I waited a few hours before going downstairs again. This ti Tye was awake and on his phone so I felt more comfortable being noisy while going about baking. The cookies were marked as beginner friendly, and the ingredients and instructions were simple: cream butter and sugar, add eggs, vanilla and the flour and salt. That was it and after so scrounging I found a hand mixer in one of the cabinets and began to follow them word for word.
Tye didn’t make any comnt and barely acknowledged beyond a glance-up followed by a nod and then he turned back to his phone.
It didn't take long at all to make the dough, form it into a long log and put it in the fridge to chill. It also wasn't very long to clean up after, requiring only a few wipes of the counter and to put the bowl and mixer blades into the dishwasher.
Then I sat at the table with my phone. Tye once again only glanced up and then resud his phone activities. I noted he was being very reminiscent of Alisha, scrolling through ssages, typing, receiving new ones and repeating the cycle several tis before he finally put his phone down and rubbed his eyes.
“Do you know what ti Alisha will be getting back?” I asked quietly.
“Probably this afternoon,” he said. “No, actually she has more etings then… she'll probably be back late tonight.”
“Oh,” I said. That ant I had many hours of filling ti before she would get here.
“If you need to talk to her, you can text her. She just might not respond right away,” he said.
“No, that's okay.” I tried not to bother her when she was already stressed.
I went back to my phone and blinked at a new ssage from an unknown number. It was probably spam but just in case I opened it and read through.
“Hello, [XXXXXX]. Your mother and I heard you were doing quite well for yourself.”
An icy dread started to sink in as a second ssage loaded.
“We want you to co ho so we can talk about this.”
I put a hand to my head. Tye looked up and gave a concerned expression at the look on my face
“I'm okay,” I announced and stood to hurry upstairs. I caught a glimpse of him watching go but he didn't make a move to follow .
“How did you get this number?” I texted back. I didn't want anything to do with them but I needed to know for sure
“Our good child gave it to us when we asked. We heard you're prostituting yourself to so rich bastard.”
“No,” I answered imdiately. That was not what was happening. Even if Alisha and I were having sex it wasn't because of that that she was paying for my needs… was it?
I sat on the floor, my legs folding up awkwardly beneath .
“You can't lie to us. Co ho and we can talk things over. Your mother and I can be understanding.”
“I can't co ho,” I ssaged. “And I'm blocking this number.”
“[XXXXXX] don't you dare. We're worried about your well-being and your future.”
I ignored the ssage and instead blocked the number so there would be no more from them.
I was still left shaking. Sophia said she wouldn't give this number to anybody and I couldn’t help but feel the betrayal like a fist around my heart. I should block her number, too, but took a deep breath to calm down and instead sent her a ssage.
“How could you?” It was hard enough to type those three words.
I put my face in my hands. I was supposed to be done with this. It was why I left in the first place and as soon as I was starting to feel comfortable all hell ca crashing down again.
My phone vibrated and I looked down.
“What?” Sophia asked.
“You gave my number to Dad?”
Almost imdiately was her response of “No.” Followed by “I would never do that. I didn't even tell them I got your number.”
“But you did tell them you saw ?”
“Well, yeah. They were grumbling about how you were getting what you deserved, dying out on the streets sowhere so I told them you had found a place to stay.”
I hesitated. “What was the exact story you told them?”
“I told them that I ran into you at the grocery store. You were well dressed in nice clothes and looking quite comfortable. And that you had the new iPear and got in a very fancy car with so gentleman holding the door for you.That was it.”
My parents thought I was shacking up with Tye. I couldn't think of much worse than that.
“Okay,” I texted. “So uh, that dude was not my boyfriend or anything like that. TBC.”
“I wasn't sure. I thought you were into girls but I didn't claim he was or anything. What did they say?”
I debated a mont and then took a screenshot to send to her.
“I'm so sorry, I promise I didn't give them your number.”
I believed her.
“I heard mom in my room when I was taking a shower, that must've been what she was doing. I'll change my passcode so they can't get into anything else.”
“Thank you,” I ssaged. I finally slumped into a bit more of a relaxed position. I had been the dumb one. I never should've turned my number over to Sophia. Even if she hadn't ant it, she was still a liability.
I went back downstairs a couple hours later, having cald myself down and feeling like I wanted to distract myself by baking. The cookie dough would be ready now.
Tye was still at the table, though now he was boredly scrolling on his phone.
“Is everything okay?” he asked as I passed by.
“Yeah, everything's fine,” I said. I didn't want to have to explain to him the nuances of my family drama. “I blocked the number,” I explained.
“Okay. I won't interfere if you don't want to,” he said.
I shook my head. My parents, while not really good people, would not know how to handle an angry mobster at their door. It would only cause more problems and probably draw attention to Alisha’s business which I desperately didn't want to do.
Tye went back to his scrolling and I got the cookie dough from the fridge testing the firmness with a few hard pokes and approved that it had chilled all the way through.
It was then just slicing them into oblong circles and laying them out on the baking sheet while the oven preheated. I only sliced a dozen and wrapped the rest of the dough up really well and put it in the freezer so it could be used another day.
Once the oven beeped to signal it had finished the preheat cycle, I slid the sheet tray in and started a tir so I could relax but quickly found myself getting drawn back to the ssages from earlier. I wouldn’t let them make feel like I had to go crawling back to the house. I had chosen to walk away, consequences be damned and I was happier on the street, despite everything. Yes there were so uncomfortable things and yes there were a few incidents where n tried to follow down dark alleys but I had gotten by and it had been easier than staying in that suffocating, hateful place.
I sat at the table with a sigh, making Tye glance up again. There was that unpleasant anxiety building again. I’d already gone through the worst of it upstairs in privacy but still. I felt unsteady.
I went to my phone and scrolled on the internet looking at the pictures of the cookies I was making and blinked. An alternate recipe was checkerboard icebox cookies, which looked identical to the checkerboard sables Alisha and I had discussed earlier.
Maybe I could try putting so of those together next, if they weren’t really any harder than the ones I made today it shouldn’t be a problem and that would be a dream co true.
It was that thought that made realize how content I was here. I could be free. I could bake cookies simply because I could and I could take a bath in peace and quiet. When Alisha got ho we could cuddle up in the bed and read our books next to each other. My parents couldn’t touch here. I was over eighteen so they couldn’t force to go ho, and I told them I wouldn’t. If they were really desperate enough to change their numbers to get to , I’d ask Alisha to change mine and that would be that.
I smiled at the pictures on my phone and continued to scroll. This was a happy place, I decided. Yes Alisha was a mobster and there were going to be complex issues from that, but I was going to be happy.
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