Page 40 of Just (Fake) Married (Calloways vs. McGraws #1)

TWENTY-SEVEN

HARMONY

“We’ve got a serious problem,” I said, pulling Ethan by the hand across the town square. The snow was finally melting away and the mud was here to stay for a few weeks.

We’d just crossed into March and were scheduled to have our next committee meeting tonight for the festival, which was just seven weeks way. I was walking across the square when I saw a new wanted poster on the community board next to the gallows.

I ran back to the store to get Ethan, who’d been stuck in a conversation with Darryl H. regarding a lump on his heel.

“Babe, thank you so much,” Ethan said, when I pulled him out into the street. “That was a couple minutes of my life talking about puss I’m never going to get back.”

Ignoring the babe , which he was starting to drop a lot in public, I stopped once we got to the community board.

“I didn’t pull you out to save you, I pulled you out because of this!” I shouted, pointing at a new picture of us.

The photo must have been taken at the last committee meeting.

I was standing on the small stage and someone had gotten a picture of Ethan standing up after the meeting to applaud me.

Which had been silly, really, because it was just a committee meeting.

But he’d said he wanted to make sure everyone knew I had full McGraw support.

There was an expression on his face in the photo as he was looking up at me, that I didn’t want to think about too hard.

Just for show. Just for show.

The problem we had was what the caption read beneath our picture.

Wanted: Information on why Harmony is really cleaning out the apartment above her store. Is there trouble in McGraw/Calloway paradise already?

“What in the hell?” Ethan exclaimed. “Are you kidding me? After all these weeks of safe kissing you in public?”

“Maybe we’re not as good at fooling everyone as we think.”

“Bullshit,” he said, squeezing my hands. “Who is doing this?”

“Nobody knows,” I said. “That’s the point of a mysterious town gossip. It’s a mystery.”

“Who knows you’re cleaning out the apartment?” he asked, like he was some kind of amateur detective.

“Uh, let’s see,” I said, rattling off the names.

“Mom and Marion were there. Plus, Bliss has started selling the skin care products again. Amity’s cook keeps complaining about the boxes piled up in the café kitchen.

The Strunk sisters offered me way too much money for a box of vibrators. We weren’t exactly subtle, Ethan.”

“What do you think this means?” he asked me, his expression grim.

“People are going to start asking questions. About us. And the truth is…”

“What?”

I sighed. “It’s getting harder to lie to everyone. It’s getting hard to remind myself that you’re just pretending to care about the festival-”

“Hey,” he said, grabbing me by my upper arms and giving me a little shake. “I do care about the festival. I care about all of it. I consider this marriage my responsibility and I’m owning up to that.”

I pressed my lips closed because I didn’t want to give away anything to him. I didn’t want to tell him that he was doing a really good job of making everyone believe he was in love with me.

Including me.

“I hate lying to everyone,” I said again. But maybe more than that, I hated that he was so good at it.

“I know you do. I know it’s not you at all,” he said, in that way that made me want to fall against his chest and let him rub my back.

So, I fell against his chest and I let him rub my back. But only for a minute.

Then I pushed my hands against his chest and stepped back.

“What do you think we should do?” he asked me.

I thought about it, and he must have been thinking about it, too.

Because at the same time I said, “Let’s tell everyone the truth,” he said, “Let’s double down.”

Needless to say, Ethan won that argument.

As the weeks marched on, we fell into a pattern.

There was a reciprocal medical licensing program between Washington state and Wyoming. Dr. Blackfeather had been able to fast-track some paperwork that allowed Ethan to work at the clinic as a doctor rather than just assisting her.

Because of him, they were able to double the amount of patients they saw in a day.

I wondered how much he thought about the surgeries he wasn’t performing. The lives he wasn’t saving by being here and talking to Darryl about his health.

Every day, we would carpool into town together, with our travel mugs of coffee, the animals in the back seat. I dropped him at work, and I went to the store. We’d either meet at the café for dinner or stop by Mom’s house for a home cooked meal so she could glare at Ethan the entire time.

Or, we’d dive into whatever Mrs. Walker had left for us in the fridge.

The nights…well, they were ours. Technically, I hadn’t moved into his room, but when Jenny and Bruce started to get upset with me in the mornings for abandoning them every night, we moved their beds into Ethan’s room.

Still, I had to be the one to knock on his door every night and I left every morning as soon as I woke up.

