Anything but Ordinary(47)

Bryce had spent an hour that way, calling multiple syllable words down to him and listening to him define them, catching his eyes on her when she looked up from the book and feeling her face turn red.

“Isn’t this boring for you?” Carter had asked.

“No,” she said, because it wasn’t for some reason. She liked to watch him think.

He stood on a mound of old rocks, his hand absentmindedly on his lips as he conjured the right words, his long, lean muscles running from one angle to the other in the most natural way, unlike Greg, who sculpted himself at the gym with self-conscious purpose. Carter looked like he belonged out here, like he belonged everywhere.

She did everything around him without worrying, without having to think about who she was hurting, without remembering every little thing from when she was seventeen.

Her phone buzzed again. Bryce rolled like a log over to the bedside table.

k. you have pancake stuff?

“Mom!” Bryce shouted upstairs.

“What?” she shouted back.

“Do we have the ingredients for pancakes?”

After a while her mother called, “Sure.” Then, “Why?”

“Carter can come over, right?”

When Bryce finally made it up the stairs—after a lot of sitting on her bed with no pants on, listening to the Beatles—she found Carter already explaining to her mom the science of pancakes that were fluffy on the inside and crispy on the outside. Sunshine hit the panes of the kitchen windows, leaving patches of warm light on the dark marble countertops.

Bryce’s mom smiled at her. Bryce grinned back.

Carter stopped talking briefly when he saw Bryce. She was still wearing his shirt, and had managed to put on pants.

“Um,” he said, looking at her. “Sorry, I lost my train of thought.”

“You were talking about how to make pancakes,” Bryce said, her eyes locked on his.

“Yeah.” He shook his head, turning back to her mother. “So…”

She saw he still had ink stains on his fingertips from taking notes with his ballpoint pen. He noticed her gaze and smiled, casting his blue-gray eyes downward. He had been in her kitchen before, but not like this. Not after she had had her lips on his.

“You ready to start, then?” he said, rubbing his hands together.

She smiled at Carter. “Hang on,” Bryce put a hand on her mother’s arm. “Is Dad here? He loves pancakes.”

“You’re right,” said Bryce’s mom. “He usually goes on a walk now, but—”

“See if you can catch him!” Bryce said hurriedly. Her mother bustled out of the room.

When she disappeared, Bryce hoisted herself to sit on top of the counter, inches away from Carter.

“Hi,” Bryce said. They were at eye level.

“Hello,” he said. He lifted his hand to brush away a strand of her hair.

“I didn’t know you knew so much about food,” she said.

They heard the footsteps of Bryce’s parents returning.

“…and I was just thinking,” Bryce’s mother was saying as they entered. “It’s been a while since I made them.”

“Well, thank you, Beth.” Bryce’s father looked at her mother, his tone light.

Bryce’s mother looked back at him. Bryce saw her pale pink lipstick turn up at the corners. “You’re very welcome.”

He sat down and spread out the New York Times in front of him as Bryce’s mother warmed up the griddle. She pulled out frilly aprons for herself and Bryce. Bryce was pleased to see hers wasn’t the one with the puffy rooster on the front. She hadn’t seen these aprons since she woke up.

“Want an apron?” her mom teased Carter.

Carter glanced at Bryce’s dad and said in a gruff voice, “No, thank you.”

Bryce and her mother giggled.

Carter threw himself around their modern tile with the same furrowed brow he got when taking Bryce’s blood pressure. He whipped pancake batter with precise strokes. He wiped his brow with one of their pristine white dish towels.

Things are better, Bryce couldn’t help thinking as she watched the batter fall into perfect circles. Her mom had started going for long walks in the morning with ladies from the neighborhood before she immersed herself in her work. Her dad had come home from Vanderbilt and gone straight out to the barn until nightfall, returning to the house with his toolbox and not even bothering to turn on the TV.

Sydney shuffled in at one point in long underwear and an oversized T-shirt that said OBEY.

She stood near the stove and stared openly at Carter. “Why is the hospital guy in our kitchen?” Sydney looked at Bryce, and then said, “Oh.”

“What?” Bryce asked. Was she blushing?

“You want to slice up some fruit?” Carter asked, and slid Sydney a bowl full of peaches. Bryce was about to make an excuse for Sydney, who usually only came down to get water, but Sydney just took the bowl and put it under running water.

“Sure,” she said. Bryce’s dad folded his newspaper over to look at his youngest daughter. Her mom looked up from the bacon in surprise.

“I like handling knives,” Sydney said to no one in particular, and turned back to slicing peaches with a quiet fury.

Twenty minutes later, Carter stood there, brooding, as the Grahams loaded their plates. “They taste like they could use a pinch of salt, but I can’t believe that. I measured it perfectly.”