Page 57 of The Surprise
“Don’t break it, fumble fingers,” I say, eager to be a part of things.
“You’re calling me that?” Izzy asks. “You’re the one who dropped the pickles last week.”
“Only because Roscoe got in the way and I tripped,” I say. “I’m not clumsy.”
“What about the time you caught that football and then went through the neighbor’s door?” Whitney asks. She’s always happy to add an embarrassing story.
“Theirscreendoor,” I say, “and remember, Icaughtthe ball.”
“Yes, your professional football skills are not in doubt,” Izzy says. “Just your general grace.”
Beth’s laughing along with the others, and I’m beginning to think I might have gotten the wrong end of this deal when Izzy points at Whitney and Gabe. “We need to go feed the animals. Maybe Beth can help Ethan make dinner and then he can give her a ride home?”
“I can walk,” Beth says. “It’s not really that far.”
“I can take you,” I say. “But where’s your car?”
“It needed an oil change, and my dad’s taking it in today.”
The others kind of duck out—Emery and Maren go with them too. Emery loves to help with the horses, but Maren just hates making dinner. It usually annoys me when she ducks out, but today? Not so much.
“What are we making?” Beth asks.
“I’m a pretty simple guy,” I say. “I can heat up spaghetti sauce my mom leaves in the freezer and boil noodles. I can make oven nachos. And I make a mean frozen pizza.”
Beth laughs. “Wow. Your mom failed.”
I laugh. “Right?” I shrug. “You just can’t get everything, as it turns out. And she’s such a great cook that I never had the motivation to learn a lot myself.”
“That’s really all you can make?” She cringes. “Yikes.”
“Oh, I can also heat up my mom’s chili, put a frozen lasagna she left in the oven,orbake a shepherd’s pie.”
“What can you do that she hasn’t already done for you?”
“Did you nothearme say oven nachos or frozen pizza? Or are you kidding?”
Beth shakes her head. “How about chicken dumplings?”
“Who am I looking at right now? Is your name Betty or Beth?”
“Excuse me?” Beth frowns. “What?”
“BettyCrocker?” I wink.
She throws a towel at me.
“I feel like my sisters are teaching you bad habits.”
“If you think I had to be taught to throw things at men, you underestimated me from the start.”
“Snap,” I say. “I guess I did.”
And then I fetch and carry things to her from places in the kitchen. She’s not impressed that my mom doesn’t have any cans of chicken. “We mostly use frozen stuff,” I say.
She sighs. “Fine, fine. It’s just slower.”
“They won’t come back in until we call them,” I say. “Believe me. They’re like little bums. Once they’re done feeding the animals, they’ll basically ride around on scooters, swing, or play chase until we tell them dinner’s made.”
