Chapter Nine

"That's it," I say flatly. "I'm breaking up with you."

Levi doesn't even glance up from the table. "Well, we had a good run."

The two of us are currently locked in a flavor stalemate in the adorable little cake tasting room of Cassie's Cakes. The walls are decorated with gorgeous pictures of tiered cakes with just about every frosting pattern and color under the sun, and the windows are decorated with prism crystals that project rainbows all over the room. In front of each of us there is a lattice-print plate with five small rectangles of cake in lemon, pistachio, chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry, plus tiny bowls of different buttercream and cream cheese frostings. The idea is that we can mix and match them to come up with the ideal flavor combinations—not for the cake Dylan and Mateo planned out, but for a larger sheet cake we've had to get to accommodate the expanded guest list.

Leave it to Levi to somehow disrespect the entire institution of wedding cake by taking a shine to the pistachio cake and suggesting we don't have any frosting to pair with it at all.

"Nobody's breaking up with anybody until I get more of this caramel sauce in my mouth," says Sana, the phone she's been getting content with in one hand, a dainty spoon full of caramel in the other.

Cassie preens at the head of the table, where she's been holding court as we go through the flavors. The two of us see plenty of each other since our shops are so close, but even if I didn't, I could appreciate that not much has changed about her since high school—she's still got that sunny disposition, that bright smile, and those big blond curls that always reminded me of Bad Sandy in Grease .

"We make it in-house," Cassie says, pushing the bowl of caramel closer to Sana.

Sana licks her lips. "In that case, consider me moved in."

"You understand that frosting isn't just god's gift to our mouths," I continue to impress upon Levi. "It's what makes the cake architecturally sound . You ditch the frosting, you lose the very glue holding it together."

"If you did want to lessen the frosting ratio, they could consider switching to a naked cake," says Cassie, flipping through her cake look book.

"Do not entertain this dessert delinquent," I tell her.

Except the cakes she flips to are, of course, as beautiful as all the others we've seen pictures of on the walls. The edges of these are rough frosted with a thin layer so you can see the color of the cake underneath, and sometimes decorated with a few flowers on each tier. They've got a rustic, cottagecore feel that I know will appeal to Mateo's vest-wearing sensibilities. (I'd take Dylan's opinion into account if that opinion didn't start and end with "When can we eat it?")

"In fact, you might want to look into this option if you really are considering a beach wedding and want the cake displayed outside," says Cassie. "We could dye the cake with their original colors instead of the frosting, and you won't have to worry about the frosting sweating."

Levi and I worked out the final details for reserving a permit on the beach yesterday, chatting it over during my "lunch break" (read: shoving a scone into my mouth with reckless abandon before running back to the front). Mateo suggested the stretch just outside of Tea Tide so we'd have the space to prep and give guests an option to chill out inside, and the idea of a beach dance party made Dylan's eyes light up like a little kid on Christmas.

"That's actually not a bad idea," says Levi.

The way the sun has shifted, it's projected one of the little rainbows from the prism right over one of his eyes. I'm staring at it, dazed by the way it brings out the lightest flecks of blue against the gray, when I realize those eyes are staring at me and waiting for some kind of response.

"Oh. Yeah," I manage, turning my attention back over to Cassie. "I think they're set on the original design, but we'll run it past them."

She nods, making a note on the sheet she has in front of her. "Do you have a verdict on flavors for the sheet cake?"

"I came in hot on the chocolate, but I really like the lemon," I say, stabbing my fork into the last bite of mine and pairing it with the cream cheese frosting.

Levi considers his plate. "The pistachio, I'd say."

Cassie claps her hands together like we're two burgeoning cake geniuses. "Those flavors pair beautifully together. And with the raspberry in the main cake."

"I think they'll go for the pistachio," says Levi. "Dylan practically inhales trail mix."

I sidestep the audacity of Levi comparing Dylan's giant Costco bags of salty nonsense to premium cake and say, "If I know Mateo, he's going to lean toward fruit."

"Well, we don't have to decide that until the week of, so you can all talk it out and get back to me," says Cassie.

