Chapter 6 Cyanide Cookies
cyanide cookies
Lorien
“Lolo? What are you doing?” My sister’s voice is low and melodic.
And slurred.
This is not the time. I wanted a chance to celebrate with the one person who has the same stake, albeit without the same investment.
“Not much. How are things in the Keys?”
“Righteous.”
Yep. Stoned. And five or six decades past when her “spirit” was born. My sister, the hippie, living sixty years after her tie-dyed self would’ve thrived.
“Glad to hear it. Work is going well?”
A door softly clicks shut behind her and her voice rises from its whisper. “Yeah. Loving life. Hurricane season notwithstanding.”
“I’ll never understand how you chose a place that you know multiple times per year can be wiped off the map by Mother Nature.”
“Says the girl who lives in blizzard country and could die from frostbite or a snow drowning.”
Wow. Dramatic much?
“The high country maybe, but I’m well below that.” I exit, avoiding the house, and head to King Soopers. I’ll surely need wine after this conversation. Every conversation with her highlights our differences… our different-ness.
“A mile high is not well below.” She emphasizes the last two words of her sentence.
“Maybe not. Tell me about life in a place Jimmy Buffet thought of as paradise.”
“Don’t harsh my mellow, Lo,” she whines. “I miss Jimmy. That wound is still raw.”
Wrong decade, I tell you.
Wrong century is more like it.
What do I say when the sister I have exactly one thing in common with—my family—won’t talk about her home or her work and innocuous things like the weather and music set her off?
I rub my chest as I make a turn. My heart hurts knowing I’ll never have the sister I need, nor will I ever be for her what she surely deserves. Not for lack of love, but who we are doesn’t seem… compatible. It’s so wrong, the stress of trying to connect, instead of the naturalness of just being.
“I hate to do this, Sam. I’m getting another call. Will I see you next month for Strider’s fortieth?” The hope and excitement in my voice wavers.
“Planning on it, Lolo. It would be nice to all be in one place.” Her tone holds a wistfulness I’m not used to on her.
She’s a loner, an artist, carried by the wind—and apparently the storm surge—to the next exciting thing.
If she moved to a remote commune with no cell signal, none of us would be surprised.
How my parents dealt with daughters as different as we are is testament to their distraction with Strider’s health. He’s an electrician. Well, he owns the family business. I live firmly in the scientific research realm. And my sister, Samantha, is a watercolor artist.
I have exactly zero of her gift. Hell, I can barely paint my toenails without going out of the lines. Sam has never heard of lines.
Strider’s birthday should be interesting.
When I get home, I have the wine I hobbled through the grocery store to acquire, along with the makings of peanut butter cookies with the chocolate kisses on top.
I’ve got to stop baking for the neighbor next door—the married one, I remind myself—who shows up and grumbles while doing something uncharacteristically kind. That is, if you call poking someone’s eye out kind.
I have to stop, but last night was sweet especially since Liam Murphy is not sweet. Those thoughts shouldn’t be in the same sentence. Correction—those concepts don’t exist in the same time zone.
But he did take care of me. In the same manner a cat might… begrudgingly.
One last batch of cookies. He’s his wife’s problem after all.
My high from work and the low from my random conversation with my sister mix like the peanut butter and sugar. All I wanted was a moment to celebrate and somehow, I ended up in a conversation with someone who didn’t even ask how I am. On second thought, did I ask her either?
I take a large glug of my wine.
I made a huge discovery today. Life-altering for our whole family. Thanks for asking.
But my big sister is and has always been more self-focused, less self-aware than the rest of us. You can’t change nature, but there are days when I wish I could.
I add the egg and the salt and keep the mixer on autopilot as I drain my wine glass and refill it with a pour Sam would be proud of.
Strider was ill.
Sam was “ignored.” Her word not mine. And she looked for comfort.
I was the surprise they weren’t expecting. They never used the term “accident,” but they didn’t have to when I was nearly a decade after the youngest sibling and a solid dozen younger than the oldest.
