A Very Merry Mess (Cider Cove Sweet Southern RomComs #3)

Elliott

ELLIOTT

The Luckson family room buzzes with excitement as James unveils his annual popcorn extravaganza. I stand back, taking in the sheer magnitude of it all. Bags upon bags of fluffy white popcorn line the coffee table, accompanied by what seems like miles of flavored powders in every color imaginable.

“Holy popcorn balls, Batman,” I mutter under my breath, earning a giggle from Ryanne beside me.

“James takes this very seriously,” she whispers, her breath tickling my ear. “It’s like his Super Bowl.”

I nod, trying to make sense of the chaos before me. Anna and Cosette stand together, chatting, while James, Rod, and Danny move around the counter, putting out labels for all the powders. Those are definitely going to come in handy. Ryanne’s parents are working on the hot drinks--spiced apple cider, hot chocolate, and a coffee bar. It’s a whirlwind of activity, and I find myself swept up in their post-church family traditions.

“All right,” James says, and that seems to be enough from the man who doesn’t seem to have a lot to say. In fact, he steps back as his wife eases away from her sister and to her husband’s side.

“The popcorn bar is now open,” Anna says. “I just want to remind everyone that it’s not a competition. You can make yourself a dozen flavors if you want. Or make a big bowl for others to try. Or just try the concoctions of others. It’s just popcorn.”

It’s so much more than that, but no one argues with her.

In fact, they simply surge forward, a line forming immediately. James steps back to the counter to open the industrial-sized bags of already-popped popcorn, and my mouth waters. “What if I just want all the butter and salt I can get?” I ask Ry.

“Then have all the butter and salt you want,” she says. “But how many times are you going to have access to powdered essence of truffle?”

“Truffle popcorn?”

She grins at me. “It’s not just a salty snack, Ell.” She takes my hand, and I find her so bright, so shiny, so much fun. I’m free-falling through space with her, and I don’t mind at all that there’s no ground beneath my feet. As long as I have Ry’s hand in mine, everything will be fine.

“I need to see all the flavors first,” I say, and Anna lifts her eyes to meet mine. “Can I just go around and read the labels?”

“Of course,” she says as she delicately taps a spoonful of green powder over a small bowl of popcorn. “I like making caramel apple.” She smiles and moves expertly to the next bowl of flavoring she wants, which is the caramel. It’s going to take me ten times as long to read all those signs, so I ease away from Ry, deciding to join the line last. Maybe then everyone else will have their preferred flavor and be ready to start the movie.

I guess that’s what the rest of today is: movies. Ry says sometimes they get into a real argument between them, as they try to come to a nine-way consensus about what to watch next. This year, ten-ways.

“I’m making a lime coconut,” Cosette says. “I love the tropical flavors on popcorn.”

I’ve literally never thought of that, and she’s made a big bowl for sampling. Others have too, and they’re set up at the end of the countertop, crammed in by the last little bowls of powders.

There are your classics—butter, salt, cheese, both cheddar and parmesan. Then we move into the more adventurous territory—ranch, barbecue, sour cream, onion, ranch dressing powder—condiments. I’ve had barbecue chips, but never barbecue popcorn, and I spy the Tabasco Ryanne told me her dad used one year.

The powders then move into the sweet territory. Chocolates, which are drizzle-able, come in chips or as a powder, marshmallows—which are teeny tiny little things that I can just toss into my bowl with my popcorn, and tiny pretzels. Maple, butterscotch, cinnamon, caramel powders and bits. There are mini M&Ms, and I’m not surprised one whit when Ry adds a scoop of those to her bowl, along with one of pretzels. She’s making a popcorn-style trail mix, which I find brilliant and just so Ry.

Then come the fruits, and there’s everything from passionfruit to dragon fruit to banana. I don’t even want to think about banana popcorn, and I move past the fruits pretty fast. The chatter is constant, punctured with laughter as everyone partakes in the merriment.

