CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Kate
It’s almost time for the holiday break. Just two more weeks until the last day of classes, and I’ll be free to sleep in, eat leftover ham, and finish the cheesy romance novel sitting under my bed.
It also means Michael’s almost leaving.
He hasn’t said anything about it yet, but I know how this works. Community service hours end, and so does whatever… thing this is. I haven’t even written his evaluation yet. I was supposed to. I’m the supervising teacher. It was literally part of the agreement.
But I keep forgetting because he doesn’t feel like someone doing community service. He never clock-watches. Never drags his feet. He just shows up like it’s where he wants to be, and somehow, he’s good with the kids. Patient. Present.
It’s messing with my ability to compartmentalize. Besides, it’s not like he actually needs that evaluation. He’s just here for the PR stuff.
Right now, I’m sprawled on the living room rug with a pair of scissors and a paper strawberry factory forming at my feet. Tomorrow’s craft theme is ‘Fruits We Like,’ which I now regret choosing, because cutting dozens of symmetrical fruit shapes is an actual form of punishment.
I’m technically still in rest mode since I just recovered from food poisoning, but I’m bad at doing nothing. So now I’m snipping paper fruit and watching TV with Haley and Mom.
“Celebrity Check-in!” the news anchor announces with a very upbeat voice. The screen cuts to a montage of slow-motion red carpet clips, glossy smiles, and a background track that sounds like elevator music.
Mom barely looks up from her knitting. Haley’s flipping through a magazine. I keep cutting strawberries.
And then…
“Today marks the 30th birthday of basketball star Michael Lee,” the anchor says, as if reading a weather update. “Still currently under temporary suspension, the athlete is nowhere to be found. But fans all over the country are giving him well-wishes…”
My scissors freeze mid-slice as I stare at the TV.
They show a photo of him, probably from a press event. He’s in a suit, mid-laugh, looking like someone I don’t know. The Michael I know has his hair always tousled, and always wears clothes that are a perfect fit for bedtime.
“Oh, that guy,” Mom says, squinting at the screen. “Our neighbor.”
Haley snorts. “You mean Kate’s secret boyfriend.”
I throw crumpled paper at Haley. Before my mom can respond, the news anchor continues, “The latest we’ve heard from him is he’s laying low, somewhere, with an unidentified curly-haired woman that the internet has labeled his secret girlfriend.
” And then they flash that photo of Michael’s Instagram story where my hair was peeking out from the door.
“Oh my God,” I whisper.
Haley lets out a dramatic gasp. “You’re famous.”
“I’m blurry.”
“That’s soft launch level three, Katherine,” she says.
“There are levels?”
“Yes,” she says gravely. “Level one is a mysterious hand. Level two is two plates at dinner with one just slightly out of frame. Level three? Blurry features in the background. You’ve been soft-launched. Congratulations.”
I sink deeper into the rug. Mom finally looks up from her knitting, adjusting her glasses. “What’s the deal with you two? You’ve never been this… close to a guy before.”
“That’s not true,” I say, sitting up quickly—too quickly. “I’m close with Richard and Ryan Miller.”
“Because they’ve been living here since we were six. It wasn’t exactly over the course of a month,” Haley says.
“Ugh,” is all I manage to say.
I can’t believe it. I’m soft-launched on TV but all I can think of is how I didn’t know it’s his birthday.
I didn’t know.
I know the sound he makes when Polly says something that catches him off guard.
I know he likes the puto bumbong they sell at the local market.
I know how he crosses his arms when he’s uncomfortable, and how he sometimes says something too sarcastic and then immediately checks to see if he went too far.
But I didn’t know it was his birthday.
“You should bake him a cake,” Mom says, like it’s the most obvious solution in the world.
“That’s a little much, don’t you think?” I ask, though I already know I’ve lost this battle.
Mom shrugs innocently. “Then just one cupcake. With a candle. Small gesture. No pressure.”
Haley nods solemnly. “Especially if the goal is to make him fall in love with you and stay in town forever.”
“Stop it,” I mutter.
But the truth is, the gears are already turning.
I don’t have to do anything. I know that. He didn’t tell me. He probably didn’t want anyone to know. And I could easily pretend I didn’t find out.
But I kind of want to.
“Okay, I’ll see you later, family,” Haley says as she stands up and runs out of the door. Her rehearsal schedule is weird, and I don’t have the energy to ask her about it.
I stand too, taking all my crafting stuff with me, and I leave mom to watch the news about which celebrity cheated on who.
I’m not even sure if Michael likes cake.
I’m sure he likes cookies, though.
Now, to be very clear, I am not doing this because I like Michael. But it’s his birthday. And it’s not like anyone else in this town is going to acknowledge it with something that doesn’t involve a giant feast and everyone invited. I’m just being nice. That’s all. I’m a nice person. Who bakes.
For people in general.
Plus, he was really helpful to me when I got sick. He even made me that soup.
Anyway, I bake a cookie cake. It’s nothing fancy.
