Love, Death, and Baking Cakes

Chapter 4: David

My phone gently buzzes on the counter by my stove. I only used it for warming things up or baking. I really didn't like to cook. There is a difference between cooking and baking. Baking is a science while cooking is an art, I remember my father saying something about that a long time ago.

I was still reading the letter over and over again. It was real. A tangible thing. To be honest I didn't think that I would have made it to the show but then again, I think that they invited me to the show just so they could get rid of somebody easily especially without any experience like the others.

The buzzing turns off but not long after it starts back up again. Putting down the letter and getting up I could see my brother's profile picture popping up onto my phone screen. It was him and I when we were little and naive to the world. We were sitting on a beach. I forget which one but I believe it was in Florida if I remember correctly, maybe after we went to Disney World. We were in little swim suits matching, plain gray. They looked more like wetsuits than actual swimsuits that you could see some people wearing in the background. Sand covered our faces almost as if we just stuck our heads into the sand like an ostrich and pulled out.

Walking over to my phone I gathered it up before it went to voicemail again. I could see that this wasn't his first call of the day having missed around twenty. I swipe the little green phone to answer it.

"Hello?" I say waiting for the harsh tone from my brother from not answering him but instead I got his wife. Oh goody I thought.

"David, you little shit! Where have you been?" She shouts at me, making me pull my phone away from my ear. I placed my phone back to my ear once she was done yelling.

"First off language. Two, I was running errands in town and didn't back till a while ago. Why do you ask?" I lied to her. I hear her sigh before she starts to talk again. I brace for another yelling session to begin.

"Oh, but it's like almost midnight... Never mind you're an adult, just don't get anyone pregnant and I think we will be fine." She says not answering my question and this time not yelling through my phone's speakers. In reality it wasn't. It just turned eleven if my clock on my wall was correct. It needed batteries but I couldn't find any in my usual stash.

She was always like a sister to me, one that I never had. Yelling when I wasn't home before a certain time or trying to get me to be with someone that I really don't like. Usually it was one of her friends that I despised. I went on a few dates with some of them, most of them ending horribly. Not kill them horribly just they were horrible dates. Although I did think about the one that almost made me do it. She was annoying to say the least, everything that she did bothered me. Way to clingy, not that I don't mind clingy it was just too much. Smacking her lips every time she took a bite out of her food or chewing. The way that she acted with her long nails, tapping them on the table or the sound of them hitting her phone screen.

"Okay but you still haven't answered my question yet."

"What was that again?"

"Why did you call me a bunch of times?" I say twisting the question a little bit.

"Oh, Umm.... Why did we need to call David, again?" I could barely hear her question more directed towards my brother John.

"Ask him if he could help us set up the nursery."

"Oh yeah, could you help us set up the nursery?" She says repeating the question.

"Yeah, but when do you want to do it?"

"Oh um I don't know, why do you have to go somewhere?" She asks half jokingly.

"Kind of."

"Yeah, who's the girl?" She says with a small chuckle.