At the end, we get into the weirder stuff. Bacon bits. Cajun spice. Soy sauce powder. Rosemary. I’ve never thought of herbs going with popcorn, and now it’s all I can think about.

I want to make a sweet and savory popcorn, but I’m no chef. I can barely make toast and pour milk on cereal. But I think of my favorite things to order in a restaurant—pork chops and applesauce, orange chicken and noodles—and I want that with some popcorny crunch.

“Popcorn is a blank canvas,” James says when I finally get in line. He wears a smile and holds out the clear plastic scoop. “Take three or four if you want to make a tasting bowl,” he says. “Then it’s usually one scoop of flavoring per scoop of popcorn, but Ry does double.”

“Well, she likes her tongue to be tingling when she eats.”

“I like what?” Ryanne demands, but I only smile at her.

“You do like strong flavors,” James says in his even-keel way, and I take the plastic scoop and a small bowl.

After I put in one scoop of popcorn, I take another half and smile at him. I’m very aware of everyone watching me, and I carefully and deliberately pick up another small bowl and put in another scoop and a half of popcorn.

“What in the name of Colonel Sanders are you doing?” Danny asks.

I grin at him, and he’s holding a single bowl of popcorn that looks like he added six scoops of cinnamon sugar. Gross.

“Is it a one-bowl limit?” I ask.

“Have you made flavored popcorn before?” He grins like a cartoon animal, like I don’t know what I’m getting into when I dump a scoop of butter powder over popcorn and shake it all together.

“No,” I say. “How hard is it?”

“It’s not hard at all,” Ry says, coming to my rescue. “Didn’t I tell you not to listen to anything Danny says?”

“Nothing?” he asks incredulously. “ Nothing I say?”

Ry takes one of my bowls and slides it into the microwave. “You just heat it up slightly, Ell. Then the powder sticks better.”

“What did you make?” I ask.

“Chocolate-drizzled popcorn mix.” She whips my bowl back out of the microwave, and there’s no way that got very hot. “What are you going to make?”

“I’m going to do a maple bacon one,” I say, moving down to the maple powder. I add the real maple sugar too, then move down to the poor, lonely bacon bits, which no one has touched.

“Of course,” Ry says, and I take one of the plastic lids and cover the bowl, then shake it up and down, down and up, vigorously to combine all the flavors.

The moment I take the lid off, Ry dips her hand into my popcorn bowl and lifts a couple of perfectly popped pieces out. It’s barely touched her tongue before she says, “Mm.”

I smile at her, then take a bite for myself. The cheap, fake bacon flavor isn’t my favorite, and I say, “This needs real bacon. Or bacon salt.”

“I have bacon salt,” Grace says, and I turn toward her.

“Is it allowed to start over?”

Ry nudges a full bag of popcorn that hasn’t even been opened yet. “Gee, Ell, I don’t think we have enough for that.” Then she takes the bowl from my hand and opens a cupboard behind her. It’s got wine glasses in it, but she tosses my maple bacon popcorn in there and slams it shut.

“Ryanne,” I say, grinning.

“I’ll get the bacon salt,” Grace says without commenting on Ry’s disposal of my fake bacon maple popcorn.

“Here’s another bowl.” James hands me another small bowl with probably the exact number of popped kernels in it as the first one I had. I smile around to all of them, and Grace returns with the bacon salt.

“Real bacon,” James says, his voice thoughtful as I go about warming my popcorn and adding the flavorings again.

This time, when I taste it, the smokiness is less, and the offensive crunch of the bottled bacon bits is gone. “Much better,” I say, and I tilt the bowl toward Ry to try. James takes a handful too, and I can’t even imagine how much popcorn he tastes.

“It’s good,” he says, and for some reason I feel like I’ve won a major award to have gained his approval.

“I’m making you a buttery, salty one,” Ry says.

“Yeah?” I slide my second bowl into the microwave and tap the same button Ry did.

