Happily Ever Never

12. Brooke

12

brOOKE

The parking lot of the rec center is full and a news van is setting up on the sidewalk, with a heavily made-up news anchor interviewing contestants. Serena makes her way through the crowd towards us.

Estelle, the lady I met at the Come On Inn, smiles at me and waves. “Good luck!” I say to her.

Her eyes glint fiercely and her smile is terrifying. “You’re going down. I’m stealing your cookie house idea, by the way.” She marches off with a smirk.

“Wow,” I whisper. "You think you know a person.”

“Who knew anyone was interested in cookie baking contests?” Lucas says, a little too loudly, as people stream past us into the Green Acres rec center. “Anyone at all?”

Ruby and Edna, who are walking by carrying canvas bags at the moment, sniff indignantly and march off, noses in the air.

Serena shoots Lucas a cool gaze.

“Keep it up,” she says. “Alienate those townspeople. Maybe you can move here and open up a branch of Whitfield Development in downtown Green Acres. Right where my grandparents’ hotel used to be. ”

He gives a snort of contempt. “Except they weren’t your grandparents, because you didn’t grow up here.”

Serena ignores him. “And I’ll open up my own publishing company in the building right next to yours. My audience will be at least two thousand readers, if every single adult female in town buys my books.”

“How did you end up being a judge for this contest, anyway? We all just got here. They must have been planning the contest for months.” I lean forward to peer at Serena’s pin that identifies her as a judge.

“Who knows? This universe wants what it wants.”

She’s actually even dressed for it, wearing a denim button-down shirtdress with an apron and sensible white shoes, her hair swept up into a bun. It’s funny seeing her like that instead of her usual glammed-up self. She’s taking her judging duties seriously.

I guess that makes sense, though. She’s the one who suggested that we’d have to play by this universe’s rules if we ever wanted to make it home.

There are five judges. One of them is Theodore from the restaurant where Brenda works. Henry is another one.

I wave at Brenda, who’s standing with a group of women on the grassy area in front of the rec center. She waves back.

Officer Hernandez is here too, but he’s standing all the way on the other side of the crowd from her... sneaking looks at her while Homicidal Henry stands there jawing at him.

“They’re too far apart,” I say to Lucas.

“Yeah, yeah, the B-line plot.” He rolls his eyes at me. “You could go grab her by the hair and drag her over to him.”

“Trust him to come up with the caveman approach,” Serena says.

Then a bell gongs loudly, announcing that the competition is about to begin.

Serena, Lucas, and I make our way into the rec center and follow everyone down the hall and into a cavernous kitchen, guided by a glaring Mr. Vickers.

The cooking area is enormous, with twenty ovens, and each contestant has their own little cooking island.

Lucas shoots Serena a look of annoyance. “Why would a town this size have a rec center with twenty ovens and... you know what? The hell with it.”

“They have a lot of cooking contests here. Christmas, Easter, Fourth of July, Summer Solstice... It makes perfect narrative sense,” Serena says indignantly.

“Oh, excuse me for trying to inject some realism into this crazy world.” Lucas gives her a scornful look. “I am now biting my tongue.”

“Not hard enough. Man, I never realized what a-holes my characters are until I met them in person. I need to write a personal letter of apology to every one of my female characters.” Serena shakes her head.

“Right?” I say.

“Hey! I’m standing right here.” Lucas scowls as he sweeps the room with his irritated gaze.

“Oh, good; then I don’t have to raise my voice. Do not write that down,” I add to Serena, but it’s too late. She’s scribbling in her notebook.

“Classic,” she murmurs. “I’ve still got it.”

“No, you don’t. Those are our words,” Lucas scowls at her.

“We’re in my universe. I get the credit.” She shrugs. “Show me the book,” she adds to me. I pull the book from my purse and show her. “I’ve felt it vibrating a couple of times,” I tell her.

We flip it open and look at the pages.

“Good. It’s filled in more chapters,” Serena says, nodding to herself.

“Don’t look smug,” Lucas says. He turns and stalks off to our table, which has a large placard with our names on it. Well, it has the names of Susie McGillicuddy and Jasper Whitfield. I don’t recall signing up for this contest, but whatever.

Lucas glances at me. “She’s looking smug, isn’t she?”

I nod. “Very.”

Ruby and Edna are a couple of cooking stations down from us.

