She caught herself mid-rummage in the pantry.
No.
She would apologize and maintain professional distance. She would audit the well and nothing else.
After gulping down the rest of her coffee, she rinsed her mug in the sink and placed it in the dishwasher. She resisted the urge to rearrange the dishes already in there for maximum cleanliness.
After a quick stop to Melly’s room to retrieve her computer, she slipped on her shoes and trudged outside.
Honey made it exactly seven minutes before she meddled again. She’d been on her way to the wishing well, laptop tucked under her arm, and mind focused on work and only work. But as she passed the orchard, something caught her eye near the back of the barn. Thick green vines wound themselves around the body of a bicycle. A perfectly good bicycle at that. Her fingers twitched with the need to intervene.
It would only take a minute to fix. Maybe two.
She set her laptop down and crouched beside the bike, carefully tugging at the vines. The stems were thick and shiny, and the leaves were three-pronged.
She wiped sweat from her forehead and grunted as she wrestled the vine from the gears. She heard the small pitter-patter of little feet coming over, and she looked over to see Pickle’s approach. He stopped just short of her feet, bleated once, and stared pointedly.
“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Honey said, grimacing. “I was not meddling. I was simply…”
She gave the vine another tug, and something gave way.With a startled yelp, Honey toppled backward. She let out a small “oof” as the wind rushed out of her lungs.
Footsteps crunched over the gravel path. Marlene rounded the corner, her arms crossed, lips twitching like she was trying very hard not to laugh.
“Not sure you should mess with that, hun.”
“I’m not messing.” She groaned. “I’m just freeing a perfectly good bicycle from nature’s hostile takeover.”
Marlene snorted. “Some people need to learn the hard way.”
“What does that mean?”
Ethan rounded the corner, a coil of fencing slung over one shoulder, and immediately frowned when he saw her. “What did you do?”
“I don’t like the way you phrased that.”
He raised an eyebrow. When Honey didn’t say anything, he looked to Marlene.
“Don’t look at me,” Marlene said. “I try not to get in everyone’s business.”
That earned the smallest breath of a laugh from Ethan. “Fine. You two figure it out. I’ve got work to do.”
“I wasn’t doing anything,” Honey said. “I was just on my way to the wishing well?—”
“The well is that way. Seemsinefficientto come off the path.”
“Maybe I meandered over here to admire the foliage.”
“This is ridiculous. You’d rather risk doing injury to yourself than admit you were doing the one thing I asked you not to.”
“I was not meddling,” she shot back. “Besides, don’t you have work to do?”
Marlene made a lowooohnoise under her breath.
“Oh, please. You just can’t help yourself.” He got closeruntil the toes of his boots were inches from hers. Honey’s heart gave a traitorous thump.
“Marlene,” Ethan said, not taking his eyes off Honey. “You can go. I’ve got this.”
Marlene smirked. “Yeah, you do.”