“Yes,” she says. “I know you want that.”

“I’m going to make a savory one too.”

She gives me an easy, soft smile. Something that tells me she already knew that, something that means we know each other well enough for her to know that. “I figured,” she says.

“Something’s burning,” James says.

I turn in a full circle, getting back to facing him right as he lunges for the microwave. “It’s this.” He pulls out my bowl, yelps, and drops it immediately. “Ow! That’s hot.”

I back up, like perhaps someone else snuck into the kitchen to make a bowl of popcorn, as all eyes come my way.

“I…thought I pushed the same button Ry did.” I look at the microwave, but it’s not like I can read the teeny tiny lettering on the small buttons.

“Sorry,” I say, going into full Lambert-the-Sheepish-Lion mode.

“Again, we have more popcorn,” Ry says.

“But it reeks in here now,” Danny adds. “Mom’s going to say something in three…two…one…”

Grace pops up from where she’s sitting on one of the huge couches, the TV in the living room already on. “It stinks,” she says, twisting to look into the kitchen. “Someone burned their popcorn.”

I surely can’t be the one person who’s ever done that, though in this family, maybe I am.

“We got it under control, Mom,” Ry calls. She hands me another bowl of slightly warmed popcorn and nods down to the sweeter components on the counter. “Go make your savory bowl, baby.”

Her Southern drawl comes out on that last word, and I sure like such a pet name—for me—coming from her.

“Okay, yeah, yep,” I say, feeling a little out of sorts. I face the row upon row of flavored powders, my mind a little blank as to what I was going to do before the microwave incident.

We go home tomorrow, but I wonder how many more things will happen that I’ll be able to label “incidents.”

Hopefully none.

Then I move down to the more savory flavorings, and I put in a half-scoop of soy sauce powder, a half-scoop of orange powder, and a whole scoop of lemon-pepper.

I put on the lid and shake, shake, shake, and Ry walks toward me with a tray with three bowls built in.

Two of them hold the popcorn flavors I’ve already made, and I dip my hand into the oriental orange chicken popcorn I’ve just made.

It’s not precise, but it’s pretty dang good.

“Can I try it?” Ry reaches for it without waiting for my permission, because she knows she doesn’t need it.

I love that about us—and I realize that I am dangerously close to loving Ryanne.

Her midnight eyes brighten, and she nods. “Yes, this is good.”

I grin at her and sweep my arm around her waist. I chuckle as I hold the bowl of popcorn out to the side as I press her close, close, close.

“Thank you for having me here,” I whisper, and then I don’t care who’s watching, I kiss Ry standing right there in her parents’ kitchen.

It’s sweet and over a moment later, but the ground beneath our feet shifts violently. Or maybe that change is just inside me.

Ry tucks herself into my chest, and then Danny calls, “The movie’s starting. Bring over all the popcorn and let’s do this.”

Ry looks up at me, and that’s when I see it—something has shifted for her too.

“Let’s have James try this.” Ry takes the savory popcorn in one hand and mine in her other. Then she leads me into the living room, hands the popcorn to James with the words, “Try that,” and then pulls me onto the remaining bean bag with her.

I have a very real feeling that I’ll go wherever Ry wants me to and do whatever she wants me to—and I’ve never been in this spot before.

It’s as terrifying as not being able to see, but I tell myself I’ve survived a skunk-spray and maybe, just maybe, I can survive falling in love with my best friend.

“Holy cow,” James says, because he’s not a Luckson and doesn’t curse in the name of Colonel Sanders. “Who made this, and what is it?”

“Good or bad?” Danny asks, already reaching for a handful of my oriental orange chicken popcorn.

“Amazing,” James says, and that’s how I know I’m not getting my bowl of popcorn back. “If you ever need a job, , let me know.”

Ryanne grins at me, but I just shake my head, despite the warm glow moving through me as Anna says, “I’m not sure why I can’t stop eating this. It’s funky, and yet…delicious.”