Chelsea Fine - Best Kind of Broken

“Yeah, but it’s pretty. So fix it.”

I shake my head and smile. “Fine.”

She grins. “Have fun.”

Fun is the exact opposite of what I have for the next two hours as I fix Ellen’s precious hanging piece of hell, but my mood doesn’t sour. I conquer all the items on my list earlier than usual and head back to the front desk to let Ellen know I’m calling it a day.

She cocks her head at me. “You seem chipper.”

“Chipper?”

“Yeah. Happy. Upbeat.” She looks at me suspiciously and then smiles.

“What?”

She just keeps smiling. “Nothing.”

I stare at her, but she says nothing more and now it’s awkward.

“So…” I say. “Anything else you need me to do before I wrap up for the day?”

“No. Oh wait—yes. Can you give this to Pixie?” She hands me a white envelope. “It came in the mail today, but I forgot to give it to her. And while you’re there, can you check the garbage disposal? Mable said it was gurgling.”

“Gurgling. Sure.” I take the letter and head to the kitchen.

When I enter, Pixie looks up from a mess of baking ingredients and smiles. I smile back. A piece of myself that I didn’t know was starving suddenly warms in satisfaction.

“Hey, handsome.” Mable smiles at me. “Haven’t seen you all day.”

“That’s because Ellen has an unhealthy obsession with chandeliers.”

Pixie scoffs. “She has an unhealthy obsession with everything old and impractical.”

“Tell me about it. Ellen wanted me to give this to you,” I say, handing over the letter.

“Thanks.” Pixie takes the envelope and nods at two plates—one red, one blue—of chocolate squares on the counter. “Want a brownie?”

“Sure.”

She pushes the red plate toward me and I grab a brownie and head to the sink. As I reach for the garbage disposal switch, I take a giant bite and—

“Holy mother of hell!” I gag and spit the disgusting treat into the sink. “What the—” I start coughing and stare at the vile brown piece of crap in my hand.

Mable keeps her eyes down with a smile.

Pixie crosses her arms and raises an amused eyebrow at me. “That’s what you get,” she says, looking much too satisfied by my continuing gags and coughs.

“For what?” God, this is the worst thing I’ve ever tasted. I gag again.

“For switching the sugar and salt on me all those years ago and adding vinegar to the vanilla so my brownies came out tasting like sour bars of salt. I finally figured it out this morning and decided to whip up a batch and give you a taste of your own medicine.”

I spit again and smile. “It took you this long to figure it out? Yikes, Pix. You might have to kiss that future in detective work good-bye.” I throw the remainder of the nasty brownie away and gag again. The real kind of gag where I think I might throw up.

“And you might have to kiss what you ate for lunch good-bye,” she says. “Please don’t vomit in my kitchen.”

This only makes me gag harder.

“God.” She rolls her eyes and grabs a brownie from the blue plate. “These are the good ones. I swear.”

“Get away from me, you wicked treat devil.”

She laughs. “Wicked treat devil? Wow. You can do better than that.”

“Evil dessert demon?”

“Still lame.”

“Chocolate temptress of salty death.”

“Now you’re just reaching. Here”—she grabs something—“spare your mouth any future embarrassment.” She shoves another salty-sour brownie against my mouth and I start hacking all over again.

She smiles as she tears open the envelope. She scans the thick piece of paper inside and her face goes slack.

I quit gagging and wipe my mouth. “What’s wrong?”

A bewildered expression crosses her face. “I was accepted into NYU. I can transfer there this fall. I’d have to leave in two weeks.”

“Wow,” I say.

Wow.

“That’s wonderful, dear,” Mable says, then frowns at the dumbfounded expression on Pixie’s face. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m just… I don’t know.” Pixie smiles and wrinkles her brow and bites her lip. In that order. “I’m surprised, that’s all.” She smiles again.

I smile at her, but for some reason my gut feels hollow.

I’m stunned. Shocked. Dazed. Terrified, even. But not because I was accepted to NYU. I’m surprised because I’m no longer excited to go.

I’ve been trying to transfer schools for the past year, and now here’s my chance and I just… don’t care. I should be jumping up and down and squealing. Or at least smiling in a way that doesn’t have Mable looking at me in concern, but instead I’m just standing here, staring at the red plate of brownies.

“Congratulations,” Levi says.

I meet his eyes, and our strained smiles collide.

“Thanks,” I say.

“New York.” Mable smiles. Hers isn’t strained. “What a wonderful city. I’ve only ever been there once, myself, but it was breathtaking. A great place for an artist.”

“Yeah. NYU has a great art program.” I sweep up some sugar with my hands and clean it off the counter. “One of the best in the country.”

“How exciting.” Mable sounds genuine, but keeps glancing at Levi every few seconds.

“You deserve it,” he says, pressing his lips together.

I nod. Nothing else. I just nod and sweep up more sugar.

He clears his throat and wipes a few brownie crumbs from his face and shirt before moving to the disposal, where he promptly gets lost in work after retrieving a few tools.

I concentrate on cleaning up flour and salt, baking powder and sugar, tossing the remainder of my baking mess into the garbage.

