December 28th - The Kitchen
I spent the whole day in the kitchen. My grandmother taught me to knead the dough, to cut out the stars, to decorate them with colored icing. My cousins came by to peek, but my grandmother shooed them away with a wave. "This is serious business," she said. "It takes concentration."
I made twenty-four cookies. Twelve star-shaped, for the Dunphys. Twelve tree-shaped, for the Pritchetts. On each one, I wrote a letter in white icing. The stars spelled out: "Merry Christmas, Dunphy." The trees spelled out: "Merry Christmas, Family."
After they cooled, I put them in a metal box my grandmother had saved since I was a child. It had drawings of reindeer and snow, and a lid that closed with a metal clasp.
"Where are you sending them?" my grandmother asked.
"To Los Angeles. To my neighbors' house."
"And how will they get there?"
"I'll ask my dad to take them. He's going back tomorrow. He has to sign some work papers."
My grandmother looked at me. In her eyes was something—a combination of tenderness, pride, and understanding.
"It's nice to have someone to send cookies to," she said. "Your grandfather used to send me letters when we were apart. They were love letters. But cookies are tastier."
"And the letters?"
"I keep them in a box. Just like the cookies. The things that make us happy, we have to keep."
December 29th - The Delivery
Mark left in the morning with the cookie box in his hand and a list of instructions I had written on a sheet of paper.
"Leave it with Claire or Phil or whoever opens the door. But make sure it gets there today, before her punishment is lifted."
"Punishment?" Mark asked, confused.
"It's a long story. But it has to get there today."
Mark looked at me with amusement dancing on his face.
"You're in love, Leo. You don't have to say it."
"She's my friend."
"I know. That's why you send her cookies instead of flowers."
He left. I stood in the doorway, watching his car drive away down the street covered in wet leaves.
At two in the afternoon, the message came. It wasn't from Alex. It was from Mark: "Box delivered. Phil answered the door. He said it was the nicest thing anyone had given him in years. He cried a little. Claire hugged me. Luke ate three cookies before anyone could stop him. Haley said the icing was 'Instagrammable,' whatever that means. And Alex..."
The message cut off. I waited a minute. Two. Five. I was about to type, impatient to know what Alex had said.
And then the phone vibrated with a name I hadn't expected.
Alex: "My mom gave me back my phone. She said if someone went to the trouble of sending cookies from Oregon, they deserved a call."
Me: "Did you like them?"
Alex: "I haven't tried them yet."
Me: "Why?"
Alex: "Because I want to save them for when you're here. We'll eat them together."
Me: "They're going to get hard."
Alex: "It doesn't matter. We'll eat them anyway."
I fell silent. She did too. And in that silence, a thousand kilometers away, I felt there was no distance at all.
"Leo," she said after a while.
"Yeah?"
"The star tree. The one you made with the icing. It's good."
"I learned from the best."
"Your grandmother?"
"You."
She didn't say anything, but I knew she was smiling. I knew it from the silence, from the way her breath stopped for a second—just a second—before starting again.
"You come back Tuesday," she said.
"I come back Tuesday."
"I'll wait for you at the stop."
"As always."
"As always."
December 30th - The Return
The plane landed in Los Angeles at four in the afternoon. The sky was gray, but it wasn't raining. At the arrivals gate, my parents argued about who had parked the car badly while I looked at my phone, waiting for the message.
It didn't come. Because when I left the airport, she was there.
Alex was leaning against the terminal wall, hands in the pockets of her gray sweatshirt, her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail, and a smile that hid nothing.
"What are you doing here?" I asked, happy to see her again.
"My mom said I had to come get you. That it was good manners."
"Your mom brought you?"
"My mom's in the car. She said she wasn't getting out because it was cold, but to get in fast."
"Why didn't you send me a message?"
"Because I wanted to see you arrive."
She looked at me calmly.
"And the cookies?" I asked.
"They're in the kitchen. In the box. No one else touched them."
"Not even Luke?"
"Luke ate one. But I told him if he touched another, I'd tell his mom about the time he broke Grandma's lamp."
"And did it work?"
"It worked."
We laughed. And in the laughter, in the noise of the airport, in the people passing by with suitcases and hurry, everything that had been absent for a week came back at once.
Then we saw Mom and Mark coming with the suitcases toward us. Alex greeted them and told them she had come with her mom in the car, and that they would take us home. My parents, tired from the trip, thanked her for the ride back.
"Let's go," Alex said, pointing to Claire's car waiting for us in the parking lane. "My mom's going to get mad if we take too long."
We walked together. We didn't hold hands. We didn't need to. The distance was gone.
The system, which no longer recorded, recorded nothing.
But if it had, it would have noted:
Gingerbread cookies: 24. Stars: 12. Trees: 12.
Messages: 47. Calls: 3. Silences: countless.
Days without seeing each other: 7.
Days without talking: 2.
Days without thinking about her: 0.
The path continues.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
If you enjoyed it, leave a Review and Power Stones.
✅ Early access to 22 new chapters
Join LEGEN - DARY Level on Patreon
👉 https://[email protected]/cw/Day_bluefic
@=a
----------------------------------------------------------------------:
The cookies arrived. Alex got her phone back. And when Leo returned from the airport, she was there.
Claire came to pick them up in the car. Because it was good manners. Or because she already knew.
In the kitchen, in a metal tin, twenty-four cookies were waiting. The stars said: "Merry Christmas, Dunphy." The trees said: "Merry Christmas, family."
And Alex didn't eat them. She saved them to eat together.
What do you think of Claire's initiative to pick them up and take them home? Do you think those cookies will be hard when they finally eat them? 🍪🚗💙
Thanks to everyone who reads, follows the story, and supports with power stones. You're the reason this story is still alive and kicking! 💎🙌
Comment, follow, and support with power stones. 🏠🍪✨