Chapter 7
Chapter 7
Scarlett didn’t want to be the type of person who always assumed everyone was staring at her. How cringe. But when everyone in the Kellysville Harris Teeter was blatantly gawking at Scarlett and Jaime, she didn’t have to pretend to be modest anymore, did she? She never should’ve agreed to eat her meals with Jaime. Then she never would’ve come with him on this errand.
“I don’t want to alarm you,” Scarlett said to Jaime under her breath, “but we seem to have become zoo animals.”
An older white man had parked his cart next to a stack of apple boxes. He’d crossed his arms one over the other on the handle and was chewing a piece of gum and baldly watching them.
This was worse than The Metamorphosis . At least Gregor Samsa had woken up in his own bed.
For his part, Jaime was unperturbed by the attention. He was calmly sifting through a bin of romaine lettuce, trying to find the best one. “If they are, it’s because of that Vogue spread.”
At that, Scarlett’s attention snapped back to Jaime, from the nosy man. “Oh, so you saw the Vogue spread?”
“It’s seared on my retinas, woman.”
Scarlett knew she was a pretty girl, and she had cleavage for days. Why all the Victoria’s Secret models hadn’t been plus size, she would never know. It was easier to flaunt it if you had it, and Scarlett had it.
Except posing for those pictures was one thing. Knowing Jaime had seen them ... that was another.
Wanting to focus on his awkward feelings and not hers, Scarlett drawled, “It’s the one with the giant pawn that really stuck with you, isn’t it?”
The image had been in black and white, with Scarlett sprawled out behind a seven-foot model of a pawn, wearing approximately $10.6 million in borrowed Harry Winston jewels—and only Harry Winston jewels. The pawn had kept it on this side of porn, but if it slipped over the line, well, it was classy porn.
Jaime began coughing violently.
“It was all lighting and Photoshop,” she assured him.
Jaime moved from the lettuce to a bin full of melons. From how closely he was inspecting them and from how tightly his hands were clenched, Scarlett could be forgiven if it seemed as though he was determinedly not looking at her—but that was probably wishful thinking.
“It wasn’t all lighting,” he finally got out.
If Jaime had been anyone else, she would have started joking that he thought she was cute ... but that would’ve been too far and too much and too mean. And Scarlett was trying so hard not to be mean.
She was also trying darn hard not to think about how he’d obviously spent a lot of time with her nearly naked high-fashion spread.
Changing the subject, Scarlett gestured at the produce section. “What can I grab?”
She wasn’t used to full-size grocery stores. The aisles of her local bodega were so comfortably snug. This was a lot of space for untrusting eyes. The nosy man had finally moved on, but that woman over there by the pickles, the one glaring at Scarlett, she might have been their gym teacher. Just looking at her evoked the pulsing refrains of Jock Jams .
Scarlett offered her a jaunty wave and a smile. In response, the maybe gym teacher only glared harder.
“I’d forgotten how friendly Musgrove is,” Scarlett muttered.
Jaime glanced up, and after a jolt—seriously, that woman could give anyone the creeps—he made his own half wave. “They’re real good at the welcome wagon here.”
For an instant, Scarlett thought he might throw an arm over her shoulders as a gesture of support ... and Scarlett almost wanted him to.
Instead, Jaime said, “How about you get some baby carrots?”
“If you keep eating those by the handful, the bottoms of your feet are going to turn orange,” she warned.
“That’s a risk I’m willing to take.”
When Scarlett returned to the cart, Jaime was loading it up with apples and oranges and potatoes. But then, someone even scarier than the gym teacher walked into the grocery store.
Jaime’s mom was wearing a pink sweater set and khakis, and she still had the Dooney it would’ve splashed over her mom too.
Alma might not have been much of a parent, or much of an employee. But she’d loved Scarlett, and she’d done the best she’d known how to, to feed and care for them both. If, in maturity and competence, she was more like a little sister to Scarlett than a mother, well, that was just how it went sometimes.
The smile Scarlett was able to summon at the memories wasn’t faked. All of this—it felt like a win. It had been a win. “As I got better, this world spread out in front of me: eating in actual restaurants, getting to travel overseas, having my picture in magazines, receiving free designer dresses, becoming a celebrity. The works! And I had to seize that with both hands. I know that you think ...”
Actually, Scarlett had no idea what Jaime thought. Based on his questions earlier this week, it was something he pondered frequently and was still broken up over, but she hadn’t been able to indulge in the same what-ifs. She wasn’t being a brat, even. She simply hadn’t had the same choices he had.
“But I had to take it. I never considered not leaving.”
Jaime hadn’t asked about that directly today, but she knew what he’d asked today was connected to what he’d asked her the other night.
And he needed to understand it. They both did.
In leaving Musgrove, Scarlett had saved herself. She’d saved her mom. And whatever it had cost her, it had been worth it.
“I understand,” he said gently. “I just wish I could’ve gone with you.”
That calm resignation and acceptance pissed her off more than if he had argued with her. But since Scarlett didn’t want to contemplate why she was mad at him, she said, “Time for us to get back to that fancy house of yours.”