“Annie, you can not be serious about this.”

I looked up from reading, “What do you mean? Of course I’m serious.”

Levi looked at me, his eye brow raised, “We both know that you can’t cook.”

I scoffed, tossing my long brown hair behind my shoulder, “How hard can it be?”

“Very.”

“You doubt my abilities.”

“Yes, yes I do.”

I slapped his arm, a smile on my face. He was right of course, I was a terrible cook, baker, chocolateer, anything that involves food and a kitchen; you might as well count me out of that equation. It was nearly Christmas, and every year my grandfather made his Butterscotch-Pizza-Pie. It was only called a pizza pie because its thinner than a traditional pie, but Grandpa Bex had died last year, it only felt right to carry on the tradition of making his pie. Even if I couldn’t bake, I had his cookbook.

I looked at it, it was old, the pages worn out, the writing barely intelligible, but it was his. I could smell the various spices that he probably spilled on the paper, the countless times he dropped it, how his hands would turn the pages. I sucked in a deep breath, biting my lip, and closing my eyes,

“Look, I know I’m not the best at this kind of thing, but Christmas is already going to be different without him, I want to make it as close as it used to be as possible.”

He smiled, “I know, I just don’t think that it would be a super fantastic Christmas if you burn down the house.”

I swatted at him, “Shut upppp.”

He laughed and I flipped open the book, it wasn’t long before I found the page. Out of all of them, it was the most pristine. He only ever made it on Christmas.

“Okay, um, there’s a problem.”

“Of course there is.”

I closed the book and faced him, spinning in my seat, “I can’t read the ingredients fully.”

He blinked, “Oh, yeah, that is a problem, that is definitely a problem.”

I scrunched my eyebrows, trying to concentrate, “I mean, I guess we can just wing it.” I hopped off the stool and went to the cupboard, pulling out flour, sugar, and salt. I felt my brothers hand on my arm,

“Annie, you know I love you, but that dish was going to be bad even with the cookbook, I don’t think, “winging it” is a good idea.”

I waved him off, “Nah, it’ll be fine.” I peered into the fridge, I’d probably need eggs, we were out of eggs. “Can you-”

“No, I’m not getting you eggs.”

“Leviiiii.” I whined.

“No, this is the fifth time this week that you have asked me to run around town for you, I’m staying in tonight.”

I groaned, pouting up at him, “Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease.”

“No!”

“You’re no fun.”

He laughed at me, I probably looked ridiculous, my arms crossed, bottom lip puffed out indifferently. He’d break eventually, if I ignored him long enough. It didn’t take long.

“Ugh, fine, I’ll be back in twenty minutes.”

I clapped my hands and jumped up to hug him, “Yay! Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

He peeled me off of him, “Yeah, yeah, okay that’s enough.”

With a sigh, he spun on his heel and sauntered out.

Levi.

She’s always doing this to me, like she can’t drive herself. I messed with my hair, the brown was fading back into blonde, I’d need to re-dye it sooner than later. I hated going into the grocery store alone. People always asked me if I was interested in buying a steak for the price of a microwave, me being a doormat, I find it hard to say no.

I was in and out quickly, snatching up a carton of eggs and paying quickly, ignoring the lady who stood by the door with a catalog ready. We lived in a small town, so traffic wasn’t terrible, though the snow was starting to come down fast.

I made it back quickly, we only lived about five minutes away from the center of town. When I walked through the door, the smell of burning food and smoke smacked me in the face, “ANNIE?!”

Setting the eggs on the table, I ran into the kitchen, and doubled over laughing.

She was hovered over the stove, covered in flour, the pot was smoking.

“What the heck did you do?”

I clutched at my sides, it was so funny that it hurt. She glowered at me, “Don’t you dare.” She wiped at her face, coughing harshly. I wiped away tears from my eyes,

“How do you blow up a pot full of flour, why did you even HAVE a pot full of flour!?”

“I thought that it told me to!”

“WHY WOULD A COOKBOOK TELL YOU TO DUMP FLOUR IN A POT?!”

She bit her lip, trying not to smile, “I have no idea.” Chuckling, she went to walk away, and tripped over air, falling onto her butt. She broke into a fit of laughter, flour flying out from under her and going in my face. I went to help her up and my feet slid out from under me, my hands went out to brace myself and when I picked them up, they were soaking wet.

“Ugh, Annie, what is this?”

She looked at the ceiling, “Um, it may or may not be oil.”

“OIL?!”

“A little bit spilled.”

I glanced at the bottle of vegetable oil on the counter, the brand new one I bought yesterday. It was half empty.

“ANNIE!”

The floor was coated in oil, I tried to stand, and just slipped back down to the floor. I groaned and started scooting myself along, trying and failing to get out of the kitchen. Annie continued to laugh, the smile on her face being the biggest brightest smile I had seen since Grandpa died.

Annie.

As I watched my brother slip around in the mess I had made, I realized, this Christmas would be happy after all.