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The few weeks following your crisis over Mikey were uneventful.
You couldn’t say you expected or planned for anything different; Lord knows you’re not doing anything about the feelings you just unearthed. It’s more like— instead of being in a locked box, they got moved into a dark corner. Yeah, they’re out in the open, but they will still be ignored to the best of your ability.
You were more embarrassed with yourself than anything, for not stopping to consider that maybe you liked him a little bit before. But in your defense— it snuck up on you! You two barely talked! And he’s Illi’s brother— that had to be some cardinal sin against girlhood, right? Why would you ever even entertain the idea that you felt some kind of way? You couldn’t. You simply weren’t allowed.
But your brain and your heart weren’t on speaking terms most days, so the rules didn’t seem to matter. You liked Mikey.
At least you had the agency to decide that you weren’t going to do a thing about it.
When Illi called you, inviting you over to bake at her house on a Sunday afternoon— around three weeks or so after your world turned on its’ axis— you shot out of bed so fast you almost pulled a muscle.
Normally, you didn’t think much of going over there. Her home was a second home to you; you’d show up in whatever you had available in your closet that was clean, and that was that.
But now you’re too aware of Mikey. Of the potential of him being there.
…
You sprinted for the shower and managed to be out of there in 15 minutes— which you would call a new record— and you picked out of the nicer of your graphic tees, not one with a chewed up collar or anything too worn. You wanted to look put together without looking like you were trying to look put together, because trying is embarrassing when people can tell that you’re doing it.
And trying for a boy? It had to be among the worst of the most humiliating things a person could do.
You found yourself throwing on a nice body spray anyway.
“Hey,” Illi beamed at you, opening the front door wide upon your arrival. She got straight to the point, “I wanted to try out lemon bars today, my mom bought a crap ton of them cause they were on sale but they’re gonna go bad in like two days.”
You nodded, stepping into her home and pulling your shoes off at the door. You found your eyes wandering, on the lookout for … other bodies.
“Cool,” you finally responded, haphazardly dumping your Converse in the corner. “I like lemon bars.”
“I know, that’s why we’re doing ‘em,” she excitedly moved ahead of you into the kitchen. “You never eat anything we make.”
You trailed behind her, eyes still roving around corners and ears still attentive. You were listening… mostly.
“Well we’re always making stuff with nuts. Or fruit chunks,” you huffed, approaching the kitchen island where she was all set up. It looked like she had only done a little bit before you got there; the blender was out and filled with what looked to be sugar.
She waved off your complaint. “I know that. I’m just saying. I like when you’re able to eat it too. So—“ she gestured at the lemons on the counter, “—I already zested them. The recipe I found said to use a food processor, but we don’t have one of those, but a blender is basically the same thing, I think? Anyway— I’m infusing the sugar with lemon zest, because that’s supposed to taste even better and you get more out of your lemon with less waste and whatnot…”
…blah blah blah. That’s what she was starting to sound like, because your mind kept derailing your focus, wondering if her brother was home.
This sucked. You were so embarrassing, nodding along while not hearing her whatsoever like a horrible, awful friend.
“Okay. Sounds easy enough,” you replied when she finished talking, having at least enough awareness to do that. You managed to pick up on being tasked with the shortbread base, so you absentmindedly moved over to that assigned bowl while she went back to the blender. The nice thing about doing stuff with Illi is that you never felt obligated to talk to each other just to fill silence. That at least gave you a screen to zone out.
You couldn’t hear anything around the house when you came in… maybe Mikey wasn’t home? Sundays tended to be a gamble, you’d noticed. You knew that he liked that one comic book store in town; but if he went there today, Illi most definitely would’ve gone with, and you wouldn’t be baking with her. Hm.
He had friends who were in a band… you never met them, but you knew from Illi that they had gigs a lot. Maybe he was with them?
Or he could just be at home, upstairs, asleep. He slept a lot.
You dumped a stick of butter into a glass measuring cup and moved to the microwave to melt it down.
…
“Is Mikey home?”
You couldn’t help yourself.
Her eyes flicked over to you, and she turned the blender off. “What was that?”
“Is your family home?” You gladly took that opportunity to rephrase. She clicked her tongue and shook her head.
“Nah. My mom’s running errands, and Mikey’s with Frank,” she explained, removing the blender lid and dipping her finger into the sugar inside.
You nodded, and grabbed the melted butter from the microwave. “Yeah? Is Ray with them?”
Anything to not sound like you were asking about Mikey specifically.
“Ray works today,” she stated simply, and dumped the sugar into her bowl. “But yeah, I think they went to Frank’s house?”