Soon, the counter is spic-and-span and there are no more ingredients to sweep or put away. I wrap up the good brownies and put them in the fridge for tomorrow, wondering why my stomach keeps twisting.

Mable hangs her apron on a hook by the door. “All right, dear. I’m headed home. Are you sure you don’t need any more help?”

“Nope. I’m good. Have a great night, Mable.”

“You too, love.” She leaves through the dining room door as I survey the kitchen. Levi is frowning at the disposal with a wrench in his hand and some leftover brownie still on his shirt, and Mable’s blue apron is gently swinging back and forth from the hook.

Finding a fork, I scrape the remaining prank brownies off the red plate and into the trash. They pile up, a tower of deceitful chocolate in a white sea of discarded baking ingredients.

Like a tidal wave rushing for land, it hits me, and I instantly know why my stomach is twisting like a pretzel.

And the reason has ocean-blue eyes and chocolate brownie crumbs on his sleeve.

“No,” I say.

“Aw, come on, dude,” Zack whines through the phone the next morning. “I would do it for you.”

“You would drive an hour to come babysit my pet goat?” I tuck my phone against my ear and shoulder as I grab my mail from the front desk and start flipping through it as I head upstairs.

“Yes.”

“You’re a fucking liar.”

“You owe me,” he says.

“Since when?” I pass Pixie in the hall and give her a tight smile.

She smiles back and shifts past me as we go our separate ways. She’s probably thrilled about moving to New York. She should be. She deserves it. She deserves something more than… well, anything here.

Zack says, “Since I hooked you up with Savannah the boobtastic blonde.”

I enter my room. “I didn’t even hook up with her.”

“Irrelevant. Now, come get Marvin so I don’t get kicked off the team for bringing a goddamn billy goat to the first day of practice.”

“I’m not babysitting your goat.”

“Get your ass down here, Andrews. Or I’ll call up Sarah and tell her about the night you got wasted freshman year and blubbered all about how you wanted to kiss her pretty teeth and smell her golden hair.”

I stop walking.

“Golden hair,” he says. “You called it golden.”

I drop my mail on my desk. “I hate you.”

I can hear the smile in his voice. “The best friendships are rooted in hatred and blackmail. See you in fifty-five minutes.”

By the time I reach the practice field, I’m royally pissed off and have decided that I’m going to sell Marvin on Craigslist before practice is over so I’ll never again have to do a goat errand. But I guess this is better than staying at the inn all day, thinking about today.

Charity’s birthday.

It’s definitely not as heavy as the anniversary of her death, but it’s still something. A piece of her. A reminder that she’s not here. It’s a cruel twist, her death being just a few days before her nineteenth birthday. One of many.

I park and walk through the familiar stadium gates and tunnels to reach the field where my former teammates are doing warm-ups. I wonder if Pixie will ever go to a football game in New York.

Coach McHugh sees me and blows the whistle to signal a five-minute break. Everyone disperses from their sprints and congregates around the bench as Coach marches up to me.

“What the hell, Andrews? Why isn’t your name on my fucking roster? And why aren’t you dressed for practice?”

I scratch the back of my neck. “Because I haven’t responded to Dean Maxwell and I’m not here to play. Where’s Arden?”

Coach’s face turns red like he wants to scream at me, but instead he screams across the field at Zack. “Arden! Get your ass over here.”

Zack jogs up to us with a pleasant expression. “What’s happening, Levi?”

I glare at him. “Where the hell is your goat?”

Coach shoots his eyes to Zack. “What goat?”

He shrugs. “I left him at the mansion.”

“What mansion?” Coach asks.

I flex my jaw as I stare at Zack. “Then why the hell did you have me drive all the way out here?”

“Because it’s time for you to get your shit together.” He looks at McHugh. “Coach, I believe Levi is here to scrimmage with us.”

I shake my head. “No. No, sir. I’m not here to scrimmage.”

“It’s shit-getting-together time and Levi has clocked in,” Zack says.

“No, I haven’t.”

“Shut up, both of you.” Coach looks me up and down. “Suit up.”

“What? No. I’m not here to play, Coach. I’m not even enrolled in school—”

“Too bad. You’re here and I need players. Suit up.”

“But I—”

“Suit your ass up!” he screams loud enough to draw the attention of every member of the team, who of course are looking at me like they’re glad to have me back.

Zack grins. I hate him.

But as I look around the field and smell the newly cut grass and upturned dirt, a piece of me aches to stay, to feel air rushing at me and to thrust a ball from my hands. And the idea of running and throwing and smashing into things sounds good.

I slowly turn to Coach and relent. “Fine. One scrimmage game.”

Coach gives me a warning look. “What’s that, now?”

“One scrimmage game, sir.”

“Good. Now quit gabbing and suit the fuck up!”

“Yes, sir,” I say, biting back a smile as I jog off to dress for practice.

The kitchen screen door squeaks as I take out the last trash bag of the day. Mable left early, so I’ve been on my own for the past few hours, which is just as well. I haven’t been much of a conversationalist today.

Partly because it’s Charity’s birthday and I wanted to indulge in a private stroll down memory lane in my head. But mostly because I made my decision about NYU this morning and I’m not sure how I feel about it yet.