Page 153 of On the Breakaway

Avery points the knife at me. “None of this is funny, Grayson.”

I raise both hands in surrender, then turn away to hide the grin that spreads across my face anyway.

The next half hour passes in near silence.

I pour wine while she cooks and mutters obscenities under her breath.

At one point, she nearly drops an entire pan of something onto the floor. At another point, I catch her glaring at a sauce as though it’s out to get her.

By the time she finally sets two plates onto the table, I’m relieved. That is, until I take a bite.

When the pasta hits my tongue, I know something has gone horribly wrong. It tastes as if I bit into a garlic clove soaked in salt. It takes everything in me to choke it down.

I glance up to see Avery take a bite, but her face doesn’t change.

There’s no way she likes this. Right?

I force myself to take another bite, hoping it gets better. Across from me, Avery takes another bite and another.

I start plotting ways to get her to look away long enough that I can dump my serving in the trash. Before I have a chance to do just that, Avery sets down her fork and slides the plate away from her. She reaches for her phone.

“What are you doing?”

She unlocks the screen. “Ordering something edible.”

A laugh escapes before I can stop it, and she narrows her eyes.

“I’m sorry.” I cough out, trying to regain my composure.

“Pasta isn’t supposed to be hard to make.” She complains. “It was supposed to be a gesture.”

“I appreciate the gesture.”

“Not enough to eat it.” She says, eyeing my mostly untouched plate.

Another laugh slips out while I nod. “Not enough to eat it.”

“What do you want to eat?” Avery points her phone at me.

“Literally anything else.”

She snorts despite herself.

And just like that, some of the tension finally cracks.

Relief rushes through me when I see her lips tilt up. She locks her smile back down fast, clearly not ready to call a truce, but I can work with that.

She still came here. She didn’t hide, and that’s already so much more than what she would’ve done in the past.

“Can we get to the fighting part of the evening, please?” I ask, desperate to get whatever’s coming over with.

“Fine,” she starts immediately, already pointing a finger at me, “Liam is my friend. I am allowed to have lunch with my friends. And you have absolutely no right to be upset about that.”

That’s what she thinks I’m upset about?

She keeps going before I can say a word. “You don’t get to show up and act weird because I had lunch with a friend.”

“Avery.”