If It Makes You Happy Page 2

  Most of the houses slanted toward becoming historical landmarks. Old enough to be considered too important to tear down, but sturdy enough to be lived in with some slight renovations. According to ye olde Mayor Way, any remodeling required city approval and usually excluded any “extravagant” exterior work. That’s how most of the houses became a quirky mishmash of the past and the future. On the outside you’d think you’d find a house full of Puritans ready to hang some witches, or witches ready to bake some kids, but inside you’d swear someone let Steven Spielberg have at it to create a futuristic domestic wonderland.

  The Meyers, the most (in)famous family in Merry, had the distinct honor of being my first delivery of the day. I’d been to their house dozens of times last summer on official Goldeen’s business but had never gotten past their kitchen, which kept things disappointingly normal for the most part. Chrome with black trim everywhere and a hardwood floor that probably killed their heating bill in the winter. Or they wore a lot of socks and flannel to keep warm. That’s what my family did anyway.

  I slid the gigantic tray of deviled eggs onto the counter before heading back out to the car for the array of pretentious-yet-delicious finger sandwiches, multicolored macarons, and mini egg-and-bacon quiches with the finest chops of green onions. Aaron always sent a list of typed-up instructions for how to reheat the food if they wanted, so I placed that on top of one of the lids, in plain sight.

  “Hey! Delivery lady who no one thought to help carry the trays needs a signature!”

  A familiar voice replied, “Do you always yell in people’s houses so early in the morning?” Dallas Meyer. The bane of my romantic existence.

  Distracted and trying to find the delivery paper, I said, “Only if they’re special.” I looked up—a startled gasp ripped out of me. My hand slapped over my mouth on reflex.

  Dallas had shaved his head! All of those soft, natural curls—gone. Just gone! I moved my hand long enough to whisper, “You’re bald! Oh my God, you’re bald!” before putting it right back over my mouth.

  “Not quite.” He laughed.

  The remaining shorn hair made his light brown skin, which he took amazing care of, seem brighter.

  Ordering Korean beauty products and using face masks a minimum of twice a week kind of amazing. He even had his eyebrows professionally done once a month. Anyone who spent more than two minutes watching YouTube videos could tell that was not a natural arch. Not that he kept his beauty routine a secret or anything. In Haven Central, secrets of any kind never lasted.

  Dallas walked toward me, still smiling. My inability to stop making an overdramatic fool of myself must have been amusing. He stood on the other side of the kitchen island, kitty-corner to me.

  Me, who couldn’t stop staring at the top of his head.

  He leaned forward into my space. Mint and some kind of sweet-smelling cologne washed over me. He’d already put in his contacts. Clear ones because he didn’t need to enhance his already freakishly lovely blue-green hybrid color.

  I planted my feet, waiting, looking him in the eye, but blinking far too often. He probably thought I’d developed a twitch in the last thirty seconds. Eye contact made me nervous sometimes, but I wanted to do this. I wanted to be there in that moment, so I pushed myself to be strong.

  “Dallas?”

  “Hmm?”

  I’d had dreams about touching those curls. Long, detailed dreams that I would never confess to, not even to save my life. It was just hair. It would grow back. But still—“Why did you cut off your hair?”

  He smiled wider, squinty and cute with his stupid button nose, and rubbed the top of his head. “Kind of just decided to do it and then did it. My mom screamed when she saw me. Do you like it?”

  “I don’t dislike it,” I admitted before grinding my teeth at my stupidity.

  His hand seemed to move in slow motion. Before I took my next breath, I knew where his hand was headed … and I waited. I waited for him to touch my braids. His fingers wrapped around a cluster of them, holding them loosely in his open palm. “These look nice on you. I like the little gold clips.” He kept on staring at my braids while I shamelessly stared at his bow-shaped lips.

  A swirl of infatuation and self-loathing curdled in my stomach, made my palms sweat, and my heart beat fast enough to register some kind of arrest—until I stomped a mudhole in it, forcing it down, down, down for the millionth time. It was never going to happen. Never. Boys like him didn’t date girls like me. The End. No need for a sequel. No need to waste my emotional energy.

  A small voice in my head, which sounded suspiciously exactly like my mom’s, screamed something about self-rejection, but I ignored it. I always did.

  Taking a half step back, I angled my torso away from him as my braids slid out of his hand. He looked up at me, eyebrows slightly raised.

  “No touching without permission.” I winked at him and smiled. It would have been nice if he had asked first, but I wasn’t mad. I would’ve stopped him if I truly wanted to. So.

  “Ah, sorry.” The tiniest bit of redness flooded his apple cheeks as he cleared his throat. He righted himself before saying, “I’m surprised Goldeen’s sent you.”

  “It’s my family’s diner. I sent myself.”

  “I doubt it. When have you ever voluntarily made deliveries?”