Ah. So you weren’t going to see Mikey today. Cool.
You poured the butter into your bowl. “Gotcha.”
…Well, that was probably a good thing. Less distractions. You were sure that if you even heard his footsteps upstairs, you’d think about nothing else at all.
“Sooo,” she spoke up again, right as you started to pour your sugars into the bowl. “I was thinking. Winter Formal? Yay? Nay?”
Your eyebrows furrowed. “The Winter Formal? Uh… why?”
“Well, cause—“ she cracked an egg into her bowl, “—it’s mine and Ray’s last year, y’know? And none of us have gone to any of the dances, and we don’t even have to stay for the whole thing. Raid the food, take pictures, look pretty, done.”
You sighed.
“Um… I’m not… totally opposed… but I’m not dancing or anything,” you muttered, standing on the tips of your toes to reach for the electric hand mixer in her cupboards. “Or buying anything new.”
She huffed at you. “Well, yeah, I’m not buying anything either— but you can’t not dance a little. That’s, like, the point.”
“It’s not my thing,” you argued, attaching the beater pieces.
“Boring,” she replied, taking on a sing-songish tone. You gave her this incredibly flat look, and plugged in the mixer so you could combine the sugar and butter.
…
About forty or so seconds into the process, your ears pricked at the sound of the front door creaking.
Your head whipped around, and in came Frank— carrying a slushy— with Mikey trailing behind him. Oh.
Illi immediately scoffed upon their arrival. “Frank, take your shoes off,” she waved him away without even a greeting, sending him back towards the front door. He rolled his eyes sky high, but complied, and turned on his heel.
Illi raised her eyebrows at Mikey as he approached the kitchen island, “I thought you were going to Frank’s house?” She frowned.
“Our house is closer to the store,” he shrugged, and sipped at whatever was in his cup. Illi made a face; she seemed to be disappointed that she didn’t have the house to herself anymore.
“You get me anything, or what?”
“No,” he snarked, and then dropped a bag of peach rings onto the countertop in front of her. She beamed, and you awkwardly looked back at your mixture in the bowl when his eyes flit over towards you.
Frank sauntered back into the kitchen and shoved his cup right in front of your face, “Try this.”
You blinked at him, but you don’t get to respond right away.
“She’s not gonna like that, dude,” Mikey grimaced, leaning up against the counter. Frank just scoffed.
“You don’t know that— I need a second opinion, try it,” he shook the cup in front of you like jingling keys in front of a baby. You were… confused.
“Uh. What… is it?” You sounded almost frightened.
“It’s banana. And Coke. And cotton candy,” Frank insisted— though you could feel yourself making a face already— and he looked dead serious.
“Who turns banana into a slushy flavor?” was your first thought, immediately out of your mouth. “That’s gross.”
Mikey pointed at you in triumph. “That’s what I said!”
“That’s not the point— it’s the mixture, okay? There’s a science to this,” Frank fired back, sputtering a little while still very much in your personal space.
“Yeah, and you clearly don’t get it, because that’s the nastiest thing I’ve ever tasted,” Mikey argued, and your eyes flickered between the both of them like you were watching a tennis match.
“Guys, get out of my kitchen,” Illi interjected, but she might as well of been talking to a wall.
“Oh come on, just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean she won’t!” Frank threw a hand up exasperatedly.
“She doesn’t like much of anything, I think I know what I’m talking about.”
“A sip won’t kill her.”
“The banana flavor is literally slimy, slushies should not be slimy! It overpowers the whole thing! It’s sweet in the bad way!”
Illi was getting visibly stressed out.
“Okay—!” You cut in, and grab the cup from Frank. “If it gets you to leave me alone, God.”
You peel the lid off of the top— you’d die before your lips touched a straw that also touched Frank’s— and sip from the rim of the cup.
…
Yeah, no. That’s bad.
You pushed the cup back into his hands and ducked to spit in the sink. Mikey was right, there’s a weird sliminess that made it hard to get down.
“See!?” Mikey gestured emphatically at you as you wiped your mouth with a paper towel. It’s funny how animated he gets when he’s not talking to you directly.
Frank groaned, and clicked the lid back into place. “Literally— whatever. Whatever. We still wouldn’t have known that if she didn’t try it.”
“I tried to tell him,” Mikey turned to you now, and you found yourself standing up a little straighter. “I told him, I swear. That you wouldn’t like it. I mean, I eat everything, so if I didn’t like it, you definitely wouldn’t—“
“Oh my god, we get it,” Frank whined, “you know everything on the planet, you know everything about her.”