Every table has basic ingredients on it—flour, sugar, salt, butter, eggs, food coloring, vanilla extract—along with cookie cutters, various boxes and containers, bowls and mixers, and cookie sheets and other implements.

Lucas and I walk over to our table. Ruby and Edna are unpacking supplies from their canvas bags—oranges, graters, lots of little bottles and bags and boxes, stuff I don’t even recognize because I’ve never been much of a baker... They look like they’ve got an entire grocery store with them.

The mayor, standing at the front of the room, clears his throat and speaks into a mike, giving the history of the cookie baking contest, which started as a morale booster during World War II.

He spells out the rules, and then a buzzer goes off, and it’s time to start baking.

Brenda is working with one of her friends from town. Throughout the room, there are some singles and some couples, and everyone looks like they know their way around a kitchen. They move swiftly and expertly, mixing, chopping, stirring.

Everyone has brought extra ingredients and equipment except for us.

Also, I see people reading from recipe cards. Lucas sees it too.

Carmel is here. She’s participating? She’s across the room from us, and she’s brought three baskets of muffins with her. People are filing up and taking muffins with guilty looks on their faces... including Henry. Word must have gotten around. I can smell them from here, and my stomach is rumbling.

“Where are our recipe cards?” Lucas asks me.

“I don’t know; did you forget to bring them?” Maybe I’m a little defensive. People are already cutting out their cookies with cookie cutters, and I’m staring at our ingredients trying to remember how many tablespoons are in a cup and if it matters.

“Well, since you like to point out that you wouldn’t trust me to boil water, I assumed you’d take care of it.” Lucas pins me with his steely gaze. “Your mother owns a bakery. So I was assuming that you were an absolute cookie-meister.”

“My mother owns a bakery, so I never needed to bake anything. I can make basic foodstuffs that do not involve baking. For example, I put together a very edible sandwich. I have made several salads for us, and you survived every time. Ditto with the spaghetti that I boiled quite expertly last night. What?” I demand, as Lucas squints and avoids my gaze.

He sighs. “I appreciate the effort. It was a little chewy.”

“That just means it has more fiber in it,” I tell him, which probably isn’t true.

My parents and I are all artists in our own ways, but it’s never overlapped. My father was a master carpenter, and he shaped wood with his hands in a way I’ve never seen before. My mother is a kitchen witch. And I like to paint theatrical worlds into life.

“So... what do we do? Do you know how to make a basic cookie? Damn it, that’s not going to be good enough, is it?” Lucas scowls. “And we’re already behind.”

“For argument’s sake, why do you even care? You don’t take anything in this universe seriously,” I say, glancing around the room. We’re the only people who haven’t gotten started yet.

He lets out an indignant huff of breath. “I’m naturally competitive.”

“Yeah, you are. ”

Ruby is looking in our direction and smirking as she stirs ingredients in a big bowl. She whispers something to Edna, and Edna laughs.

Across the room from me, Estelle from the Come On Inn stares at me and draws her finger across her throat.

Dang. Who knew that cookie baking contests would turn into a battle royale. I just hope she doesn’t have a set of sharp knives with her.

“Wait here.” Lucas stalks over to Carmel’s table and whispers something in her ear. She murmurs something back to him in a low voice.

As she does, I open the bag of flour, and the scent of it brings tears of memory to my eyes. I’m trying, Mom, I think. Please don’t worry about me too much.

A picture of my mother flashes through my mind, standing at her kitchen counter... wait, no. I’m remembering the McGillicuddys’ kitchen counter. And the woman isn’t my mother, it’s Mrs. McGillicuddy. She’s baking bread. I’m helping her.

Susie’s helping her.

And my dad—I mean Mr. McGillicuddy—is relaxing in the living room, reading the newspaper like he does every Saturday morning.

How do I know that?

For a long, terrifying moment I can’t conjure up a picture of my mother at all. I feel like I’m blind. When her picture appears in my mind, I gasp in relief.

Lucas walks back to me, holding two muffins. "Are you all right?” he asks, looking puzzled. I grab the muffin and take a huge bite. It’s soft and lemony and melts in my mouth. Lucas devours half of his chocolate chip muffin in one bite of his own.

“I’m fine. What did Carmel say?”

