Chapter 9 - Cookie

"Please, Liz." Jonah is on my front porch, begging me to help him make it up to Rilee.

"No." I snap. "You really hurt Rilee. Do you really expect me to help you after you hurt my best friend? If you want to make it up to her then you'll have to do it yourself."

"Please. I really want to apologize." He looked solemn. "I want us to be friends again."

"Whatever. Why are you coming to me?" My hand slides to our cold, metal doorknob as I go to close the door in his face.

"Wait! Liiza." He bites his lip in thought. "I'll sing for you. I have an awesome voice."

"What?" I look at him in confusion.

"I'll get you a jewellery." He sounds desperate.

"Nu-uh."

"I'll buy you makeup." He pleads.

I roll my eyes in response.

"I'll buy you a pizza!"

I contemplated his promise for a short while. "You've got yourself a deal."

I know that I'm being pretty selfish, but hey, food is my first priority. I could never say no to pizza.

Besides, I'm doing this for Rilee. She deserves an apology.

Jonah exhales in relief, before explaining his plan.

"Can you convince Rilee to meet me at Bulls and Barrels?"

I nod in agreement.

"After that, I can take care of everything else" he explains. "Can you do that? At least?" He asks slowly, staring deep into my eyes.

"Yeah, of course I can." I crossed my arms, huffed "Don't think I can handle one simple task?"

Does he think I'm a baby? I can handle my best friend.

You always mess up things.

"Woah, yeah. I was just checking." Jonah scratches the back of his head awkwardly "Thank you so much for this, Liiza."

I give him a small smile. "As long as I get my pizza. What time do you want her to be there?"

"7:30." he replies softly.

"She'll be there."

Jonah nods silently, before turning and walking down the steps and into his car. After he drives away, I slip back into Andree's house.

I'm so thirsty.

I make the trek to the kitchen and pour myself a glass of milk, and see it. A plate, piled high with chocolate chip cookies, sitting right next to the microwave on the counter.

Well, a single cookie won't hurt anyone.

I look left and right to make sure there's no one coming, before taking a cookie and stuffing it into my mouth in one bite. It melts in my mouth. Oh my god.

I take one more, and another one and another one, until there is just one left on the plate. I reach out to take the last one but stop when I hear the click of a picture being taken.

"Gotcha." the person says. I turn around slowly only to find Andree smirking at me.

"Hey," I greeted him, hesitantly.

"Hey, cookie." He waves, lifting himself onto the counter.

"Don't call me that." I frown. "Only Zach can give me pet names."

"Why? Is he your boyfriend or something?"

I take a moment to decide what to tell him. Zach is my fake boyfriend but-

"Something like that." I finally say.

"Huh. Well, I can call you whatever I want." He shrugs.

"What's going on here?" Cass asks, her eyes flicking between the both of us. "Where are all the cookies I made? I made them for Perry's book fair! Who ate them all?"

My eyes widened and in that moment I realized that I have made a really big mistake.

Shouldn't have eaten the cookies.

Stupid voices.

I look at Andree and he just raises his hands in defense. "I'm so sorry Cass-" I start.

"I finished them, mom. I'm sorry, I just couldn't resist." Andree finishes, lying easily.

Cass sighs in disappointment. "You should have told me! I would have made a second batch."

"I know. I'm sorry mom." Andree looks...sincere?

I didn't know that he was the type that apologies. Maybe he isn't as bad as I thought.

"It's okay Andree. I'll just have to make another batch of cookie dough."

"I can make it for you." I offer.

It's the least I could do, especially after eating all her cookies.

"It's okay, dear. I can make it." She shrugs.

"No, please Cass! I always bake at home. I promise I won't stuff them up." I protest.

"If you wish." Cass says finally.

"I want to help too." Andree butts in.

"Andree you are bad luck in the kitchen." She replies. I snort at that and all four eyes turn to me.

I look down, muttering a small, "Sorry." to myself.

"But being in the kitchen might help me become good luck, won't it?"

Cass sighs. "It's on you if you mess it up."

Cassandra walks out of the kitchen leaving Andree and I alone. This is my chance to thank him.

"Thanks for the save back there." I mutter genuinely.

Andree laughs. "Woah, woah, woah. Hold up a minute, Princess." He puts his hands in front of my mouth. "You really think I would help you without asking you for a favor?"

What was I thinking?

How could I expect him to help me for nothing in return?

"What do you want?" I cross my arms, annoyed.

"I want you to tutor me for chemistry." He says simply. "If I don't pass the test then I won't be on the soccer team anymore."

My mouth gapes open in disbelief. "Are you failing chem?"

He makes a dismissive hand gesture and continues, "If you tell anyone, I will ruin you."

That's a bit dramatic.

I nod slowly.

"Also, I'm sure my mom would love this photo." He holds up his phone to show me a picture of me reaching for the last cookie.

That would be mortifying.

"Fine." I agree. "I'll do it."

Andree just smiles slyly. "So! How do we start with the cookies?" He brushes past me on the way to the pantry, patting my head like a dog.

••

"And we're done." Andree places the last spoonful of cookie dough on the tray.

"Now all we need to do is put it in the oven and then we can start cleaning up the kitchen." I reply.

Andree chuckles as he slides the baking tray into the preheated oven. "You're on your own with that Angel Face." He says, walking out the kitchen.

"Well, at least come back in like twenty minutes." I call after him, and he gives me the thumbs up.

Better get to work.

The kitchen is a mess. I start with washing up. It takes a while to clean the bowl. Next, I decide to put away all the ingredients. Eggs first, sugar, baking soda, butter, vanilla extract, chocolate chips and finally, the flour.

I gather the flour and step to the pantry, before my heart sinks in my chest. Here's the thing, I am not tall in any sense. And Andree got the flour from the very top shelf. There's no chance I can reach it, even on my tippy toes.

I look to my left and spot a stool which I could stand on to put the flour back. Dragging it over, I place the flour on a lower shelf and climb onto the stool. As I try to stand up, the stool feels suspiciously unstable beneath my feet, but I can cope. I will not ask for help from Andree. That's humiliating.

I pick up the flour box, crouching, but almost as if it was in slow motion, as I straighten up, I lose my balance and fall from the chair.

I press my eyes close, letting out a small scream as  I slip. The flour is going to go everywhere. Suddenly, I feel hard arms break my fall.

I snap my eyes open to find myself in Andree's arms. "Oh my god."

"Having fun there, Princess?" I hear his familiar voice chuckle.

"Put me down!" I snap, taking in the surroundings. Their beautiful marble floor, covered in flour.

Andree drops me to the floor. It hurt.

"Ow!" I wince. "What did you do that for?"

"What? You told me to put you down." He smirks, brushing the flour off his slacks. "I guess I came at the right time."

"Why are you even here?" I stand up, rubbing my butt.

"I thought you might need a hand in cleaning up." He shrugs.

"Well, thanks."

He laughs it off. "Let's get cleaning."