says, returning to work on the fondant. “You’ve never had luck with the brother’s of girls you’ve dated in the past, and Luke is no different.”
“I’m already aware of that,” I snap; my irritation rising as we continue to talk about him. “I just don’t understand why he likes you but not me.”
Michael shrugs. “Maybe I don’t give off as much of an “asshole” vibe as you do,” he jokes.
I fake a laugh. “Very funny. I’m trying to be better.”
“And your efforts are paying off seeing that Ruth shoved a cupcake in your face.” He grins widely, ticking me off even more.
Before I can come up with a witty come-back, my mom peeks her head in the doorway, searching the room until her blue eyes land on my hazel ones.
“Ashton, there’s someone here asking for you,” she loudly whispers and then returns to the front of the shop.
All my irritation is washed away and is replaced with excitement. If whoever is at the front is who I think it is, my day may have just gotten better. I haven’t seen Ruth since the cupcake incident and I’m beginning to believe that she’s locking herself in her apartment to work, or she’s avoiding me; both of which aren’t good.
Dropping everything, I leave Michael in charge of finishing the macarons to which he complains that he’ll screw them up. I wipe my hands off on my apron and wish him the best of luck, hoping that he’ll actually make them right this time, and head out to the front of the shop.
My smile falters when instead of a beautiful girl waiting for me, there are two guys; one of which makes it obvious that he’s not too thrilled to see me. First pistachios, and now a surprise visit from Calum (who I don’t really mind) and Luke. Could it get any worse?
“Oh,” I say, trying my hardest not to sound disappointed. “Hey, guys. What are you doing here?”
“That’s a good look for you, Ashton,” Calum jokes, referring to the unmanly purple apron hanging from my neck. “I was showing Luke around town and we ended up here. Since I haven’t been able to come here with Serena, I thought I would take the chance to see for myself why she loves this place. It’s very…pink.”
I chuckle lightly. “You can thank her—” I point to my mom who is on the phone and writing down details for a pick-up order, “—for that.”
Luke doesn’t even give me the time of day as he examines the entire shop with a blank expression. He keeps his hands in his jacket pockets and doesn’t look like he has the slightest interest in being here. I wait for him to make some snarky comment about the bakery, but he keeps his mouth shut.
“Did you want anything to eat?” I ask, gesturing to the display case.
“No,” Luke finally speaks. “I’m not that big on sweets,” he says monotonously.
I beg to differ from the way you keep licking your lips.
“Okay…” I trail off. “Calum?”
“No, I’m fine,” he declines my offer and I mentally thank him because I really don’t want for them to stay and eat, especially Luke. “Do you have a bathroom though?”
I nod and point to the small hallway in the corner and he quietly thanks me before heading through the door. I stand awkwardly with Luke, not sure if I should try to make small talk or just stay silent and hope that he doesn’t address me for anything.
“I don’t like you,” he states, crushing my hope of not having to speak with him.
“The feeling is mutual,” I say.
“So you like Ruth?” he asks bitterly.
“I don’t think that’s any of your concern,” I say, and his face hardens.
“It is my concern seeing that she’s my sister,” he argues. “She doesn’t seem to have that much of an interest in you anyway so it’s better to give up on her now.”
I narrow my eyes at him and lower my voice. “How would you know? I’ve seen and talked to her more than you during the few days that you’ve been here,” I snap. “I probably know her better than you since the only contact that you’ve had with her until now has been through a computer screen. So don’t tell me that she doesn’t have an interest in me when you don’t even know her yourself.”
I may have crossed the line by saying that, but I don’t really care. Ruth is an adult and can like whoever the hell she wants. She may or may not like me, but at least we’re somewhat getting along and she seems to enjoy my company at times. I don’t need Luke ruining that for me and I’m not going to let him try and stop me. He may not like that I’m her neighbor and he sure as hell doesn’t like my attitude, but it’s not like he can do anything about it.
He clenches his jaw and opens his mouth, but before he can get the words out, Calum joins us again. His cheerful smile eases the tension between Luke and I, and I’m almost thankful that he showed up when he did or else who knows what Luke would have said.
“We should probably get going,” he says, patting Luke’s shoulder. “It was good to see you, Ashton. When you’re free we should hang out some time. Since you’re friends with Ruth we’re probably going to see each other more often and I could use some more guy friends other than this guy,” he says with a chuckle, pointing to Luke.
“Uh, sure,” I stammer. I don’t really want to decline because Calum is actually a nice guy, but I don’t know how long I will be able to endure having Luke around.
“Awesome, I’ll see you around then,” he says with a smile and pushes Luke’s back to guide him out.