Mikey sputtered. “That is not what I said.”
“Okay!” Illi spoke up once more, and clapped her hands in a second attempt to dismiss them from the kitchen. “As fun as that was; Bye. We’re busy.”
A few beats of silence hung over the room; you had gone back to making the shortbread (now a lot more flustered than previously), Illi was whisking the eggs and sugar with lemon juice, and Mikey and Frank were silenced— snapped out of their bickering.
Though, eventually, Mikey approached her side the kitchen island, and hovered directly over Illi’s shoulder in true brotherly fashion. “What are we making??”
Her shoulders squared off, and she side stepped him a little bit. “None of your business.” Frank sidled up and hovered directly over Illi’s other side.
“Why is it piss yellow?” He reached for the bowl, and Illi batted his hand away.
Mikey scoffed. “No healthy person’s piss is that color— are you drinking enough water?”
That one got a snort out of you before you could stop it from slipping out, and you covered it with a well timed cough while scraping the sides of your bowl absentmindedly. Illi started pushing them out of her personal bubble before they could pay you any mind.
“Wha— I want to try it, though,” Frank grumbled, though letting himself be pushed away. Mikey barely resisted himself; he just simply stepped back.
“This is literally lemon juice and eggs, it isn’t great unbaked,” she picks up the whisk and keeps beating it. “If you quit bothering us, you’ll have some later.”
“Fiiiiine.”
They both sat at the kitchen island barstools like dogs dismissed to their kennels. Frank sipped at his abomination quietly while Mikey tapped his fingers on the countertop. Illi sighed, but they seemed like they weren’t going to invade anymore.
You cracked an egg and threw in an eyeballed amount of vanilla before something sliding across the counter caught your eye. A candy bar— your eyes followed the up hand attached to it to meet Mikey’s eyes staring back at you.
“You like these, right?” he murmured, his eye contact wavering between the both of your own eyes.
Whaaaat.
“Uh— yeah? I do,” you muttered, “Is this for me…?”
“Yeah,” he affirmed. “Illi told me you were coming. And I got her something. So.”
…You nodded, and slowly slipped the candy from the counter and into your pocket. “Cool. Thank you.”
Don’t freak out. No reason to start freaking out. He’s gotten you stuff before. You’re chill.
Still, as you talked yourself down from cardiac arrest, heat crawled up your neck anyway.
You promptly turned the hand mixer back on, drowning out all your thoughts as the whirr filled the quiet in the room.
“Are you almost done with that?” Illi raised her voice. “It needs to bake for 10 minutes before the lemon goes on top.”
You nodded, reaching for the one cup measurement. “Yeah, m’gonna put the flour in.”
You flicked the mixer off and scraped the sides, then moved to fill the cup with flour.
“So,” Illi spoked up again, this time addressing the boys with that same tone she gave you earlier. “We were talking about the Winter Formal,” she re-introduced the topic as you leveled the flour in your cup.
“Oh?” Frank sat up a little straighter. Mikey just tilted his head.
“Yeah. Ray and I were discussing it, because we’re seniors, and we have to go to something, right? And it’s not as stressful as prom, or expensive, and we can all go just to say we went. Right?” She yammered on.
“Oh, awesome,” Frank nudged Mikey with his elbow. “You should tell that one girl yes, then.”
Mikey’s expression immediately fell into a glare, and the tips of his ears started to redden. “Shut up.”
Illi blinked at the two of them, and then at you, and then back at them. “Girl?”
“It’s nothing,” Mikey shook his head, but Frank wasted no time in speaking up after him.
“Mikey got asked out,” Frank said sagely, and the former got redder.
Ah.
You glanced between all of them, and stayed dead silent while you mixed the shortbread dough with a wooden spoon. Good for Mikey. Good for whoever that girl was. You didn’t care. You were the picture of nonchalance.
Illi’s eyebrows shot up into her hairline.
“What? When? Why don’t you tell me things anymore??” She chided, pointing an accusing finger at Mikey.
“Because it wasn’t important!” He groaned. “It’s just some girl in my math class. She sits next to me. We talk sometimes, I didn’t know she liked me like that.”
“Well, what did you say to her?” Illi pressed.
“I said, ‘I’m flattered, but I’ll have to pass,’ and I didn’t want her to feel too bad, so I said that it’s not that she’s not a nice girl or anything, but school events aren’t really my scene— and. And yeah.”
“That kinda makes it sound like you would go with her if she wanted to go somewhere else,” Frank pointed out, and Mikey dragged his hands down his face.