No lingering and no snuggling, was a silent rule of mine.

The other rules hadn’t changed, either.

No kissing or affectionate touching when it was just the two of us.

No talking about anything that wasn’t like this, harder, more please, fuck me now.

In public, however, we kept up our strong display of affection.

At the café, we held hands and he pushed the hair off my cheek, looking at me like I was the greatest thing that ever happened.

At the store, when he’d come by to pick me up, always a kiss on the forehead, the cheek and my nose.

When he attended the Feud Day Festival committee meetings, just to support me, everyone at the meeting thought it was sweet.

Fortunately, we’d managed to handle the fallout from the latest Wanted Poster by continuing to present a united McGraw/Calloway front.

Like Ethan suggested: we doubled down instead of coming clean.

Which led to thoughts. Stray thoughts that slithered into my brain that I couldn’t keep out. Thoughts like; I want us to be real . I want us to have a future we could talk about.

I hated myself because this was exactly what I’d been afraid would happen. That I would fall for the act we were putting on.

That I would fall for him.

Ethan and I walked into the café for our third dinner that week. We’d swapped out our winter coats for lighter spring jackets and I could feel his hand on my back.

“Hey!” Amity called out. “If it isn’t the lovebirds.” While I couldn’t say Amity had lost all her disdain and suspicion toward Ethan, at least she was making him real food.

“You two are becoming my most regular regulars,” she said, as we sat down at what was quickly becoming our table.

“It’s good for folks to see us out,” Ethan said, looking at the menu.

“Of course,” Amity said, and gave me an expression that reminded me I still needed to keep my walls up around this man. Did she see them slipping?

“Oh, also, I was hoping I could order something for later,” Ethan said, still looking at the menu. “You know, a late-night snack. For those times when you wake up and just can’t fall back asleep.”

“You have zero problems falling asleep,” I said, wondering what the heck he was talking about. The second we decided the fun and games were done for the night, he was out like a light.

He just kept looking at the menu. “You never know. So, I was thinking, maybe if you could make me a turkey gobbler sandwich, but instead of the cranberry sauce, use your homemade mac and cheese. Then an extra slice of cheese on top of that and then just a light dribble of honey mustard. That sounds like it might be delicious together. What do you think?”

Amity’s eyes immediately narrowed on Ethan. “I think you can tell Mac McGraw if he wants that bullshit sandwich he can come here and order it himself.”

“You didn’t!” I hissed at Ethan.

He looked guilty. “We’re all family now. I’m trying to bring…harmony to the group.”

“Did you just use my name in vain?” I asked him, horrified.

“If I promise to apologize, will you please not give me the garnish plate again?” Ethan begged Amity.

“Oh, I’m going to give you what you ordered. For dinner. Then you can tell Mac how absolutely delicious it was.”

Amity took our menus, she knew my regular order, so there was no point even looking at it.

Ethan, however, looked a little worried. “Mac and cheese on a sandwich? With an extra slice of cheese? Why is Mac ordering that? Does he have a death wish?”

The front door of the café opened and Marion beelined to our table. “Harmony,” she said, like the world was coming to an end.

“Hey, Marion,” Ethan said. “We were just about to eat, do you want to join us?”

Marion looked at him like he’d grown another head, but I looked at him like he was the sweetest guy in the world.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I was interviewing Mayor Gallup for the high school paper and I specifically asked him if he had a guarantee from the state that someone from the Blue Ribbon Committee would be attending the festival, and his answer was…not yet.” She looked at us, aghast. “Can you believe that? Like, what is the point of all of this if the Blue Ribbon person isn’t actually at the festival? ”

“Well, it’s disappointing, but we can’t force anyone to come to the festival.”

“Maybe the mayor isn’t pushing hard enough,” Ethan said, and Marion pointed at him.

“Yes. That.”

Ethan beamed, like having a teenager’s approval was amazing.

“I will talk to the mayor,” I said.

“Good. Because that ribbon matters,” Marion said. “This whole stupid thing is resting on that ribbon!” She twirled away, her long dark hair swinging behind her, and I wondered if someday she might not be the person to replace Mayor Gallup.

“She works at the historical museum, runs the student festival committee and the high school paper?” Ethan asked me.

“That’s not even the half of it,” I laughed.

“Ambitious,” he muttered. “I like it.”

“Ambitious like you were. Like you are,” I corrected. “You probably miss it all the time, right?”