Birdeater

Chapter 11

Blair had watched this woman get out of her car. He had responded to Florence's nudge.

"Her."

He knew exactly what he had to do. It was all scripted. Almost nothing could go wrong.

So why did he feel like this was going to end in disaster?

Even with Florence by his side, his confidence rested in the very pit of his stomach.

Jackie Candy was moving up and down the aisles at a snail's pace. Clearly, she was not in a hurry to leave. Florence tracked her from Bread into Paper Products. Every now and then he would drop something in his cart. Whatever made sense. He had little intention of buying anything.

He finally decided they should run into each other in Produce. She had stopped in front of a wall of apples and was hunting for the best ones. The way the apple crates were set up made it so that when he brought his cart around, she was all but wedged into a corner. Trapped, and she didn't even seem to notice.

"Jackie?" Florence got her attention.

Jackie looked up and smiled. Blair hated the way she smiled at him. It was genuine and affectionate. If he didn't come prepared with the knowledge that she was going to die it might have sent him into a spiral.

"Florence! Good to see you again." She turned to Blair. "Hi, nice to meet you. My name is Jackie." She extended her hand. Blair begrudgingly accepted.

"I didn't think we would run into you, here." Florence leaned over the front of his cart and propped one foot up on the bar underneath. He looked so casual, so easy all of the time. Blair didn't know how he did it.

"Now, hold on. What is this 'we'?" Jackie moved her finger between the two of them suspiciously. "I thought we talked about this?"

"Well," the smile that spread over Florence's face looked apologetic. "We aren't exactly out yet. We have only been dating a little while and, well, you know how it is around here."

"You could have told me." She scolded. She still seemed pleased.

"Yeah," Florence rubbed the back of his neck and feigned embarrassment. "Well! Jackie, meet my partner, Blair. Blair, this is Jackie. She is basically my second mom."

"An honorary title." Jackie turned the full beam of her expression onto Blair. He fought against making a face.

"Nice to meet you." Blair muttered. He could only do so much. He wasn't as good at pretending as Florence was. He couldn't craft the illusion of being happy to meet this woman. He was just ready to see her dead.

"I know that Amos has his way and feelings about things." Jackie said. "But you know we will always love you and support you no matter what."

"I know," Florence said. "Still, I would really appreciate it if you didn't say anything to him about it. I know he will respect it more if I have the courage to tell him myself."

"That, he will." Jackie agreed.

"I couldn't be out when mother was alive. So it's a drastic change in my lifestyle."

"I can only imagine. So how did you two meet?"

"Well, it was funny. We both like the same book." Florence's grin widened. "So we got to talking about it and here we are."

"Beats my cigarette story." Jackie laughed. "Books are more romantic."

"Oh, since you're here, I'm going to go ahead and ask. Would you like to meet up for lunch sometime? I know Amos has been working a lot lately. But I'd love for the three of us to get a chance."