Page 12 of The Goat Next Door

My stomach lets out a loud, hollow growl, reminding me that my breakfast consisted of a single lukewarm energy bar at a gas station sixty miles ago.

The Gilded Goat has no food, no water, and a kitchen that looks like a filming location for a horror movie.

I need supplies.

Since I want to take in the fresh country air and clear my head, I decide to leave the giant rental truck in the driveway. The town center looked incredibly close on the map anyway.

A brisk, European-style walking tour of my new community is exactly what I need.

⋆ ✦ ⋆

Ten minutes into the walk, I realize that “country miles” are a completely different geometric measurement than city blocks.

By the time I actually reach Main Street, my leather boots are pinching my feet, my throat is parched, and I am sweating in places I didn’t know could sweat.

I push open the heavy wooden door of “General Store & Hardware,” a small brass bell chiming above my head.

The instant the bell rings, the entire store goes dead silent.

It’s like a movie trope, but worse because it’s happening to me in real time.

There are three people in the aisle nearest the counter: a middle-aged woman holding a bottle of maple syrup, an older guy in a camouflage jacket looking at fishing lures, and a young guy behind the cash register with a name tag that says BILLY.

Every single one of them stops what they are doing and turns to stare at me.

Nobody smiles. Nobody says hello.

The woman with the maple syrup clutches the bottle tighter to her chest, as if I am about to steal her sugar reserves.

“Hi!” I say, my voice entirely too loud and cheerful for the room. “Good afternoon! Just doing some light moving-in shopping.”

Billy behind the counter blinks at me. He looks about nineteen, with a sparse mustache and an expression of pure skepticism. “You the one who bought that farm place?”

“The Gilded Goat, yes,” I say, stepping into the first aisle and grabbing a red plastic shopping basket. “I’m Emmy. Nice to meet you all.”

The guy in the camo jacket lets out a low, gravelly huff and turns back to his fishing lures, muttering something that sounds suspiciously like “city folk and their damn titles.”

I chew on the inside of my cheek, my bright coat of red lipstick feeling like a neon sign that says TARGET.

I walk down the aisle, trying to maintain my breezy confidence, but the atmosphere in here is thicker than the mold in my parlor.

I can feel their eyes tracking me through the gaps in the shelves. At this point I’m fairly certain there’s already a town Facebook group discussing me in real time. Every time my boots squeak against the floor, it sounds like an accusation.

And because I am a manic, over-compensating stress-shopper, I completely lose control.

I don’t just buy a loaf of bread and peanut butter.

I buy a massive, five-gallon jug of purified water because the thought of drinking from the shipwreck-spigot makes me want to die.

I buy a twenty-pound box of premium goat feed, white interior paint, a giant bucket of cleaning solution, forty tubes of industrial silicone caulk, a caulk gun, a box of trash bags, and—because the old man’s words haunted me—three family-sized boxes of saltine crackers for Kevis.

By the time Billy scans everything, the counter is a mountain of heavy, aggressive modern survival gear.

“That’ll be one hundred and eighty-four dollars,” Billy says, his voice devoid of human emotion.

I slide my credit card into the reader. It beeps in approval. Billy packs everything into massive, incredibly heavy paper sacks, leaving the five-gallon water jug and the twenty-pound goat feed sitting on the floor.

He looks at the pile, then looks out the front window at the empty street. “Where’s your truck?”