Page 11 of The Baby Dragon Bakery
“Everything okay?” she asked, confused.
He blinked. “Uh. Yeah.”
They both stood in silence then. It was awkward, painfully so, and she hated this. She needed to get over her feelings for himimmediately; there was no use holding onto the idea of them, an idea that would never happen.
Theo looked at her carefully, as if he wanted to say something but didn’t know how. Her thoughts spiraled to the worst, embarrassment making her skin heat. He must have been considering how to let her down easily, and mortification shot through her at just the thought. She did not think she would recover from such a confrontation.
Thoughts frantically jumped around her mind until an idea broke through, surely inspired by Genevieve and her chaotic advice. But there was no time to lose. Theo opened his mouth to speak.
“Theo, I need to tell you something,” Lavinia quickly said, nerves buzzing through her. His eyes went wide with surprise.
“What is it?” he asked.
Lavinia looked over her shoulder, though no one was around. Even so, she leaned over the counter. He did the same, until they were eye-level with one another, their faces inches apart.
She gazed up into his eyes, which were a perfect chocolate brown, framed by criminally long lashes. She inhaled the scent of dough from his skin, momentarily distracted. Her chest ached.
“I wanted to talk to you, too,” Theo said, his throat movingas he swallowed. His face was white and he looked . . . nervous. Anxious. She knew that look; it was the look he got before he had to bring up something uncomfortable.
He was going to bring up last night. He was going to reject her again.
She needed to take control of this situation,fast.
“I like Calahan,” she blurted out.
Theo’s mouth jutted open. He blinked. “Oh?”
“Yeah. I have for a bit now.” (A bitbeing five minutes.) “And I don’t know what to do!”
He stood utterly still, unmoving. Slowly, his eyebrows furrowed, first with confusion, then with a deeper emotion as his lips turned down into a frown.
He looked upset.
Oh god.He was probably upset because she said she had liked Calahan for a bit and she was only telling him now. She always told him everything the moment it happened.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ears.
He moved back, snapping his mouth shut. He worked his jaw, eyebrows still crinkled. He was very quiet, and she could see his mind working as he processed this information.
Then, strangely, his hand went to his front pocket, as if to pull something out. She saw the imprint of his hand curl into a fist, but when he removed it from his pocket, his hand was empty.
Theo took a deep breath, a determined expression on his face. “So. What’s the plan?”
Now it was Lavinia’s turn to go quiet. Her eye twitched.
It was their usual line, whenever one of them liked someonein the past; they always helped the other figure out how to get together. But it had been some time since Lavinia had liked someone and told Theo about it—she hadn’t realized that if she told him she liked Calahan, this would be his response.
But of course it would be. He was her best friend. She was so stupid! She hadn’t considered what a precarious situation this would become.
She felt like throwing up, but that might have been due to the three coffees she’d had today.
It was too late to turn back now.
And that was how Lavinia found herself enlisting the help of her best friend (who she had feelings for) to help her get with someone else (to get over aforementioned feelings).
Which wouldn’t be complicated. Or messy. And that wasn’t a bad idea.
Not at all.
