Chapter 18

At lunch I handed out homemade cookies, to much acclaim and praise. After dinner, with my homework completed, I had baked cookies. I did them in batches of 6 as I carefully adjusted timings and temperatures with the new oven, until I had the exact data to create a perfectly baked cookie routine.

The Alexa routine started the oven and gave instructions for cutting out a dozen cookies and putting them on a tray. It then instructed when to put them in the oven, and when to take them out, and where to put them to cool. The final instruction before the routine ended, told when they were cool enough to eat, as well as to either start another batch or to turn off the oven. Dad loved it, because he could now bake cookies from my premade cookie dough in the fridge, all on his own.

I had three dozen cookies to hand out, and the only comments other than ‘thank you’ were from cute girls at the next table who wanted to know why they were square. I showed them a picture of the dough in the gallon bag, pressed flat, and one of them nodded and said, “That’s clever.”

“Thanks, it’s my Mom’s recipe.”

“See, I knew you didn’t make those,” one of the girls said.

“She died three years ago from cancer, I make them when I miss her,” I responded.

“Susie! You are so rude. Thank you for the cookies Sam,” one of the other girls responded, as another dragged Susie back to her table.

I could hear Susie making excuses, “Come on, you know guys don’t cook,” as she was dragged back by embarrassed friends, but I ignored it.

“Oh, they are also vegan,” I added to the two who continued to stand there eating my cookies.

“I’m Amber, and I’m so sorry about Susie and your Mom.”

“I’m Heather, just ignore her, we all have to because she doesn’t know how to keep her foot out of her mouth.”

“These are really good, would you consider helping the cheerleader bake sale?” Amber asked.

“Oh my god, these would be so perfect for our bake sale!” Heather enthused.

“It’s not until October, but we have such trouble getting vegan and gluten free items. It really would be a big help, so think about it Sam!” Amber pitched.

“I have no objections, how many cookies do you think you would need?” I said.

“You said one batch was three dozen? I don’t know, I’ll have to ask Miss Barnes, she’s the cheerleader coach. I could see selling these for a dollar each, and ten batches would make a big difference in our budget for the year.”

“Well let me know. I don’t know if I’m up to baking three hundred and sixty cookies, but I could probably turn out ten batches of dough if others were willing to bake them so they were fresh the day of.”

“Wow, that’s a great idea! I’ll let you know, thanks Sam!”

They tromped off, and I sat back down to finish lunch. At first I didn’t notice the stares.

“Something wrong?” I asked.

“Dude, you’re baking cookies for the cheerleaders!”

“I bake cookies a lot,” I said with a shrug.

“He doesn’t understand,” Mike said, “Nobody comes to our table, much less the cheerleaders.”

“They wanted cookies, as much as you did. I don’t see the problem,” I responded.

“Oh, no problem. I just hope it doesn’t get us in trouble.”

“Let me know if it does, if people want to be assholes, they have the right to be assholes, but they’re going to be assholes without cookies,” I stated.

The group laughed, and started joking, “No cookies for you!”

At Economics, I had the courage and chance to ask, “Is your name Elizabeth?”

“Um, yeah, why?” she said, giving me the you better not be hitting on me look.

“I thought so, my Dad mentioned you, but I wasn’t sure, because Mizz Kennedy always calls you Miss Gershon.”

“How does your Dad know me?” she asked, sounding interested.

“I don’t think he knows you, but he used to play football here at the school with your Dad.”

“Wait, are you to be one that moved in the big house across the street?” she asked.

I put out my hand, “Nice to meet you, I’m your new neighbor, Sam Atwood.”

She tentatively reached to shake my hand, so I gave her a big smile, and the firmest, most platonic hand shake I could imagine.

“Mr Tallman, next door to me, said your brother was going to be on the football team.”

“Personally I don’t care, but I’m sure he will.”

“Cool, so if you aren’t into football, what do you do around here for fun?”

“I mostly hang with the cheerleaders.”

“That’s cool, Ambers trying to convince me to make cookies for the bake sale.”

“That was you with the vegan cookies at lunch?”

“Probably.”

“I’m so sorry for Susie, we all heard what she said about you.”

“It’s not that big of a deal, if you want to punish her, just don’t let her have any of my cookies,” I said with a smile.

“The bitch needs to lay off you people, and the cookies.”

“Not sure what you mean by ‘You People,’” I said.

“You know, prison people.”

“Your Dad works at the prison just like my Dad does,” I told her, my smile dropping.

“Oh, sorry, no, it’s just that most new people who move in, do so because they have criminals for relatives.”