Page 38 of Just One Chance
Listen. I’m sorry about the other night.
Delete.
I’m sorry I was a jerk when we talked about Tucker.
Delete. Delete.
I know I was out of line, but Tucker is a cheating jerk and he doesn’t deserve you.
Delete. Delete. Delete.
Please leave him and love me instead.
Delete. Delete. Delete. Delete.
David heaved a sigh and rubbed his eyes. He maybe shouldn’t be trusted with his phone on so little sleep. Before he could try again, another text from Avery popped up.
I’m sorry I was so defensive the other night. Thank you for answering Tucker’s wrist questions.
Funny they’d been thinking along the same lines.Don’t apologize,David responded.I was the one who was wrong. I shouldn’t have judged.He didn’t text that he also should have just kept his mouth closed and let her kiss him, even though that’s exactly what he was thinking. They might be having a very different conversation if he’d let the moment play out.
Still friends?Avery asked. He’d never hated the wordfriendsquite so much.
David responded immediately.Absolutely yes.
Chapter 13
AveryatedinneratMelba’s house later that day. She reread her text thread with David while Melba rooted around in her kitchen. “You want hot sauce?” Melba called from behind the fridge door.
“And ruin a perfectly good bowl of shrimp and grits?” Avery yelled back.
Melba shuffled back to the table, the open bottle of hot sauce in her hands, and dumped a generous portion onto her own bowl. “Sometimes I don’t know how you call yourself a true Charlestonian.”
Avery rolled her eyes. “Oh, whatever. Drowning the flavor out of your food does not make you more Southern than me.”
“Drowning, nothin’,” Melba said. “This here highlights the flavor. You don’t know what you’re missing.”
Avery scooped up a bite of the creamy grits at the bottom of her bowl, sliding them through the thick tasso gravy before moving the spoon to her mouth. Avery was a sucker for Melba’s shrimp and grits. Nobody made them like she did. Still, Melba usually only offered them up when she felt like Avery was in need of some life-directing wisdom or a swift kick up-side the head. Avery knew as much, but could never bring herself to turn down the invitation. She’d take Melba’s advice if it meant eating Melba’s cooking.
Melba nudged the skillet of cornbread toward Avery. “Try some. And butter it. I did something different and want to know if you like it.”
Avery did as she was asked, cutting out a thick slab of the cornbread and slathering it with the butter that sat in a crock at the center of the table. She took a bite, chewing slowly as the flavors exploded on her tongue. She looked at Melba, eyebrows raised. “Did you . . . why does this taste like bacon?”
Melba grinned. “Like it?”
Avery took another bite. Did she like it? It was maybe the best cornbread she’d ever had. Melba made it like she was supposed to—without sugar, in a well-seasoned iron skillet coated with enough butter to make the cornbread crispy around the edges.
“It isn’t the cornbread that tastes like bacon,” Melba said. “It’s the butter.”
“You put bacon in your butter?”
Melba raised her shoulders. “Just a touch of the grease. It didn’t take much.”
Avery’s arteries protested even as her stomach rejoiced. It was a good thing Melba didn’t cook for her all the time.
“So,” Melba said, leaning back in her chair.
Avery steeled herself for the interrogation she knew was coming. Melba was as predictable as the tides.
