THE LANDLORD (BBANGSAZ)

Chapter 10

MINJI

Hanni sucked in a sharp inhale as she walked into my kitchen, staring wide-eyed at the cut on my hand. "Minji, oh my God, what happened?"

"It's fine; it's fine. I was just trying to make cookies," I said, grabbing a fistful of paper towels to soak up the blood. Applying pressure to the cut, I raised my hand in the air above my heart. "See? All better."

"But there's no step in a cookie recipe that requires a knife," she exclaimed, dropping her purse on the counter and looking around to figure out what went wrong. "Were you trying to cut open an eggshell?"

To be fair, my hand was bleeding profusely, but it felt a little like she was overreacting. Still, watching her freak out over my well-being was kind of sexy.

"Listen, when I asked for your help with Jia's preschool bake sale, I wasn't looking for any of your judgment," I said, raising my eyebrows at her. "Clearly, the cookies are a bust."

"When I agreed to help you, I didn't realize you were so helpless," she said, placing her hands on her hips as she surveyed the ingredients lined up on the counter. She began sorting through them all, separating the dry ingredients from the wet, before clapping her hands and looking at me triumphantly.

"I figured it out!" she said, beaming at me as she tied an apron around her waist.

"Did you bring your own apron?" I chuckled. This woman is something else.

"I'm choosing to ignore your mockery. I've decided to make a pie instead," she replied, cutting butter into a bowl.

"What are you doing here?" Jia asked Hanni, walking into the kitchen from the backyard, where she'd been playing outside.

"Jia, be nice to our neighbor. Hanni's here to help," I said, raising an eyebrow at my daughter as I gathered first-aid supplies for myself.

"No, it's fine. That's a fair question." Hanni smiled, brushing her hair out of her face with the back of her hand. "Well, Jia, I'm here to help with your bake sale. Your dada was trying to make cookies, but she couldn't quite figure it out. So now I'm making a pie."

Jia nodded, looking over at me before turning and watching Hanni measure out a cup of flour and pour it over the cold butter. "Does pie have gluten in it?" Jia asked, scrunching up her nose.

"Not this one," Hanni replied, turning the label on the sack of flour so Jia could see it. "I'm using gluten-free flour for the crust, so it won't upset your tummy. Or mine," she said with a wink.

Jia smiled and climbed up onto one of the bar stools at the counter to watch Hanni more closely. Hanni worked the flour and butter together, making sure to stand a little to the side so that Jia could see what she was doing. Hanni cracked an egg over the crumbly dough, mixing it together even more before turning to give Jia a long, measured look.

"Hey, Jia, do you think you could help me?" she asked.

Jia's eyes widened as she nodded.

"Make sure you wash your hands first," I said as Jia clambered down from the stool. She quickly made a beeline to the guest bathroom.

"Is that okay?" Hanni turned to me. "I guess I should have checked with you first before asking Jia. She just looked so interested. Plus, I figured it'd be good to have her finally forget about that whole adult-time thing once and for all. Give her a new memory to replace that one."

We both laughed.

"It's more than okay," I said. "I'm just hoping she didn't inherit my baking skills—or lack thereof."