LIVING THE DREAM I ONC 2024 [COMPLETE]

Seven: The cooking spree, the innocent freak and the confused intern

Mitchell was feeling bad.

She couldn't get Austin's crestfallen expression when she turned his offer to go job hunting with him down. He had nodded and awkwardly walked away, not even saying goodbye.
And to think that the person she had turned the offer down for had waken up and left the house without eating the wonderful breakfast she'd been so kind to make.

To drown out her frustrations, she made herself busy in the kitchen.

In the movies, cupcakes (or muffins) always made everything better with neighbors. Her plan was simple: she'd wait for him to return, go over to his house and give him cupcakes - and if he was nice enough to take them, she'd accompany them with a long speech about how sorry she was for turning him down.

Along with the cupcakes, she made spaghetti the way Hayley liked it, beetroot juice - mixed with watermelon juice as a substitute for sugar as Hayley normally preferred - and Hayley's favorite salads: tomatoes, onions, cucumber, carrot and lettuce dressed with vinegar and mayonnaise.

She was still looking through a list of top ten action movies - the ones she thought Hayley would love to watch - when a knock sounded from the front door.
Who could that be? They never had visitors. Ever. They had no friends nor family. They didn't usually get mail - they had nobody to get it from anyway.

By the time she made it to the door, the knocks had become more insistent. She took a deep breath and opened the door. And slammed it closed as soon as she saw who stood outside.

What is he doing here?

She had half a mind to run to her bedroom and hide under the bed but it was no use. He'd already seen her. And hiding wasn't going to make the situation between them any better.

"C'mon Mitch," the familiar husky voice called. "Let me in, please."

"Why?" she squeaked

"I can't be at Claire's. I need a place to be right now. Will you let me in now?”

"No!"

"Why not?"

I'm already feeling bad about not accompanying you downtown. And I had a whole ass speech prepared to apologize to you but you are here before I had time to rehearse it. "The house is a mess," she said instead.

"I don't care about the mess. Let me in."

She could picture him frustrated, pouting even. His crestfallen expression from the previous night when she turned him down appeared in her mind and before she knew it, she flung the door open and not a second later, Austin strolled into the house - holding a cat.

He looked around the house. "I don't see any mess."

Mitchell snorted. "Wait until you see the kitchen."

"No, thanks," he laughed. "I hate kitchens. Two reasons. One - I can't cook for shit. Two - I hate washing dishes."

"Too bad. I kinda did a lot of cooking today and the kitchen is a mess. Wanna have a cupcake as I clean? I can't stand having a mess anywhere in the house else Hayley-"

"Give me a cupcake," he cut her off as he offered himself a seat at a single seater sofa in the living room. Mitchell got him one of the cupcakes fresh out of the oven and watched as he took a bite out of it. His grin widened. "This is great. You do this more often? You should invite me over every time you make these!"

Mitchell fiddled with her fingers.
"Well, uh considering that I made them for you, I'm glad you like them."

He stopped mid bite. "For me? Why? Not that I don't like them, but why?"

"I was planning on coming over to apologize for not going downtown with you today."

"Oh, no. God no!" he shook his head. "I'm not mad at you or anything, I swear. I really understand why you didn't wanna come and even if I was mad, this cupcake wouldn't leave a strand of anger in my blood."

"You aren't mad?"

"Of course not. I'm really not mad."

Phew. "So, I'm guessing job hunting didn't go great?"

Austin took a second cupcake from the tray on the table.
"Yeah. And Claire didn't take it well."

"I'm sorry. You can always try again, right?"

He averted his eyes.
"Well, there is a printery that gave me a chance."

"Then?"

"The pay is shit! I'm not gonna work for six bucks like a little high school kid. I'm pretty sure the man was just pitying me or something."

"Six bucks?"

"Six bucks an hour! I didn't study chemical engineering for four goddamn years in university to get a six bucks per hour job!"

"Austin-"

"I'm not taking it."

It was quiet for a while as Mitchell worked on cleaning the kitchen and Austin ate cupcakes and fed some to his cat. Austin's mood had changed from the usual carefree self to more tense. After cleaning the kitchen, Mitchell gestured for Austin to follow her to her bedroom. Maybe they could watch a movie or something. Anything to calm him down and make him forget about his job predicament.

"Damn," Austin whistled as they entered Mitchell's room. "You have more movie posters than any lady's room I've been to. Not that I've been to many ladies' rooms but you get my point. Like holy shit, every single romcoms poster is in here."

Before Mitchell could reply, Austin turned his attention to the open laptop by her bedside. Unfortunately for her, Mitchell didn't keep a password on her laptop. She didn't need to. Hayley didn't touch the laptop unless they were watching a movie. And she had her own anyway. So, when Austin pressed a random key on the keyboard and the laptop lit up, Mitchell blanched.

And sure enough, he turned slowly and faced Mitchell, his eyes wide and mouth open.
"Yo- you write this stuff?"

Well shit. "It pays the bills."

"I- you- but you look so innocent. Like what the fuck? This is freaky shit. What?" Mitchell could swear that she saw drool from his open mouth. "But on a serious note, this actually pays?"

"Alot," she nodded. "But when I had just started writing on that site, I practically wrote for free. Until one book hit a million reads and the site offered me a contract. Still, it was like fifty bucks a month or something. It wasn't much but Hayley and I needed it. Desperately."

"Wow. What about your parents, if you want to talk about it?"

"Mum died giving birth to Hayley," she explained. "I was five when that happened. Dad died like a month or so later from heart attack, my grandparents took us in until I was like twelve and when grandma died, our step grandpa stopped caring."

"And it's been just you and your sister since then?"

"Yep. We lived off our parents' security fund till we couldn't. And I had to find a way to work and I studied, hence how I landed on that site and freelancing. It wasn't much but it has brought us this far. Can you believe that the first money I made from freelancing was five bucks?"

"I can't imagine all the shit you've had to put up with," Austin sighed. "But you're really brave. I actually think big siblings are just unrecognized heroes. I don't know how much Claire has done for me. In fact, now that I mention big sisters, I just remembered something," he added as he stood up

"What-"

"I'll be back," he walked out of the bedroom, Mitchell following him puzzled.

But they didn't reach further than the living room. Because right at the doorway stood Hayley, looking as confused as day.

If you can correctly predict what Hayley's reaction to Mitchell having a man in the house, I'll dedicate my next chapter to you.
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