Better With You (Better Love 2)

I release an exasperated, dramatic sigh. I’d rather spend five bucks on value menu nuggets and a pop, but I’ll splurge fifteen for half a pizza and a water. We’re in Chicago, after all, and we did just survive day two of the contest. I climb into the back seat and Riggs slides in after me. He tells the driver to take us to a place on Ohio and Wabash that I’ve never even heard of, and my stomach grumbles again.

“So, where you from, then?” Riggs asks after about a block.

“’Bout three hours south. A small town just off Interstate 57.”

He looks at me with a raised brow. “Did you transfer to Butler from UIUC?”

“Nah. From the community college in the same town, though.” I clear my throat and force away the tears that want to prickle my eyes. “The plan was for me and Brandon to transfer to UIUC after two years at the community college. But after he died, I couldn’t stay in that town anymore, so I transferred to Butler. Took on more loans than planned, but whatever.”

He’s looking at me. I can feel his eyes on the side of my face, but he’s not speaking. He doesn’t have to. I know what he’s wondering.

“Just ask it,” I say to my lap. When he doesn’t say anything else, I look over at him and hold his eyes. “Ask it, Riggs.”

He nods, his brow furrowed. “How did he... was it...?”

Suicide.

That’s what he wants to ask. Was it suicide? It’s what everyone always thinks, and as much as I hate it, it’s not an unreasonable assumption. The suicide statistics for transgender youth are harrowing. I shake my head.

“No. Brandon didn’t die by suicide. Though I was scared for him before we left home—shit was bad senior year of high school. If we hadn’t gotten out...”

I squeeze my eyes shut at the old fears that creep up. Unwarranted now, but my body still remembers them. Isn’t it strange how muscle memory can apply to emotions? Even years later, my body reacts to the fear and worry as if it were fresh. As if we were seventeen again and Brandon was right in front of me. All it takes is a song, a scent, a place, some unknown trigger, and suddenly the trauma is exploding before my eyes all over again, and I feel everything. I take a breath.

“When we graduated and left, things got better. We got an apartment together and he was involved with the LGBTQ+ Student Center. Outside of the toxicity that is our hometown, Bran was able to focus on making art and transitioning and being him.” I smile at the memory, but it quickly falls into a frown. “We both got strep throat. The health center told us it was pretty common for freshman students—all the new germs circulating in close proximity or whatever. Anyway, we treated it and thought it was fine. But he developed myocarditis. It was such a freak thing. And we didn’t even know until...”

“I’m sorry,” Riggs says softly, and when he takes my hand and gives it a squeeze, I let him. I don’t let go until we pull up to the pizza place.

We order a twelve-inch deep dish.It’s supposed to feed four to five people, but Riggs has already hoovered two-thirds of it. And here I thought I’d get to bring home a doggie bag.

It’s great pizza, though. I’m almost uncomfortably full, wondering if I can pop the button on my jeans under the table without him noticing.

“So, we’re going with Chum Chum, then?” Riggs asks after finishing up his pop. I nod. Chum Chum, also called cham cham sweet or chomchom, is a traditional Bengali sweet that is popular throughout South Asia, and specifically in Bangladesh and West India. From the recipes we’ve been seeing, it’s typically made by curdling whole cow’s milk and shaping the curds into thick cylinders, cooking those in a boiled sugar syrup, then rolling them in dried coconut, stuffing them with something called mawa, and topping them with a variety of things. We’ve seen recipes top them with pistachios, some with tutti-frutti candies, dried fruits, and, in our case, cherries.

“Yeah, I think that’s the one we should go with. It will be a little tricky because we’ll have to curdle the milk, and I’ve never even heard of mawa before, but the rest of the ingredients I’m familiar with.” I shrug. “And we can top it with cherries, so that’s a win for me.”

“I already asked the PA to grab us some of this stuff just in case. I’ll send an email to see if they can get us mawa, but if not, we’ll at least have the stuff to try and make it.” He pulls out his phone and starts typing, sending an email from his app, probably. “It shouldn’t be too hard. It looks like mawa is just coagulated milk. This says we can make it with milk powder, ghee, and a few other simple pantry items.”

“I’ve never used a cheesecloth in my life,” I murmur, mostly to myself, as I scroll back through one of the recipes Riggs shared with me. The idea of jumping into this recipe without any sort of practice makes me extremely nervous, especially with so much riding on the final product. The what ifs start circulating through my brain, and I’m a split second from spiraling into an anxious mess when Riggs sets his phone down and interrupts my thoughts.

“I have an idea.”

When I look up from my phone screen, he’s studying me with a blank face. I put my phone down and fold my hands in front of me. “Okay.”

“What if we go to my house and practice a few times.”

“We’re allowed to do that?”

“Yeah. That’s why they gave us the country on Sunday during orientation. We’re allowed to prepare, and that includes practicing the recipe if we need to. I’m sure a lot of the teams will have trouble finding a kitchen if they’re from out of town, but it says in the contract that we could even use the cooking stations if we wanted.”

My mouth gapes. “I didn’t know that! Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

“I thought you’d read the contract.”

I look away and shrug. “I started, but it was overwhelming, so I decided to take the contest one day at a time.”

“Well, lucky for you I’ve read it about eight times. We’re allowed to practice this recipe and whatever we decide to do for Friday, assuming we make it through tomorrow and get assigned the theme.”

Well, damn. Maybe I should have read the contract.

“Okay. So why don’t we just go back to the kitchen stations at the convention center?”

His grin is huge. “My mom is a renowned pastry chef, Barnes. Our kitchen and pantry are next level.”

“Your parents won’t care?”