Page 11 of Spicy or Sweet
Working in the culinary world with any kind of allergy is frustrating, but I don’t think I’d risk it, either.
“I don’t work with a lot of peanuts or pistachios, but I’ll make sure I have none around when we’re working together,” I promise. “Are almonds okay? I use a lot of them.”
“Almonds are fine. You know, I honestly don’t know how this is going to work. We work on completely different things.”
Does she think having a patisserie means I can’t bake? Granted, I don’t get the chance nearly as often as I’d like these days, but baking is where I started.
My siblings and I all grew up with a creative outlet. For Nico, it was wood—processing, carving, building. For me, it was baking. I spent every free moment in the kitchen, baking up a storm. I had more fails than wins in my younger days, but I loved it.
Georgie was always less creative than Nico and me, but she loved art. For as long as I can remember, she was obsessed with Paris—the galleries, the fashion, the patisseries.
As teenagers, we dreamed of opening a patisserie together. I’d run the kitchen; she’d run everything else. Now, I’m living our dream without her.
“I’ve worked in plenty of bakeries over the years,” I assure Noelle. “I’ll be fine with whatever they throw at us.”
Noelle doesn’t look convinced, but she nods, anyway. She eyes the cookies and cream brownie on her plate before grabbing it and gingerly nibbling a corner. Her eyes widen, and she takes a bigger bite.
“Shit. That’s good,” she murmurs, sounding surprisingly pissed off about it.
She pushes her plate away and stands. “Well, I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see what the network has in mind for us. I’ll see you when they want to meet with us, I guess.”
I don’t even get the chance to respond before she’s running out the door, like she reached her limit and can’t bear to spend another second in my presence.
Maybe not friends, then.
5
NOELLE
There’s something about seeing my whole family crowded around my parents’ kitchen table. It’s the same one we’ve had since we moved to Wintermore, and so many memories have been made here.
Rora’s first Whitten family dinner, when she was seven and I was eight, and we already knew we were meant to find each other.
Celebratory hot chocolate after surviving our first holiday season in The Enchanted Workshop.
Being surrounded by glitter and markers, making signs when Felix and his best friend, Quinn, decided to try football one year—and hated it.
Me and Rora staying up past midnight the day after we found out we would be hundreds of miles apart for college.
Rora and Uncle Henry telling us they were having a baby.
I love it here. This town, this home, this family.
Between the movie, the café, and Shay goddamn Harland, everything feels a little out of whack right now, but being here helps.
Of course, the movie is everyone’s favorite topic of conversation tonight.
A Christmas Wish in the Mountainsis, to this day, my parents’ favorite movie. It’s not that the movie itself is any good—though, by made-for-TV Christmas movie standards, it’s not bad—but what it did for our family. My dad says the moment he saw Wintermore on our old box TV, he knew that was where the Whitten family was meant to be. And he was right.
Needless to say, he and my mom are excited about the new movie. Technically, it’s a secret, for now, which means the whole town is pretending they don’t know about it.
“Doesn’t it feel like kismet?” my dad asks, rubbing the top of my head as he passes the table on his way to the fridge. “Our family toy store appearing in the very movie franchise that made us open it!”
“I don’t think you can call it a movie franchise with two movies, Dad,” Felix points out, but my dad is too happy to pay him any mind.
Felix didn’t protest The Enchanted Workshop’s involvement in the movie:
“Abigail says it’ll be great for social media,” he told us, and that meant he’d agreed. Whatever Abigail says goes in The Enchanted Workshop these days. As it should—Felix made the best decision he’s ever made in hiring his best friend’s sister. She has a knack for business that makes me wonder how nobody noticed it earlier.