“She wouldn’t share her recipe with me. She says all’s fair in love, war, and cooking contests. ”

“That witch,” I gasp indignantly. “She works for you. She can’t get away with this. Fire her!”

“That seems a little much. She did tell me that the back of our flour bags have a basic cookie recipe.”

I pick up the bag of flour and start reading the recipe. Ruby catches me looking at the flour bag recipe, and smirks, whispering something to Edna, and they both laugh again.

“Oh, that’s it. I’m not dealing with these Geritol Mafia Mean Girl tactics. We are going to destroy them,” I inform Lucas.

He nods in surprised approval. “There’s my girl. What’s our dastardly plan?”

I gesture at the bag. “We’re making basic chocolate chip cookies. There is a best chocolate chip cookie category. Maybe this universe will throw us a bone and we’ll win.”

We get to work quickly, following the instructions, and a few minutes later, we’re spooning two dozen blobs of cookies on a sheet and sticking them in the oven that’s been assigned to us.

“Now what?” Lucas leans on the counter.

“Now, who knows?” I chew my lower lip. “Let’s talk about what we’ll do when we get back home.”

That buys us a few minutes.

“So . . .” Lucas trails off.

“So... listen, real talk here. How often are you having actual memories that should be Jasper Whitfield’s? Like when you knew about the spaghetti Bolognese. That wasn’t just a lucky guess.”

I glance at Lucas, and he gives a resigned sigh.

“You’re right. It wasn’t.” He nods, his brows drawing together. “It’s happened a few times. Okay, a lot of times. When we were walking by the grocery store yesterday, I had a flash of irrational rage because I remember the owner chasing me out of the store when I was a little boy, accusing me of stealing something when I hadn’t actually stolen it. I’d been mowing lawns and I saved up money to buy a candy bar, and I was so excited about buying that damned candy bar, and he ruined it for me.”

Protective anger swells up inside me. I remember how the people of Green Acres never used to give Jasper a chance. “Wow. Those bastards. I had no idea.”

Lucas shrugs. “You were one of the few people in this town who treated me right. That’s why it hurt so much when you—damn it!” He sucks in a sharp breath. “I’m doing it again. Those aren’t my memories. They’re Jasper’s.”

My stomach roils in dismay. He’s right. And I don’t remember how everyone treated him as a child, because I wasn’t here.

“You said you’re ‘doing it again,’” I say quietly. “So it’s happened before. During the daytime? It wasn’t a dream?”

He hesitates. “Yes. I guess. Has it happened to you?”

“A few times. It happened to me just now. I remembered baking with Mrs. McGillicuddy as if I’d really been there.” I shake my head. “I guess it’s just a side effect of being in this universe.”

“I hate it. Makes me feel like I’m not myself. I don’t know if Serena’s plan is going to work, Brooke. We could be in real trouble.”

“It’s working! We’re doing everything we should,” I protest. “We’re going through all the steps in the right order. I told you it wouldn’t happen overnight.”

“Our dinner date was a disaster, though, so it won’t even count towards the plot. We had to heat up leftovers at home,” he protests.

“It will count. In a novel, things rarely go the way the characters plan. If it did, the books would be pretty predictable and boring. It’s not so much what the characters want to happen, it’s what they need to happen. You did a really decent thing as your character—you went and apologized to Theodore. The book wouldn’t have filled in more chapters if we weren’t making progress.”

“I guess you’re right. So it’s okay if we screw up?”

“Absolutely. In books, as in real life, making a mistake doesn’t have to be all bad. It can serve as a valuable lesson and an opportunity for growth.”

“I sure hope so.” Lucas nods at our oven.

Black smoke is pouring out.

“Oh, shiznit,” I gasp.

We grab our oven mitts, run over, and open the oven. It immediately starts flooding the room with acrid black smoke.

“What? Why?” I cry out. “I did everything right. I even turned up the temperature higher so we’d finish before everyone else.” That was a genius move on my part. Or so I thought at the time.

“How high?” Lucas coughs. I blink. My eyes are watering.

“Like... 550 I think?” I start coughing too. There is so much smoke I can barely see.

The kitchen fire alarms go off. I can hear Officer Hernandez by the doorway, shouting for people to exit in a quick and orderly fashion.

Everyone is forced to file out of the room. Lucas grabs me by the arm and leads me to the door. My eyes stream, stinging, as we stumble past people glaring laser-rays of hatred at us.