"Hey, you mind if I get a few shots around the shop and the exterior just so I have all my bases covered?" asks Sana, setting her phone down in the stand she brought and swapping it out for her nice camera.

This was supposed to be a much shorter and more casual affair, but Cassie reached out to me and asked if Levi and I wouldn't mind if she posted about us being in the shop so she could get more eyes on Cassie's Cakes for the new location's soft launch this week. Sana immediately tagged herself in, offering to take pictures of both of us and the new store for Cassie to post in exchange for a flat rate fee, which Cassie happily agreed to—she'd been looking to hire someone to take decent photos of the new shop, but hadn't gotten around to it yet.

As glad as I am that Sana's able to get a few extra bucks out of being our de facto stage mom right now, I am a little worried about the situation. The deal was that all three of us were going to get something out of it, and I know Sana's ultimate goal was to have time to work on her pitches. So far, all she's been able to do is sell pictures of us to a website and score this freelance gig with Cassie, and I'm worried planning this whole fake dating arc for us is keeping her too busy.

"I'm working my way up to it," said Sana dismissively when I brought it up. "When it comes time to write something Fizzle -worthy, I'll know."

I'm still wondering what she has in mind when Cassie pushes her chair out to stand up.

"Absolutely, that'd be great," she tells Sana before turning to me and Levi. "Here, you two can deliberate while I show her around." Then she leans in and looks at us with an extra gleam in her already-bright eyes. "I can't thank you guys enough for doing this. And I'm really just so, so happy to see the two of you together—I think I speak for most of our classmates when I say it's about damn time!"

Cassie follows Sana out, leaving us to marinate in the awkwardness her words left behind. I can't lie. Some old, undeniably smug part of me is glad to know that at some point in the past, people thought we might be an item. It's a relief to know I didn't just build up that old crush in my head. But it doesn't change the fact that we're now spinning a bald-faced lie about it not just to the world, but to all our old friends, too.

Levi cuts through the stilted quiet by plopping his lemon cake sliver onto my plate. I nudge my pistachio over to his, then add, " Only if you try it with some of the dark chocolate ganache."

Levi fixes me with a look not unlike a cat about to knock a water glass off the table and takes a deliberate bite of ganache-less cake.

"You monster," I deadpan.

He smirks at me as he chews, the kind of smirk that tugs at my own lips.

It's strange—with Sana and Cassie out of the room, the situation feels distinctly more couple-y than it did before. Not even in the fake dating sense. Like we're in a parallel universe where we really are just sitting at a table, deliberating over cake flavors like it's our own wedding. By virtue of this becoming Fake Date Number Two, we're both dressed to look the part—me in one of my few remaining un-chocolate-stained white shirts tucked into my high-waisted jeans, Levi in a well-fitted blue T-shirt that's somehow managing to make the blue in his eyes even brighter. We look downright color-coordinated, like our next stop is the engagement shoot.

Only then does it occur to me that Levi might have already done this. He actually was—possibly is still?—engaged, after all. He and Kelly might have already had this same bakery banter.

Before I can overthink it, Levi nudges my knee under the table. "How's Tea Tide holding up today?"

"It's absolute anarchy," I report, digging in on the rest of my strawberry slice. "I've had more people take my picture today than I've had in my entire life. And the Revenge Ex scone is flying off the shelves."

I only managed to sneak out this afternoon because I have the place staffed with just about every summer breaker we have on the payroll and stayed up most of the night prepping scones for today's bake. I'm sleep-deprived enough to take a nap on Cassie's floor, but that's fine. I'll sleep like a dolphin. One eye open at the register, the other conked out and dreaming about her absurdly delicious lemon cake. As long as we're making enough money to front the three months' rent, I'll do whatever it takes.

"I keep seeing it on the boardwalk. Everyone's out with their boogie boards and their Revenge Ex scones," Levi quips. Then his brow furrows. "They aren't giving you a hard time anymore, right? The people taking pictures."

I bite down a smile at the protectiveness in his voice. "Not so much. Revenge Ex has a much better ring to it than Crying Girl." I nudge my own knee into his. "Although your fan club wants to know where you are."

