Page 48 of Half Baked

“Yeah, they’re expensive.”

“Are you having… struggles with that?”

“I thought we were going question for question,” I snap. It’s not my intention to be so harsh, but he takes my tone in stride.

“Alright, shoot.”

“Why did you buy the mixer?”

“Because I wanted to do this for you. I wanted to help.”

“I don’t need your help,” I whisper.

“You’ve made that abundantly clear.” Hayden’s tone is dry, resentful even. He has no reason to resent me for refusing to leech off his parents’ fortune. Not in high school, and not now. “My turn. How bad are things?”

I stop walking this time, digging my toes beneath the sand. “Bad enough that I agreed to jump through hoops for Small Town Table.”

He doesn’t say anything, he just stands before me with a patient look in his eyes. I know he wants more answers, and he knows I won’t let him skip ahead and ask two questions in a row. I inhale deeply and drag my exhale out slowly. I’m afraid to ask my next question, to ask why he wants to help me so badly.

I can feel a small grain of hope in my chest about the answer. And the fact that I’m hoping for him to care about me is not something I’m ready to examine. Both my options right now are horrible, so I decide on the lesser of two evils.

“Go ahead,” I tell him.

“With what?”

“You can ask your next question.”

Taking a step closer, he drags the back of his knuckles down my arm. “I thought you were excited about this show. Are you not?”

My hand moves to my lips, but he catches it before I can start picking at them. And then I’m standing on a beach holding hands with Hayden Thompson, dangerously close to bearing my soul to my sworn enemy.

“Let’s just say… I don’t care about the recognition of being on the show. At first, the idea that they wanted me was flattering. To be told I’m good enough, it felt nice. But once it set in, I’ve just been uncomfortable most of the time. I’m sticking with it for the money.”

“Poppy,” he breathes. “I hate the idea of you feeling like that. Let’s back out, tell Tara to shove it.”

A scratchy laugh escapes me. “I could just imagine her face. But no, I need to do this. I need the money from the show to keep the bakery open. I’m in the red after some problems that came up with the renovations.”

“You don’t need to do this,” he pleads. “Let me help you instead.”

Hot tears threaten to stain my cheeks, and I pull my hands from his, desperate for space. I turn quickly on my heels. We’re probably late for the town meeting, our friends with empty seats and curious thoughts on our whereabouts as the mayor calls for it to begin. But I need to get away from him. My hair whips across my face as I turn, the breeze coming off the ocean blowing it forcefully.

“Poppy!”

“I’m not your charity case,” I shout back at him, yanking my hair into place. Thank goodness this stretch of sand is empty at this hour. Most people have moved to the side of the beach with dining patios.

Large hands wrap around me, pulling me back against a firm chest. “You’re not my charity case,” he whispers in my ear. “Why would you think that?”

He spins me to face him once again and I drop my gaze to the sand, studying the speckling of fragile seashells beneath our feet. “You’ve done this before.”

“When?”

“In high school, my freshman year. Right before…”

“Right before I left school?” he finishes my thought for me.

“Yeah, we were on that field trip. And I had left my bag at home on accident with my money. So, when we were in the gift shop and I was looking at that expensive necklace, it was because there was no point in looking at the reasonably priced things. I was leaving empty handed anyway.”

“But you didn’t have to. That’s the first time I ever got the chance to talk to you, I remember asking if I could get it for you.”

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