Dear Elise

Chapter 16

I thought we would be intercepted the moment we entered the kitchen, but everyone here seems to either know Sam, or be too busy to notice us. I get a few funny looks, but most people are in too much of a rush to care.
I watch Sam looking for butter in the fridge. She has to keep moving to let people pass, like some absurd dance, and I can't help but giggle a bit at her.
She looks at me with an offended expression.
"Hey, are you laughing at me?"
She dodges someone walking towards a beeping oven at high speeds, and almost falls over, catching herself on the counter.
She pauses to catch her breath before holding up a block of butter, laughing quietly, but looking slightly embarrassed.
"Well, uh, I got it."
I smile at her, and she smiles back. The exchange prompts my heart to do some sort of flip.

After Sam assures me that nothing can go wrong with such a simple cookie recipe, I let her beat the butter and sugar.
No need to show her how incompetent I am if it's not necessary.
As she works, she's talking about her life back home.
"...and I have two siblings, a sister and a brother." She grins. "I'm the oldest of us, and they're great kids. I miss them a lot."
The sincerity in her voice when she said those last three words was so strong it almost made me sad.
"You miss them a lot, huh...?"
She just nods, not looking at me. I can't help but wonder why she joined the Selection in the first place, if she had such a nice life back home. When she continues talking, her tone is almost back to normal.
"But it's okay. They have each other."
I lean on the counter, trying to glimpse her expression. "And what about you? What do you have?"
"You."
My heart does another flip.

Just minutes later, my hopes of avoiding actively doing any cooking die a quick and painful death.
"Come on Elise, you just have to measure out the flour. There's no way you'll mess this up!"
Somehow, I proceed to mess it up.

Poof.

I start coughing, as flour goes everywhere. There's a long pause after the flour settles, and Sam looks at me in shock. There's a pause as I look at her nervously, suddenly feeling very guilty. Then, to my surprise, she starts laughing.
After a minute or so I join in, and before I know it, we're both leaning on the counter and laughing so hard it hurts. I stop to catch my breath, but I catch Sam's eye. We stop, before taking in each other, covered in flour, and immediately start laughing again. Eventually we stop, gasping for breath.
"Ohh my gosh... Elise, how did you mess up weighing flour-"
Sam starts wheezing with breathles laughter as she tries her best to clean up the heap of flour and put the right amount into the bowl.

I smile, still catching my breath as I watch her fix the cookie dough and add the eggs.
"So, uh, what's your home like? You're a Four, right?" Sam asks. I glance at her, considering my answer carefully. "Well, yes. But we're quite well off, I suppose. And my parents are quite busy because of it. I used to spend time with my older brothers when we were all younger, all the time. But we don't really anymore, since they're usually busy with work or other things. In fact, we don't even really talk that often anymore..."
I trail off, and Sam turns to look at me. I smile at her reassuringly, hoping that she sees how little I want to talk about this right now, when everything's finally going so well.

It's as if I'd said it out loud. To my shock, she just sort of... accepts it. With a smile.
I relax as soon as I see tht familiar smile, and lean on the counter to listen to her talking about her home again.
She tells me that, although her family are Threes, her mother was a Five, which surprises me a little. It's not that often people marry up or down more than one caste.
I watch her finish off the cookie dough as she explains that her mother gave art classes after marrying her father, and she taught Sam and her siblings some things too. I'm interested to learn that she became interested in some art herself as a child, and I love the way her eyes light up when she talks about it.

I watch her put lumps of cookie dough onto the baking tray, still chattering away. Her hair has been put up quickly, and it's falling out of it's ponytail because it's just slightly too short to tie properly. Her shirt is old, the top two buttons undone and the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. Her hands and forearms are covered in cookie dough. She's focusing really hard on getting the balls of dough just the right size, like making the cookies perfect is the most important thing in the world right now. She is utterly covered in flour.
She's gorgeous.

About half an hour later, we sit at a small table, eating warm cookies. Since she finished telling me about everything, Sam's been quiet, and I'm fine with staying like that with her. I finally understand what a comfortable silence truly feels like. All I can hear are the sounds of people around us, and the quiet snaps and crunches of the cookies.

And that night, I can't help wondering what it would have been like if she had kissed me again.