"Typing at a steady rate of one word an hour," says Levi.

"Progress," I say. Progress that's been slightly derailed by Levi pitching in to help at Tea Tide every now and then, jumping up to move boxes in the back or pull out things that need to be restocked. I keep calling him off, but at this point I think he's almost looking for excuses to avoid his screen.

"Maybe today I'll work myself up to two," he says, polishing off the last bit of his pistachio cake.

My lips curl into a smile. "I'm gonna have to steal her recipe. I can't believe I'm watching you enjoy a dessert with my own two eyes."

"It's mild," says Levi in his own defense. "Not so sweet."

"Hmmm," I say, tapping my fingers on my chin. "Almost like a scone , one might say."

That wrestles an exasperated smile out of him. "I've seen enough of your handiwork over the years to know most of your scones are giant cookies, June."

I put a hand to my chest in mock offense, hoping it covers up the faint blush at the reminder that Levi was keeping tabs on me. "A giant cookie? That sounds so unlike me."

Levi's lip twists to the side in the beginnings of a smile. There's a crumb of pistachio cake stuck on the edge of his mouth. I lean in without thinking, pressing my thumb to it. The instant the cold of my hand meets the heat of his mouth, we both go very still.

"You have a…"

I've forgotten the word for crumb. Or more accurately, forgotten how to speak. Because suddenly my brain has put me on hold, deeply committed to other thoughts. Thoughts like using the thumb I have on his face as an excuse to skim my fingers down the sharp line of his jaw and pull it closer to mine. Thoughts like leaving that crumb exactly where it is and pressing my lips to it instead. Thoughts like wondering what the rest of him would taste like if he let me give it a try.

Somewhere outside the room the front door to the bakery jingles open, and I pull my thumb away, the crumb falling to the ground with it.

"Thanks," Levi says, his voice unmistakably hoarse.

My face is so hot I'm tempted to fan myself with the cake look book. As soon as this fake dating thing is over, I'm going to have to take a year's worth of cold showers.

Sana sweeps back into the room then, rescuing my thoughts from spiraling any further down the Levi-shaped rabbit hole, and says, "Let's get a picture of you guys next to the display case that Cassie can post."

I look forlornly at Levi's leftover cake, then remember we're on a schedule here. I have to get back to Tea Tide.

"I have the updated contract on my computer, if you want to take a look before you bring it to Dylan and Mateo," says Cassie.

Levi nods and follows her out. I'm about to do the same when Sana collects her phone from the stand and says, "Oh, and if either of you confessed to any murders while I was gone, let me know now. Because I had this rolling the whole time."

My eyes just about fly out of my head. "Sana!"

She points a finger at me. "Honestly, this one's on you. Fool you once, shame on me. Fool you twice, shame on…" She waits until Levi's out of the room to waggle her eyebrows at me suggestively.

"Are you sure you want to work for Fizzle ?" I grumble. "Because New York is that way, Gossip Girl ."

Sana skims a hand down today's long French braid and settles it on her shoulder. "Go smile pretty for my camera. You'll thank me later."

We do just that, me warning Levi about the footage just in time for his cheeks to go pink as we're posing with Cassie's signature oversize cupcakes with blue sparkly frosting and a subtle "C" swirled on top. After we get a few standard photos, Sana tells us to loosen up, so I pretend to shove my cupcake into Levi's mouth. Then Levi abruptly does shove his own cupcake into my mouth, leaving us two blue-frosting-faced, spluttering messes when I commit to fully shoving mine back.

"This is it," I say, holding up blue frosted fingers at Sana. "The money shot."

Levi reaches back for a napkin to hand me and says, "We're probably going to have glitter on our mouths for a month."

I tuck away the thought about licking that off him too, just in time for Cassie to swoop in.

"Thank you both so much for this. Seriously," she says, hooking an arm around each of our necks and pulling us in with our mismatched heights for a seesaw of a hug. "I'm going to be slammed for the next week or two, but if there's anything I can do to help you out, please let me know."

