Page 23 of Love Bites

“We are falling for each other,” she had whimsically told me the day of the cat breakout-slash-morning of utter shame. “He is not a toad, and therefore open for romancing.”

“But…but…but…” I’d stammered, coated in cat fur, confectioners’ sugar, and the evidence of my wild night of betrayal. “He’s working with the Braunings to gather information to sink us. You said so. You said they were spies.”

She reapplied her lipstick, tied the yellow shawl that Phillip had bought her around her shoulders, and had then patted my cheek.

“Perhaps they are not. Perhaps what I hold against King Toad has soured my thinking to all those who toil under the blighted lowlife.” My mouth fell open. Crocus and the guys were sipping coffee in the office, eyes wide, ears open even wider. It had been a morning. Bathing three cats is always fun, said no one ever. “I will be gone for the day. Edgar and I are driving to Portsmouth for a tea blending class. We may take a room there so I will be returning late tomorrow afternoon.”

“But we have orders for the Founders Day event coming in.”

“Yes, mon petit, and you are more than capable of handling them. Perhaps you could ask Phillip to lend a hand. Rumor has it he is very familiar with our shop and kitchen. Au revoir!”

And out of the door she had sailed. I had spun and glowered at my manager. Crocus was the only one who had witnessed Phillip in my bed. He gulped down his coffee then herded the other men into the back. A wise move. I had been exhausted, sore in highly personal spots, and covered with fine white sugar, cat dander, and body fluids. Instead of yelling at my workers, I’d gone upstairs to shower under the dark glare of three damp cats.

That was four days ago. And still everything seemed upside-down. Ryan and I had barely spoken to each other since that odd blowup a few days ago. Now, because I wasthisclose to losing my shit over everything and nothing, I left the shop in Crocus and Mamie’s hands to go spend a few hours with Ryan, Sam, and Conor. My nerves were frayed like an old throw rug. Sleep was a distant memory. Every time I closed my eyes I saw either the mound of bills I couldn’t pay or the soft glow of the wall light on Phillip’s bare shoulders as he made love to me.

“No, it wasnotmaking love,” I corrected myself as I drove to the covered bridge sipping a nitro cold brew with chocolate cold foam I’d picked up at the big coffee chain store on the outskirts of Caldwell Corners. I needed all the caffeine I could ingest and the barista had said this was the way to go. “It was sex with a side plan.”

If I kept telling myself that maybe the vision of what looked to be pain in Phillip’s hazel eyes when I had mentioned he might have ulterior motives would go the hell away. Hurting people was not a thing I enjoyed. Even people who were trying to purchase the family dream out from under me. My heart was too soft to enjoy pain in others.

Shoving all of that mess down into the churning misery that was my gut, I parked a few hundred feet from the covered bridge, hurried to gather the goodies I had spent money I didn’t really have on, and strolled to the opening of the bridge after suiting up. It was May 4thand this was my gift to Conor.

The four of them arrived in one vehicle and exited with varying degrees of amusement/mortification on their faces. Sam and Ben emerged then smiled at each other with such besotted expressions that I felt my guts tangle into a tighter knot.

I stood at the edge of the historic Stonebridge bridge—a bridge with no stone at all—warm wind blowing across my back, feet planted wide, my mask in place, my lightsaber in hand.

“Your masks and weapons lie before you,” I said into my mask. “Sam, I have a Jar-Jar Binks mask and atlati in my truck for you. I didn’t know you were coming, Ben. Sorry. Maybe you can be Jar-Jar and Sam can be a stormtrooper sans any equipment?”

“I feel a dark pulse in the force telling me to avoid whatever this is so I’m just going to watch from afar,” Ben said with a smile.

“Maybe he just doesn’t want to be Jar-Jar,” Conor said as they slowly pulled on their masks and picked up their weapons. “Who could blame him?”

“If anyone coming out to the maple farm sees us…” Sam said but lit his plastic saber, nonetheless. Ryan was already kitted out with his glowing blue weapon and his Yoda mask. Ryan was generally down for anything I dreamed up. Which was why we had gotten a three-day suspension in tenth grade for replacing the frogs in biology class with tilapia fillets from the grocery store. It was a statement about killing frogs for us to cut up. When the vice-principal explained that the tilapia we had dropped into jars of formaldehyde had also been raised forhumans to use—eat—I felt silly but refused to tell them where the stolen frogs were hidden. Viva la Frog! I did have the blood of revolutionaries in my veins! The next day, when we were home playing video games the frozen frogs melted in Conor’s locker. The smell reportedly was disgusting, and Conor was then implicated in the frog debacle. He only got detention while Sam had missed out on all the fun as he was home sick with a stomach bug. Ben found a spot in the shade.

It sucked that Ryan had replied with aSurein the group chat when told to report here at noon today. We needed to work our stuff out but it all felt so awkward.

“Wave them on we will,” Ryan said inside his rubber mask.

“Can we get this ass whooping done? I still have to do some work for the bachelor auction,” Conor said inside the plastic Luke Skywalker mask.

Sam, sensing defeat, sighed then pulled on his mask. “Just so you know I’m off the market,” Sam said.

“And we’re both working our booths,” Ryan chimed in, which I was incredibly glad about. I hated to let Conor down but I was not in the right head space to be won by Mrs. Lancer like last year. I was happy to clean her gutters instead of going to the Moose on Saturday night for chicken wings, but I was kind of sure handyman work was not really how you were supposed to spend your“date”night.

I settled into a fighting pose, the red of my saber glowing dimly in the covered bridge. The three good guys stood at the ready. I reached up to flip on the voice modulator inside my Vader mask.

“You shall not pass,” I shouted as I planted my sneakers firmly down on the old boards under my feet.

“Wrong movie,” Conor—aka Jedi—shouted as he led the charge to battle the dark side.

He reached me first, the other two were having mask and or battery issues with their sabers, and the arc of his swing was mighty. To be fair and to apply some salve to my bruised ego, Conor was about six inches taller, forty pounds heavier, and in excellent shape. Hello. Fireman. While I was a mealy little candy maker who couldn’t fight his way out of the gusseted cellophane bags we filled with tiny candies. The connection of his saber with mine rattled my teeth. I spun, hoping like hell my black cape didn’t get tangled in my legs, and tried to slap his calf with my saber. He parried it smoothly. Somewhere off to the side Ryan was searching for a battery that had fallen out of Sam’s weapon and rolled down the hill towards the creek under the bridge.

“Your allies are weak and battery-less,” I growled in my best villain.

“You’re weak,” Conor, who was now getting into it despite pooh-poohing it not ten minutes ago, called out. “And your days in this galaxy are done.”

I paused, just a for a second, as his words sank in. “Fuck you. I am not weak and I am not going anywhere!”

Something inside me sort of broke loose. I drew back and hit him on the bicep, hard, the slap of the toy sword loud as it bounced off the wooden siding of the bridge. He yelped. I hit him again, and again, and again. The fifth swat was the last for Conor. He then grabbed the sword as I brought it around for another hit.

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