Before I can answer, the man himself appears in the hallway like a summoned ghost—arms crossed, jaw set, eyes narrowed in deep suspicion.
“I’m coming,” he says.
I pause mid-zip. “You really don’t have to come.”
“I need things,” he says.
That’s it. No elaboration. No list. No glance toward a pantry he knows is already stocked. Just two words delivered in the stiff, uncomfortable tone of a man inventing an escape hatch on the spot.
He pulls on his coat with unnecessary focus, like the zipper might reveal a better lie if he stares at it long enough.
Right. Sure. Heneeds things.
Translation: he absolutely doesnotwant to be left alone with a fourteen-year-old he barely knows, because he is convinced shemight combust, or cry, or ask him a personal question, or look at him for more than four seconds—any of which would cause him to self-destruct.
“This is because she’s fourteen, isn’t it?” I ask, tugging on my boots.
His silence is immediate.
Heavy.
And very much the most eloquent yes I’ve ever heard.
***
The bell over Miller’s Market jingles when we step inside, releasing a whoosh of warm air, the scent of soup, and enough whispered commentary to power the whole town through winter.
I barely manage to stomp snow off my boots before the first voice floats over from the bakery counter:
“Ava Dawson’s shacking up with the mountain hermit.”
I stop. Jax, behind me, stops harder. We nearly recreate a two-person avalanche right in aisle one.
“Oh, heavens,” Mrs. Parker says—the woman is basically our town oracle. “I heard she dragged him out of that avalanche with her bare hands.”
“Bare hands?” someone gasps. “She’s sturdier than she looks.”
“She always has been,” another adds proudly, like she once trained me in competitive avalanche victim extraction.
Behind me, Jax mutters under his breath, “I should’ve moved to Alaska.”
I elbow him gently. “Calm down.”
He looks anything but calm. He looks like he’d rather chew tinfoil in a lightning storm.
We navigate the aisles like fugitives dodging laser sensors, but the whisper network follows us like a well-meaning but extremely nosy ghost.
“They’re living together.”
“Well, what choice did they have?”
“Someone should bake her a pie.”
“Oh, absolutely. Maybe two pies.”
Jax’s jaw ticks so sharply I’m surprised a tooth doesn’t shoot across the cereal aisle.
We grab the essentials—bread, fruit, soup, coffee (for him), a bag of Violet’s preferred Spicy Soul-Healing Chips—and make a beeline for checkout. The teen at the counter scrolls his phone without looking up.