“Well— I-I wouldn’t.”
“What does she look like, is she cute?” Illi leaned against the counter, squeezing for every drop of information she could get. You wanted to throw up.
“She’s— I mean, not bad looking,” he stammered, and your jaw clenched.
“Then why on Earth did you say no?” Frank scoffed.
“Because.”
“Because what??”
“You know—“ Illi cut in again. “If you go to the dance now and she goes regardless, she’s gonna think you’re a jerk cause you told her it wasn’t your scene or whatever, and that’ll sound like you just made an excuse to not go with her.”
“Well it wasn’t an excuse, obviously I didn’t know that you and Ray were gonna spring your stupid plans on us!”
“They’re not stupid—“
“I’m done with this,” you shoved the bowl of shortbread dough in front of Illi, and promptly moved to wash the beaters in the sink. Silence hung in the air for a good moment at your abrupt interruption.
…
“What do you think?” Frank broke it; it took you a moment to realize his question was directed at you.
“Wha?”
“About the girl,” he clarified, and Mikey slumped in his seat. “What should he have done?”
You prayed your face didn’t portray the sourness that settled in your gut.
“Um…” you shrugged, and grabbed for a towel to dry off the utensils. “I mean… do you want to go with her…?”
Mikey’s features softened just a little, though he still seemed incredibly embarrassed.
“No,” he huffed. “She’s nice and stuff, really, but I’m just not… y’know. I don’t— it’s not. Like that.”
The weight in your chest eased a little.
“Okay… then, I mean— if it ever comes up, or you get an opening, you could explain that. Tell her you’re flattered n’stuff. Like, mention that you’ll be there and whatnot, but primarily against your own will and not because you were just making excuses to not go with her. And then say that you appreciate the invite but that you’re just not interested in her like that and you still think she’s cool and stuff. Transparency is good. So. Yeah.”
…He nodded, like he was really making mental notes of everything you were saying.
“Okay. Yeah.” Mikey rubbed at his eyes under his glasses. “God, I feel dumb. I’ve never had to reject anybody before, I thought I was getting pranked or somethin’…”
You snorted, and leaned up against the counter right across from him like before. “You think it’s that unbelievable that someone sees something in you?”
He dragged his hands down, propping his chin on top of them. “I mean— not entirely? Just, y’know. I didn’t expect it. We barely talk. It’s weird, I kinda forget that I can exist in someone’s brain even when I’m not around.”
If only he knew.
You just smiled at him, and then looked down at your hands pressed into the counter.
“You’d be surprised.”
You caught Frank and Illi giving each other a look in your peripheral, but she quickly moved to the oven to put the shortbread base inside of it, hopefully taking all the weird vibes with her.
“This should be ready in 20 minutes or so for the lemon, cause I think it needs to cool for a bit,” she muttered absently to no one in particular.
Meanwhile, you felt a little more light on your feet knowing Mikey didn’t actually like that girl. You were so resolved just hours ago to not let things change with this development even mentally, and there you were. Celebrating. You were embarrassing.
Mikey drummed his fingers against the counter, and then pushed himself onto his feet.
“Well. We were gonna work on homework and stuff,” he mumbled, lightly elbowing Frank to encourage him out of his chair.
“Kay,” Illi acknowledged, setting the bowl that previously held shortbread dough in the sink. “Have fun.”
They clamored upstairs without another word, and your eyes followed. Of course they followed.
Illi squirted soap into the bowl and turned the faucet on, eyeing you for a brief moment.
“They’re so distracting,” she complained, soaking a kitchen sponge. “I can only ever get anything done when I’m in the kitchen with you, I swear.”
You hummed in response. “Uh huh.”
You felt her side eye linger on you again— this time, you met it dead on.
“What??”
…
She shook her head, and her attention landed back on the bowl. “Nothing.”
Your gut told you it wasn’t nothing, and your mind wouldn’t let you pry in fear of what she might say.
“That was good advice,” she noted, “for Mikey, I mean.”
You let out the most awkward, stilted chuckle. “I feel like it was the obvious thing to say…”
“Not for boys,” she shook her head. She dried her hands on a kitchen towel and leaned up against the back counter. “He’ll figure it out, though.”
“Yeah…”
…
She clapped her hands together. “Okay! Now I wanna show you my outfit ideas while we wait, c’mon,” she waved you over towards the dining room table, where her sketchbook was laid out. Of course.
One last glance was spared towards the stairwell before you forced your attention out of Mikey’s metaphorical deathgrip.
You really needed to figure it out, too.