I should be getting used to that by now, but it’s still unnerving to see little old grannies looking like they want to beat us to death with their walkers.

“Figures,” Henry mutters. “He’s not content to destroy our downtown; he has to ruin the cooking contest too.”

“That was me,” I pipe up. “I did it. I get all the credit.” He gives me a look of disgust and shakes his head.

“My parents would be rolling in their grave?” I suggest.

His lip curls up in disgust. “You’re never going to visit the theater, are you? ”

My face flushes. “I am. I’ve been pretty busy.”

He turns and stalks away, and a memory of standing on the stage in the front row, bowing to the audience, flashes through my mind. I am Cindy Lou Who, in How the Grinch Stole Christmas .

Except I never acted, never wanted to act, and these are not my memories. I shudder. Lucas is right. It’s a really unsettling feeling, experiencing someone else’s memories.

Two firefighters rush past us, carrying the sheets that bear our late, lamented cookies, which are now smoking black hockey pucks. The crowd tsks and shake their heads, giving us sorrowful looks, like they’re not mad, just disappointed.

“I expected better of you, Susie,” Henry calls out.

“Why, though?” I wonder aloud.

Everyone is allowed back in to get their cookies out of the ovens. The fans are on, doors and windows open, and we’re all blinking away tears from the smoke.

Fortunately, nobody else’s cookies were ruined by the fiasco.

We do not win, needless to say.

First place overall goes to Ruby and Edna, Carmel wins first in the chocolate chip cookie division, and that Estelle beeyotch wins “best original idea” with her little house cookies.

She smirks at me, too.

After all the prize ribbons are handed out, Lucas and I do receive a mark of distinction.

We are the first people ever to be permanently banned from entering the Green Acres Annual Cookie Baking Contest.

When we leave the building, Serena follows us out, shaking her head reprovingly. “So, not even trying—that’s an interesting approach. Really starting to like it here, are you?” she asks. She makes a tsking noise. “Didn’t you say your mother was a baker?” she asks me accusingly.

I heave an exasperated sigh. “Yes, and my father was a carpenter. Would you like me to build a chair for you? Because it would go about as well as my cookie baking.”

“Let me see the book. Did it vibrate?”

I frown in thought. “I was so busy trying to escape the smoke, I didn’t notice.” She flips it open, and she and I examine it. Another chapter has filled in.

We skim it, and she nods reluctantly. “Okay. I guess the humor in the situation worked. I could see writing the chapter this way. Please, though, guys, can you make a stab at taking this seriously?”

“You think we’re not?” Lucas, who has been standing nearby, splutters in exasperation. “We’re desperate to go home. By the way, are you starting to remember things as if you are a character in your book, and if so, why, and what could it mean?”

Serena goes pale. Her mouth opens and shuts. I’ve never seen her at a loss for words before.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She stalks off, heading back into the rec center.

“She was lying,” Lucas says.

“There’s a lot of that going around,” I mutter.

“What?”

“Nothing. Yes, she was lying. Did you notice anything different about her?” I ask Lucas. “I can’t quite put my finger on it.”

“Different? Let’s see... annoying, bossy, know-it-all, judgmental. Nope, that all tracks.”

I heave a sigh. “Maybe you’re right. All right, we’ve done enough damage for the day. Let’s head on home.”

We stroll slowly towards the McGillicuddy house.

“What do you think is happening at home right now?” I ask him. “I imagine there will be news stories about our disappearance.”

“I know,” Lucas says glumly .

“Well, we both went out on our lunch hour and then never returned. Maybe people will think we eloped together or something,” I sigh.

“So they’ll think we both lost our minds?” Lucas snorts.

“Excuse you very much.”

“Getting married is one thing. Eloping is another. But getting married and then ditching our jobs and not telling our families and friends just makes no sense at all.”

A wave of emotion rolls over me. “My mother has to be so upset by now. She’ll be talking to the TV news stations and begging for my safe return. Lucas, I can’t stand it.”

“Well, look, she’s your mother, so she’s never going to give up hope. And there won’t have been any signs of violence with our disappearance, so that will give her some comfort. And we’ll work through the story as fast as we can. When we get home, she’s going to be incredibly relieved.”

I nod to myself, blinking away sudden tears. He’s right. I have to cling to that hope and just keep on doing what needs to be done. We’ve got no other choice.