She hands a bag to Levi, whose expression brightens. "Maybe you could talk to June about what it's been like to open other locations sometime."

Cassie's mouth drops open in delight just as my stomach drops down to my sneakers. "June!" she says, swatting my arm playfully. "See, this is why you have to start coming to our small business owner meetups. I had no idea you were looking to expand!"

"I'm not," I say quickly, but Cassie's already pulling out her phone.

"Let's get something on the books. It's been wild, but it's been a blast." She's on such a roll that I don't have the heart to interrupt her—or maybe it's just that I'm too curious to interrupt her. That a part of my heart is snagging on every word she's saying, part of my mind stretching to imagine it for myself. "I mean, you already know some of it. We started with the food truck before we opened our second location in Hoffman Beach, just to feel out the area—I'm not sure if you'd want to go that route, but either way, I'd love to spitball ideas."

It feels like a jack-in-the-box just flew open with all these loud, bright possibilities I've been trying to bury, and now I have to slam it shut all over again.

"I'm not opening any other locations," I say again, more firmly. I plant a smile on my face to try to soften the words, but I can tell from the way everyone in the front room goes quiet that it doesn't quite work. "I mean—I appreciate it. But we're just staying in Benson Beach for now."

Cassie nods. "Well, I'm here if you ever want to chat."

Sana dips out to go over the photos, and Levi and I make our way to Bugaboo in the corner of Cassie's parking lot. We're both quiet and a little tense, adding a layer of absurdity to the frosting no doubt all over our faces and shirts.

"What was that about?" I ask as soon as we're out of earshot of any other customers.

"I was going to ask you the same thing," he says quizzically.

We reach the car and come to a stop. "I told you Tea Tide isn't expanding. I was very clear about it."

But Levi doesn't budge. If anything, he seems to press further, crossing the distance from the passenger's side to where I'm standing stubbornly at the driver's door. "It's not as if sitting with Cassie would be signing a lease. It's just a discussion. So you could see what it might be like."

I shake my head. "I don't need to see it. I'm keeping things the way Annie wanted them."

"But it won't always be like that, right?" Levi asks. "Things are changing, and they always will be. Even this whole Revenge Ex thing is changing Tea Tide. The people who come in. The scones on the menu."

"That's not the same," I say, and not for the first time, I feel a pang of panic about that, too. About what's going to happen once this is over and I have to find new ways to keep the money coming in. "Everything that's happening now is just a blip before we go back to normal."

Levi's voice is low, almost soothing. Half of me wants to lean into it, but the other half is tensed against it. "Maybe," he says. "But it's still a change. A good one. And maybe someday down the line, you'll want bigger ones."

"You're one to talk about change," I snap, like there's been a rattlesnake uncoiling in my throat just waiting to strike.

The moment it comes out of me, I understand that I'm not just frustrated with Levi. I'm angry with him. I've been angry with him. I've just been so swept up in this—the hijinks we're getting into with this pact we made, the old rhythms of friendship returning, this new kind of attraction to Levi that makes it all the more enticing—that I've been pushing down the very real hurt from these past few years.

Levi winces, the hit landing harder than I intended it to. He takes a step back from me. "Kelly's a person. It's different," he says tightly.

My entire body goes hot with mortification. I somehow keep forgetting about the Kelly of it all.

"I was talking about your book, Levi, but good to know," I say, feeling rotten for it.

Levi ducks his head, looking down at our feet. "Right."

I take a breath and set the anger back aside. We have a lot of work ahead for the wedding, and we're getting along just fine. Levi will be gone in a few weeks anyway. There's no point in digging through the past when there's barely going to be a future.

"I'm sorry. I'm just—I'm sorry." I run my hand through my hair, unused to it being let loose out of its signature messy bun. "I know I might sound ridiculous. But the scones were a big deal for me already. That used to be something Annie and I did back and forth, like a way of keeping in touch while I was gone."

I can tell when Levi looks up and meets my eye that he had already caught on to that. Maybe Annie even told him herself. It makes it harder to have this conversation, in some ways, because it's the first time I'm having it with someone who understands the full history behind it. It's not Nancy asking me to shake things up or customers asking why we don't have specials anymore. It's Levi, who knows me, who knew Annie. Who understands that as objectively ridiculous as it is for a person to get this emotional about a scone, it's really just the tip of a much larger iceberg.

