Chapter 12, OR What to Expect When You’re Expecting (A Regency Dance That Is)
The vibes this chapter ...
The rookies vibrated with the force of barely-contained pride, as George assigned Max to pastry.
This was possibly the most fatal decision the kitchen had ever seen.
“Here,” George said, pushing a bowl of flour into Max’s hands. “Sift this.”
Max took the bowl and stared at it like it was a coded puzzle.
“Sift,” he repeated slowly.
Gabi raised a hand. “Do you… know how to sift?”
Max narrowed his eyes. “One pours the flour through a mesh apparatus at controlled velocity. Yes.”
“Okay,” Gabi said. “Dominant race-brain answer but I’ll allow it.”
Max curled his fingers around the handle of the sifter, and then it happened -
The flour erupted, like a winter storm … or more like God punched a bakery.
Kimi shrieked.
Liam choked.
Ollie yelled “COVER ME BOYS!”
Gabi dove for his notebook like it was a drowning child.
Isack fell backwards in pure betrayal.
Max stood in the middle of a white cloud, blinking. He looked like a ghost, an incredibly distressed ghost.
George screamed, “MY CLEAN TABLES!”
Max wiped his face with the back of his wrist, leaving a streak of white war paint, and the rookies braced for the explosion.
But Max didn’t explode. He stared at his hand, at the flour, at the chaos,
A short, startled burst that shook the room, and then another, and then a real laugh - deep, warm, unrestrained - the kind he hadn’t made in years.
The rookies froze, then grinned, then dissolved into hysterics.
Kimi threw flour in the air in triumph.
Isack slid across the table like a hockey puck.
Ollie ran in circles screaming, “HE LAUGHED! HE LAUGHED!”
Liam slapped his butter-knife edge against the counter in applause.
Gabi wrote furiously and then drew a portrait to match.
George clutched the edge of the sink like a Victorian widow.
“Don’t throw flour,” he wheezed. “Do not -- stop -- everyone STOP !!!! ”
The castle pulsed in bright affection, and Max, still dusted in flour, wiped his eyes and said softly, “Okay. Again, but properly this time.”
The rookies nearly fainted from joy.
