Noah frowns lightly. “You’re talking about Annie, right?”
She lightly pinches him in the side. “I was trying to be subtle.”
“I love you, but there was nothing subtle about that. Leave him alone and come bug me instead,” says Noah, pulling Amelia away as she tries to stare me into spilling my guts on her way into The Pie Shop.
Only when she’s out of eyeshot do I turn around and take off jogging down to the market.
* * *
—
I set a box of tissues on the checkout counter, followed by a box of cold medicine, a few various types of hot tea, and some random produce; and then let my eyes trail over to the town petition, trying to stop me and Annie from dating. So far, it’s looking grim. Three votes in favor （Mabel, Emily, and Madison） and over a hundred votes against. Why does that make my stomach sink?
I shake it off and look up into the most terrifying eyes I’ve ever seen: Harriet’s. This woman is severe and calculating at all times. And she really hates me.
“Hmm…cold medicine,” she says in an odd way.
I nod and fish my wallet out of my back pocket as she begins scanning everything besides the cold medicine.
Suddenly a scratchy voice sounds from the right of my shoulder. “A lot of cold and flu products there, William. Feeling under the weather?” Mabel. She’s everywhere.
“Uh—no, ma’am.”
“Then why do you need all this cold medicine, hmm?” says Harriet, lifting her brows to her hairline. “Are you planning to make drugs with them?”
I frown at the single box of Tylenol Cold + Flu Severe. “I think you’re thinking of the medicine that contains pseudoephedrine.”
Her eyes narrow on me, down to my tattoos and back up to my face. “You would know, wouldn’t you?”
This makes me laugh. Yes, my sleeve of intricate flowers and foliage paired with the butterfly really falls into the usual profiling for meth addicts. I wonder what this town, or the general public for that matter, would think if they found out I was the valedictorian of my graduating class. That I had scores so high and excelled at so many extracurricular activities （hello, science club） that I got into MIT. That I didn’t even go on my first date until I graduated from high school and decided I was tired of living my life to perfection only for it to still not help anything.
I look back at my younger self and cringe remembering how I thought bringing home straight A’s would help my parents fight less. That doing lots of extra chores around the house and taking care of my younger brother would remove some stress from them so maybe they’d actually enjoy being around each other. Yell less and smile more. Nope. Instead, I had zero fun in high school for nothing. The second I graduated, I hit a wall. I couldn’t bring myself to go somewhere and continue to work for something I didn’t care about. That’s when I joined the military.
“Harriet, what are you thinking? You’re being suspicious about the wrong thing,” says Mabel, pushing her way up beside me to put her hands on her hips. “The man isn’t trying to make drugs, you ding-dong. He’s trying to make love.”
“I’m sorry—what?” I ask, but Mabel isn’t paying attention to me anymore.
“Don’t call me a ding-dong, you old kook. And that’s even worse if he’s trying to make love to a box of medicine.”
I shake my head. “No—I can assure you both, I’m not—”
“Gross, Harriet. Not to the box. To Annie! The woman he’s dating. He’s clearly buying all this shit to take care of her because he loves her.”
“No. Again, I don’t—”
“That true?” Harriet looks up at me—trying to decide if I’m going to do unspeakable things to this box of cold medicine or not. I can’t decide whether she thinks that’s better or worse than doing it with Annie instead. “Are you taking all of this to our Annie?”
I sigh, really wishing I didn’t have to bring the whole damn town into this poorly thought-out decision to take care of my fake girlfriend. “Yes. It’s all for Annie.”
She hums as her lips purse tightly together. “I don’t really take you for a nurturer.”
“You and me both. But here we are,” I tell her in a rare moment of vulnerability.
“Just a minute, William,” says Mabel, disappearing into an aisle before returning with an armful of ingredients and setting them on the counter with a firm nod. “I’m going to teach you how to make her favorite soup. It’ll cheer her right up and get you a few extra brownie points.”