"I just—it took a lot for me to even do that. I don't even know if I will again," I say, suddenly feeling drained. Not just by this conversation, but by the past few years leading up to it. How I've felt so stuck, and even when I've known there are ways to unstick myself, the guilt of moving on feels worse than the guilt of staying in one place.

"But you might," says Levi, without any pressure. "All of these things you might do with Tea Tide—they're just something to consider. What'll it hurt to ask?"

Everything , I think. Because he may understand some of it, but not all of it. He was Annie's best friend, but he was never hers . Not the way I was. Not the way I was from the literal moment I was born, the way a sister can only ever belong to a sister, unique to any kind of belonging in the world. Maybe there was a day when I could have worn her down about franchising—a day when I came back to Benson Beach on my own, and we ran the shop together for a while like we talked about—but because of me, that day came never came.

I took her for granted when she was alive, and I can't take her will for granted, too. Not with something so precious to her.

Levi's eyes are still on me with a steady kind of patience in them that almost knocks the words loose from me, but I can't let them go. Maybe there will always be a part of me holding on to that old anger. A part of me that will always resent all the moments we could have been here for each other like this and weren't, because Levi was so determined to stay away. Because even when he tried to ease himself back in, it was only ever in half measures—short texts or abrupt emails that never made me sure what he wanted from me, if he wanted anything at all.

"How about this," I say. "We agree to leave each other's professional lives be."

Levi's lean body goes stiff. "What do you mean?"

"I mean you don't have to try to— help with Tea Tide." I smile, keeping it light. "And I'll stop pestering you about your writing."

Or whatever it is Levi's doing in the back of Tea Tide right now.

Levi works his jaw, and I see the beginnings of that almost-smile, the one that doesn't reach his eyes. Only just before it settles, something else breaks through—it isn't that shared understanding we had as kids, but a new version of it. One that's warmer, one that's softer. Like he's looking at the wall I just put up and tapping gently on it instead of walking away.

"I'd consider that deal if I had any confidence you'd keep it," he says.

I let out a breathy laugh that's part exasperation, part relief. I'm not used to this Levi. The one who doesn't let himself get pushed so easily away.

Levi leans back in. "I should have run it past you before talking to Cassie," he says. "Here. A truce."

He hands me the bag Cassie gave him earlier. Inside is a takeaway box with a transparent lid full of Levi's leftover cake from the tasting, plus an extra lemon cupcake he must have paid for when I was talking to Sana.

I tilt my head at him and see the gleam in his eye, and I'm not sure what possesses me. (Scratch that, I do. It's free cake.) But I bounce onto my tiptoes and plant a quick kiss on his cheek. So fast that I barely feel the heat of him against my lips, so fast that it feels like a drive-by.

"You know me too well," I say.

Levi looks almost bashful as he gets into the car, forgetting entirely to complain about getting squished in half by it. My anger feels slippery again, because he's here, and he's looking a little more like the Levi I knew every day—the one with those open expressions, with that unabashed, earnest energy that made him magnetic to be around. That made him dream up all these magical stories that colored so much of my childhood that it feels like we actually lived them.

And I'm not angry at that Levi. I'm angry at the one who came after him. Only sometimes it's hard to know exactly which one he is—old Levi, New York Levi, or something in between. Something brand-new, even. It makes it hard to know how to feel about him, because I still don't know what to expect.

I just know that I want to be around him. I tell myself not to examine it any closer than that. Maybe I don't know this version of Levi yet, but I know myself too well—if I follow that path, it's only going to lead me in the same direction it did years ago, and I can't let myself fall for Levi Shaw again.

So I hold on to all of it at once: the anger, the affection, the fun, the doubt. I can feel it all at the same time, and let it settle after he's gone. The thought makes my heart dip in my chest, but it doesn't make it any less true—if there's one thing in this I can count on Levi for, it's the part where he leaves.