Jamie: has he at least spent this time apologizing so hard that you won't be walking right for the next week?
Audrey: something like that
Ruth: ignoring the sex for a minute. Does he know that he's used up all his second chances?
Audrey: seeing me with Brecken made that pretty clear
Jamie: the better question is do you, Miss Audrey, know it's his last second chance?
Audrey: yeah, I do
chapter fifty
Audrey
Today's vocabulary word: coincidence
I considered confrontingJude about following my baking blog while I kneaded and rolled out dough. I whipped up a whole monologue about how little I enjoy being the last to know everything while teaching Percy how to make a cream cheese icing.
There was a minute when everything was out of the oven and Percy was busy doing a surprisingly good job at washing some dishes that I considered stomping out to the backyard and standing in the path of the mower until Jude explained himself.
But he sent all those plans out the window when he jogged down to the basement with a Sharpie tucked over his ear and his pen light in hand. I followed him into the utility room and closed the door behind me.
He glanced up from his work at the circuit breaker. "I'm going to take another look at this when you're not using the appliances. I don't like the way it's organized."
He went back to writing something on small labels and sticking them on the panel. "Yeah, okay. Do you think you could explain something to me?"
"Sure, what's up?"
"How is it that your four-year-old child follows my baking blog?"
There was a pause and then I heard the cap of the Sharpie snap into place. Jude turned, shoving the pen light and sticker labels into his pockets. "Percy told you that?"
"He told me a lot of things," I replied. "Among them, the fact that you watch my videos together. I also heard that you attempted one of my recipes. Not well, though."
Jude grimaced at that, muttering, "I should've listened to him about those apples."
I crossed my arms. "I'll just wait until you're ready to explain."
He dropped his hands to his hips and stared up at the ceiling. After a minute, he said, "I opened social media accounts to keep track of what's going on with Brenda. She likes posting a fuckton of photos whenever Percy's with her and long, emotional stuff about Penny. It's good for knowing where her head's at."
I was pleased with myself for not offering an encouraging nod but simply rolling my hand for him to continue.
"Your account kept coming up as someone I might know. I ignored it at first. Didn't think anything of it. But then I opened the app one day when my phone's audio volume had been cranked up and it autoplayed your video. I heard your voice and—" He laughed to himself. "I remember leaving the office and going to my car so I could listen without anyone else around. It was a recipe for these little blackberry peach pies."
I remembered those pies because I'd made them using an oversized pierogi press. To this day, still one of my finest thrift store finds.
Also notable: that recipe was from three years ago. I remembered because that was before I managed to get ahead on my posting schedule and the local blackberries had given me hell. Too juicy. Every test batch came out of the oven looking like a crime had been committed. I'd tossed in the peaches as a last-ditch effort to save blackberry week.
"I watched it on a loop for at least fifteen minutes," Jude continued, "just listening to you explain how important it was to use cold butter."
"It really is essential," I murmured.
"I didn't actually believe it," he said. "At first. Even though I knew your voice and I recognized your hands, I didn't trust it. I didn't want to."
"Why not?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "It'd been a hard few months. Percy still wasn't talking and no one knew whether it was a delay or something more significant. Brenda wanted me to move up to Saginaw and she hated that I wouldn't. I didn't want to believe you were right there, kneading dough and explaining how you made vanilla sugar. Like you'd disappear if I did."
