Chapter 19
Chapter
Nineteen
“It was really nice of Leo to give us extra candy because we’re newlyweds.”
“Indeed it was. I like these,” Jaak tells me and holds up a bottle labeled ‘Fizzy and You Know It’.
“What are those?” I ask, popping another gummy bear in my mouth.
I should probably slow down but I can’t stop myself.
I’ve never had candy this good. Everything in Sweet Tooth was either made in town or special ordered and all the special ordered items were rationed out based on rank in the cult.
We had our pick of the items with how well liked my family was but even then candy just meant a few chocolates or candy that were more waxy than anything.
If we wanted sweets it was the taffy we made in town or nothing.
It’s why the bakery was so popular. Ms. Donna made sure we had more than enough homemade treats to make up for the lack of variety when it came to pretty much everything else.
“Some kind of fizzy chew. It’s quite good and apple free. Do you want one?” He asks and holds out a fizzy chew to me.
I wave him off. “I’m good. I think I’m about to go into a sugar coma from these gummy bears but I can’t stop eating them.
” I look down at the bag of candy in my hands before I lift it up to look at it in the sun.
Late morning sunlight makes the rainbow colored gummy bears glow.
They look perfect, but there’s something not right about them either.
They’re almost too perfect. I swallow hard and then stop walking because the wheels in my brain are turning now that we’re out of the candy shoppe.
“Meadow, what’s wrong?”
“Did you notice Leo got weird when we asked if there were apples in this?” I ask, tapping a finger against the basket Jaak is holding under one arm.
“Or the fact that we can’t stop eating this candy?
” I resist the urge to eat another gummy bear and force myself to shove the bag back in the basket.
I manage it but just. “I feel weird and I don’t think it’s from the sugar. ”
“I did notice the apples but I think we can agree those are evil…” Jaak’s voice trails off and he frowns looking at the candy basket he’s holding, “I’ve never been one to desire sweets but you’re right. Now they’re all I want.”
“I’m not sure about evil apples but poison is a high possibility.
Or enchanted. I think the candy he gave us is enchanted.
” I look over my shoulder and back at the shoppe.
We’re only a few doors down. We’ve already seen the cobbler and found that, surprise surprise, their owner had also been on the trip.
Leo’s list of owners told us that would be the case but you never knew.
We’d visited before we’d eaten any candy, though.
I hadn’t thought much about where we were going next since I’d started inhaling gummy bears at light speed.
I thought we’d been walking but we hadn’t, we’d just been…
“We’ve been going in circles,” I tell Jaak and look around us. “What the hells is going on? What’s in that candy?”
Jaak sighs and hands the basket off to a screaming child. “Damn it all. Enchanted candy. I’ve been locked up for far too long. I never would have made this mistake before.”
“Jaak, no!” I make a grab at the basket of candy but there’s no stopping the kid.
They’re off and running with the basket lifted over their head in victory.
I watch as another few kids join the runner and the group descends on the basket in a frenzy.
There won’t be a single gummy bear standing in a few minutes.
“We have to stop them,” I say and start to rush towards the kids but Jaak catches me around the waist with one arm.
“The children will be fine.”
“But the candy is enchanted. Who knows what it’s going to do to them.”
“It will only make them want more candy,” Jaak says and gives me a squeeze.
“How do you know that? What if it turns them into pigs or squirrels? They’ll be a whole pack of them on the loose and it will be our fault.”
“I know that because all I want to do is eat candy. That’s all you want to do as well, isn’t it?”
I pause. He’s right. All I want is to inhale candy. I nod and look over at the kids with a wistful sigh. “Yes, everything in me wants to snatch that basket back even if I have to drop kick a kid to do it.”
Jaak considers the kids and shrugs. “A kick might do them good in the grand scheme of life.”
I push his arm. “No, we cannot kick children. Do not let me kick children, no matter how much candy payoff there is.”
He sighs. “Fine, fine. Have it your way.”
“The real person we should kick is Leo.” I cross my arms and look back at the candy shoppe. We’re not far off due to our sugar curse. We made it down the street, I know that but all we did was turn right back around and make a loop. How long have we been doing that?