Just a large, slightly wobbly slab of cookie with crispy edges, soft chocolate chip centers, and a lopsided “30” in suspiciously blue icing I found in the back of the fridge.
(I’m choosing not to question the flavor.
Blue is blue.) It’s a little cracked. A little crooked.
But it’s… honest. Honest and slightly underbaked on one side.
It’s not weird.
What is weird is that I’m now heading into the backyard and grabbing the spare key Michael gave me that one time he gave me back access to his backyard. He included his house key ‘just in case.’
I stand at the shared gate and peer through the slats. Lights are off and the house is silent. It feels safe enough to approach, but I still tiptoe like a cartoon burglar.
Once I confirm that he’s really not there, I creep into his kitchen and take a second to be judgmental.
The fridge opens with a soft breeze of cold air and…
disappointment. Inside are stacks of neatly labeled protein meals, three sports drinks that look radioactive, and at least six different types of energy bars wedged in random places like edible Easter eggs.
Tragic.
I slide the cookie cake onto the middle shelf and pause, just staring at it for a minute.
I feel ridiculous.
Absolutely, undeniably ridiculous.
What am I doing? This is a grown man. He doesn’t need a cookie cake from the preschool teacher next door. My friends would laugh at me for even doing this. Or worse, pity me. That I’m too gullible to think he would even like this.
And then, to make me feel even more ridiculous, I hear a honk.
Peeking out of the window, I see a small delivery truck.
Two guys hop out and begin unloading what I can only describe as cake madness.
There’s a three-tiered fondant sculpture that looks like a basketball court.
One cake has his face printed on it. Another has sparklers.
Oh my God. Of course. Michael is a celebrity. He is clearly drowning in confectionery declarations of love and capitalism. My humble little cookie cake is practically a granola bar in comparison. I need to abort the mission.
Then a sleek, black pick-up pulls up behind the delivery truck.
And out steps Michael.
Michael, in dark jeans and a white button down. His hair is fixed and he looks like someone who really does live in the limelight. He looks like Clark Kent without the glasses. Superman without the costume. You get it. Definitely not a small-town resident.
I make a small, involuntary noise–something between a gasp and a squeal–as I hear him instructing the delivery guys to bring the cakes inside.
Inside this house. That I am in.
I panic.
I need a cigarette. Or five.
I sprint to the fridge, rip off the sticky note I’d written—Happy Birthday, Mikey (which already felt like an emotional risk)—grab the cake like it’s a smuggled artifact, and tiptoe back toward the door.
I make it as far as the front step before I hear a voice behind me.
“Um… hi?”
Behind me, I hear keys jingle against the table and the muffled voices of the delivery guys wheeling in the sugar monuments that made me regret my entire existence. I turn slowly, like I’m in a horror film where the monster is… really attractive. Michael Lee. Star athlete. National icon.
“Oh, hello,” I say, because I am nothing if not eloquent in moments of crisis.
He glances at the cookie cake in my hands, then back at me. “So either you’ve started robbing neighbors for their baked goods, or that’s mine.”
“It’s not yours,” I say quickly. “I mean—it was. But then I saw the truck. With the cakes. And I figured, you know. You had enough sugar. So I’m un-baking it. Mentally. Just pretend it never happened.”
The delivery guys finish with the cakes, and one of them even waves bye to me. Michael tips them generously, murmurs a thank you, and then turns back to me with the kind of look that is unfairly gentle and very inconvenient for my nervous system.
“So you broke into my house. To un-give me a cookie?” He chuckles.
“Not broke,” I say, flustered. “Key. Spare key. That you gave me.”
He crosses his arms. “Kate.”
I clutch the cake tighter. “It’s not a big deal. I just didn’t know it was your birthday, and then I found out on the news, and I thought—well, I don’t know what I thought, honestly. I’m just being nice. It’s a cake. A cookie. A cookie cake. Really, it’s nothing—”
I stop because Michael is smiling now. A full, stupidly charming smile that makes me feel all sorts of new emotions I’m not ready to even address yet. He looks down at his shoes. Then the cookie cake. Then he locks eyes with me. He’s still smiling. A very real looking one, too.
“I love cookie cakes.” He approaches me and takes the box off my hands. “So, if you’re leaving, please leave this. Because this is better than all that,” he says, pointing to four giant cakes behind him.
He slowly sets the cookie cake on the table. Then he turns back to me, rubbing the back of his neck as if considering something, before meeting my eyes again.
“Or, you know,” he says, voice a little softer now, “you could just… stay.”
The way he says it makes my heart do a cartwheel. It’s soft like a whisper, and I could almost hear a pleading tone. Though, of course, it could well be my delusion.
I open my mouth. Nothing comes out.
He steps aside, just a little, like he’s clearing a path I didn’t ask for.
“Just for a bit,” he adds, almost like he’s afraid to say more. “If you’re not busy. And if you’re not planning to, you know, break into any other houses tonight.”
He smiles again. Not that infuriatingly smug smile I’m used to. This one’s more sincere. And despite all the voices in my head stopping me, I do, in fact, stay.