He suffered.
She soothed.
And I had a childhood where they were out of the house before I ever hit middle school. It was like being an only child in that regard.
I’m not saying Sam’s an addict. I don’t know her well enough to make an assumption like that. But there are more times than I care to divulge where her speech is slurred or she’s surprised by information we’ve had in previous conversations.
To each their own. I can’t say much when I’m half a bottle deep and swirling in melancholy that would drown an empath.
I flip off the mixer and set down the glass, pulling out a cookie scooper from the utensil drawer. I drop perfect round balls onto the silicone liner of my cookie sheet and adjust the volume as P!nk croons over the Bluetooth speaker system.
I could’ve called Mom. But getting her hopes up would be the worst thing I could think of.
She’s lived on that knife’s edge for the better part of four decades—hoping, praying, fretting, begging.
The idea that I know we’re close without telling her feels cruel, but so does letting her know we’re close when it can’t save.
And I can’t know yet.
The timer dings, and I return to the kitchen only to discover I never put the cookies in the darn oven. Defending a dissertation is easier than this homemaker stuff.
I slide the cookie sheet onto the rack and reset the timer. Pacing hurts. Sitting has me spinning in my own thoughts. I need a physical outlet.
Nine minutes is more than enough time for an orgasm. I grab my trusty vibrator—the Cadillac version that works every time—and bail onto my sofa. The wine has me loose. The smell of warm sugar permeates the air.
I flip the device on and… relax.
Liam
I know better. I so know better.
And Jesus, Mary, and Joseph would be proud of my discipline. Because when Lorien Anderson wanders the hall back into the frame of the camera, singing feminist rock into her shiny, silver vibrator, it takes every ounce of my self-control to stop the feed.
The moment she grabs for her waistband, I know I’d be crossing the line from keeping her safe and secure, while enjoying a hint of humor and entertainment, straight into creeperville with a side of gross old man. Minus the old.
I’m not disgusting, but I’m no saint either. I turn off the mechanical equipment in the house… the fans, the cooling, and wait.
It takes less than four minutes to hear an ooh and the groan of an orgasm that is followed quickly by a giggle and “Oh God, the neighbors. Shit. The cookies.”
I’m sporting a semi. The cute little neighbor with the spine of steel is baking cookies, getting herself off, and worried I might hear.
I’m tempted to stroke myself and let her hear a real groan, but knowing her, I’d end up with cyanide cookies without her even trying.
When there’s a knock on my door, I adjust my dick in my pants before pulling on the door.
“I bake as a way of saying thank you.” She thrusts the plate of cookies into my hands. The cling wrap on top is fogged with condensation. “I’m hoping you won’t need to keep saving me and I can slow down.” Her eyes are soft and lazy as her eyes trail down my chest and lower still.
I clear my throat, unable to stop the smirk. If she keeps going, she’ll be able to see the barbell and neither of us needs that. Scratch that. I need a release. But not with the cute little neighbor who’s a terror with all things confectionary.
Her eyes spring to mine and lock. They’re sated and soft. The anger and vitriol she tends to aim my way is gone.
If this is her after getting off, I’m a fan.
“How’s your foot?” Turning away from the stoop, I wander toward my kitchen to vent the cookies. “Want to come in?” Why did I say that?
She doesn’t follow. She looks from my doorway to hers before standing a few inches taller. “I abhor cheating.” And with that, she’s gone.
And I’m left to wonder who she’s seeing and why they’re never around. Why was she on her own with movers on a Saturday morning? Why is she baking for me instead of the person she’s committed to? He should be protecting her.
Against my better judgment, I try the cookie. I know better. I truly do. I spit it out, but peel the chocolate off the top, hoping it can cleanse my palate of the taste that shouldn’t be in any cookie. It only half works.
My thoughts flip back to the girl next door. Why does she need a vibrator? Because she shouldn’t need that with a man who can read her body.
She wouldn’t need it if she were with me—that’s for damn sure.