“I’m going to go in there and give him a piece of my mind. I’m going to throw an entire display worth of gummy bears at him. I know! I’ll make him eat and see how he likes it,” I say, holding up a finger, fully ready to charge back into the shoppe but Jaak steps in front of me.
“If you do that then you give up the element of surprise. Leo gave us enchanted candy for a reason,” he says and holds his hands up to slow me down when I try to dart around him, “maybe that candy is what they give everyone and that’s why they’re doing so well.
You never know what a business owner is willing to do to make a profit.
Enchanted candy would be the very least of the ills committed in the name of money. ”
That stops me. He’s right. The Founders in Sweet Tooth used to cut as many corners as possible and make sure we worked as many hours as we could manage.
I never really had days off, just time when I wasn’t meant to be doing something productive for the cult.
Everyone I knew lived like that so it felt normal.
What if Leo thinks enchanted candy is normal?
I bite my bottom lip. “You think his cult business owner is making him do it?”
“It’s a possibility. We don’t have enough information and if we charge back in there we won’t get enough information out of him to know. We must be subtle.”
I sigh and nod. “If his boss is making him do it then I’ve been where Leo is and it feels awful.”
“It always does when you carry out someone else’s plan,” Jaak says and puts a hand on my shoulder. “But that isn’t in the cards for us. Not anymore. Now, why don’t we investigate another business on that list Leo gave us. What’s next on the list?”
“Yeah, okay. Investigating is a better plan than throwing candy at Leo. He wasn’t lying about the last business owner, so I think we can trust the list.” I look down at the business names scrawled on my notepad.
“It says the owner of the floral shop and the toy store should be here. Which one do you want to visit first?”
Jaak looks thoughtful and considers both.
The floral shop is across the street from us and the toy shop is further down the street in the direction the kids ran.
I hear a high-pitched shriek that sounds like a war cry and suspiciously like the kid Jaak gave the candy to.
I make sure not to look that way in case they’re committing candy-fueled crimes.
“The floral shop,” he says, “the toy store has…an aura I don’t like about it. ”
The toy shop is…cute. That’s the only way I can describe it.
It’s a cute little brick building with purple trim around the windows and a sign proclaiming Timeless Toys ‘n Things. There’s a display for building blocks and a few kites suspended in the air like they’re flying.
By the door the puppets used for the puppet show sway in the wind.
“It doesn’t look like it has bad vibes,” I say. “It’s cute. Like, really cute.”
“Cute is camouflage. You will learn this in time. Besides,” Jaak points at the puppets, “do you think those are cute? I think not. They’re soulless. No good can come of a puppet.”
The second Jaak points out the puppets, one of them, a clown, gets blown in the wind and its head turns my way. Its eyes lock right on me and I swallow hard. Totally not cute.
“Okay, maybe now I’m seeing the bad aura,” I nudge him toward the floral shop. “Come on, let’s get inside and away from that puppet.”
Jaak offers me his arm to cross the street. It’s when we’re almost to the other side of the road that I notice something. “There’s no cars.”
“What’s a car?”
“Four wheels, big, metal, fun to do doughnuts with in the snow.” I only know the last part because I’d snuck out Roy’s car one time when he really ticked me off.
I wasn’t allowed to have a car, and Buffy didn’t have one because of how bad she drove.
That didn’t stop us from stealing Roy’s car and doing doughnuts at midnight in the parking lot behind the school.
Most of them had been accidental because truth be told, I wasn’t great at driving either but once you got them down, they were easy enough to keep doing.
Jaak rubs his chin and looks back towards Pancakes and More. “Hmmm, a snow doughnut. That sounds intriguing. Do you think the diner has them?”
I grin and grab his arm. “Not those kinds of doughnuts. A car is like, ummm, a chariot? Do you know what that is? Like something you drive to get from one place to another really fast.”
He closes his eyes and thinks for a second before he opens them. “The cult members that I mind-walked in didn’t know much about them, but I think I understand what it is. If there are any cars here they didn’t use them.”
Jaak opens the flower shop door for me and we duck inside. Instantly the temperature drops and things are dimmer. After the chaos of the candy shoppe and the fact that we ate way too much sugar, it’s nice.