I wait until I can’t see either of them outside the bakery before heading back into the kitchen and letting out a long, exasperated sigh. If that wasn’t one of the worst conversations I’ve had then it just became one.
“So was it Ruth?” Michael asks when he sees me, keeping his arms behind his back.
“Nope,” I say, popping the ‘P’. “It was her brother and Calum.”
“How’d that go?”
“Well Luke and I didn’t become best friends if that’s what you’re asking.” I saunter over to the oven to check on the macarons, but they’re nowhere in sight. “Did you finish the macarons?” Michael nods with a guilty expression. “And how’d they turn out?”
His eyes dart to the side before he reveals the flat pan behind his back. All the macarons that should look like fluffy cookies are still in a liquid form and completely inedible.
“Dammit, Mikey!” I scold and with the help of my already irritated self plus Michael’s incapability to make macarons, pressure builds up in my head, turning into a full blown headache.
“I told you I couldn’t make them!” he shouts, trying to defend himself for fucking up the batch.
Just when I thought this crap-tastic day couldn’t get any worse, I now have to undergo another torturous adventure with the dreaded pistachios.
I am able to make another batch after Michael screwed up, but the sad part is that after I put the macarons on display, no one bought anymore so I literally spent the day baking them for nothing. With a pounding head, I tell Michael everything that happened when I was talking to Luke and he thought it was pretty harsh of me to say all that I did, but he doesn’t hold it against me.
Thankfully, my mom lets me off work early after the rush hour and it’s time like these that I love working in the family business. I drive home in silence, not wanting for the radio to aggravate my headache anymore than it is, but the stupid drivers honking their horns do the job. When I get to the complex, I take one look at the stairs and decide to take the elevator instead. I just don’t have the energy to climb them today.
When the sliding doors open once reaching the third floor, Ruth is standing by her apartment door, struggling to unlock it. Her auburn hair is pulled up in a bun thing today and it sort of reminds me of a ballerina. I silently make my way over and move her hands and I jiggle the key around, unlocking it with ease.
“Thank you,” she says, tucking a piece of invisible hair behind her ear. It must be a nervous habit of hers along with picking at her nails; it’s a little weird, but we all have our quirks.
I give her a small smile and nod, not really in the mood to make much conversation due to this massive headache of mine.
“Are you alright?” she asks, stepping inside her apartment. “You don’t look like yourself and you haven’t said a word to me.”
It’s nothing. Your brother just pissed me off today to the point of inducing the worst headache ever. I rub my temple with my fingers and nod. “I’m fine. It’s just been a long day and my head hurts.”
Her eyes flicker between mine and her mouth parts slightly before closing, almost hesitant to speak what’s on her mind. “Come inside and get some water,” she states and holds the door open wide enough for me, not really giving me an option.
She guides me over to the kitchen and fills up a clear glass with water from the tap. I down it quickly and fill it up again myself while she sits on the island.
“Long day at work?” she questions.
“Yeah, and I had to deal with an irritating customer which completely ruined my day,” I answer, chugging down my second glass.
“That bad?”
“You have no idea,” I breathe.
Silence falls over us and it’s almost unsettling because whenever we’re in the same room together, we always find something to talk about, but I just can’t think of anything today.
“What are you doing this weekend?” she asks nervously.
My eyebrows furrow. “Nothing that I know of—why?”
“I was wondering if you wanted to come with me to have dinner at Michael’s? He wanted to throw me a welcoming dinner or something and since we’re “friends” I thought I would invite you.”
As elated as I am for her invitation, I’m slightly pissed that Michael didn’t tell me anything about this “welcoming dinner.” I was with the boy all day and not once did he bring it up. I don’t like how he’s hiding things that relate to Ruth from me, although, I have no right to be jealous. She isn’t mine and at this point, it’s anyone’s game.
Not only is Luke becoming a hindrance, Michael is too now.
The pounding in my head begins to cease and I watch her bite her lip as she stares at me expectantly. “I’d love to come,” I respond and she tries to hold back a smile.
I’d love to hear Luke say that she’s not interested now.
_______
A/N: I’m sorry that it’s been so long since I’ve updated, but I’m still having some writers block. Thank you so much for reading! I really appreciate it! I’ll try to get another chapter posted this week before school starts up again. If there’s anything that you would like to see happen in this story, please don’t hesitate to tell me! I would love to hear your suggestions! Please keep on voting, commenting, and sharing! Also, if you haven’t already, go check out my Michael fanfic “Foster Home” :)
Love y’all! –Rebecca xoxoxoxoxoxo