  “Never.” The summer I got my license, actually. I drove everywhere but pretended like I hated it to earn some martyr points with Granny. It didn’t work. “But I decided to make a change this summer. Like the song.”

  “I think he was talking about things a bit more serious than making deliveries.”

  “Everyone’s gotta start somewhere.” I shrugged. He smiled. And my knees turned to jelly when he laughed softly.

  “I see you haven’t actually changed, though.”

  “Why would I? I’m practically perfect in every way,” I said, regretting it immediately. Playing Quota-Pun-Looza with Sam, Winston, and Kara all the time had ruined me and any hope I had for normal interactions with other people. “I don’t mean that. I mean, it was a quote-joke. It’s from Mary Poppins.”

  “I know,” he said, still smiling, perfect eyebrows still raised. They had to be tired by now, right?

  I gestured with my chin, keeping my mouth shut before I embarrassed myself again, sliding the delivery paper forward.

  He plucked a pen from a silver cup near the fridge. “In a rush?” Instead of signing, like he should have been doing, he used the pen to tap a steady rhythm out on the counter.

  “A little bit.”

  “More deliveries?”

  “Why?”

  “Just wondering.” He signed the slip, a fast scribble where the only discernible letter was D. “Are you going to the street fair tomorrow?”

  “Probably? I dunno. The HSR always makes me feel weird.”

  “How come?”

  Some towns had annual beauty pageants for Little Miss Milkmaid Haybelle of the Year. Others put on plays where the prize positions were (a) the director or (b) the leads. It always had to be something good and wholesome before things somehow always went awry.

  Chaos—and bigotry, depending on the story you were in—came home to roost. There would be (first) kisses, temporary heartbreak, inspirational transformations, and a healthy dose of comeuppance for those that deserved it.

  In the 1970s, Haven Central had decided to skip all of that only to replace it with something equally sinister.

  Haven. Summer. Royalty. A sham of a matchmaking system.

  Anyone who had their hearts set on becoming Haven Summer Royalty put their names in a giant, glittering fishbowl made of dreams and glass. Someone got picked, they stood on stage, and then the mayor called for volunteers to be their counterpart. The resulting pair would wear crowns and sashes, be in the parade, kiss babies, pose for pictures, put ribbons on animal cages, judge contests, and blah blah blah.

  Problem was, there usually ended up being more than one volunteer. The more popular and prettier t
he person was, the more volunteers they racked up. Haven Central went full-on medieval court affair after that, and then things got really weird. Extremely so.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “It just seems so antiquated. It’s like an unofficial beauty pageant hell-bent on pretending it’s not a popularity contest merged with arranged marriage minus licensing. It’s weird.”

  He laughed. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard it described that way.”

  “But am I wrong?”

  “Everyone has to volunteer, so kind of?” He closed one eye, openly judging me. “I don’t know. I’m not convinced. I don’t think I can give this one to you.”

  “Oh, come on! With the dates? And the games? Don’t even get me started on the tiebreakers.”

  His face morphed into a serious frown. “Tiebreakers are definitely weird, yeah.”

  “Thank you.” I picked up the delivery slip, sliding it into my front pocket. “I would never enter that contest. Never.”

  “But you’re still going to watch, right? It’s like reality TV in person. Everyone loves that.”

  What he said didn’t make me look at him, but rather his tone did. Unsure and breathy, as if he wanted to laugh to cover something up. His smile seemed a bit stiff, too. Strange.

  Talking with Dallas had always been easy, too easy—turns out, steadfastly denying that you had feelings for someone did wonders for your conversational skills—but our paths had never crossed much. He had his friends and I had mine. And I was also sort of maybe obsessed with Goldeen’s and very rarely left it, preferring to work my life away instead of running wild with Haven kidfolk.

  “FYI, I don’t love it,” I said. “But Kara does. If she goes, maybe I’ll be there. Maybe.”

  His smile relaxed into a grin full of perfect teeth made possible by what had to be painful years of braces. “Well, maybe I’ll see you there, then. Maybe.”

  Three

  After leaving Dallas’s house, I deserved a break.

  Admittedly, deserve was a strong word, but I was taking one anyway.

  The stoplight turned green, and I made the turn back into Misty Haven. Main Street turned into Main Circle—a giant roundabout with a memorial gazebo erected in Misty Haven’s honor at the center.

  I drove past the ice-cream shop, Meltdown Scoops, which always had a reserve of praline ripple just for me; the coffee bar, the Traveling Cruz, which supplied Goldeen’s with freshly roasted beans in exchange for advertising space on the diner’s menus; the dance studio, Day and Night, where I made it through six summer-school lessons before breaking my ankle and never going back; the twenty-four-hour grocery and convenience store, Nina’s, where I’d worked the overnight shift after the diner closed for a few weeks last summer with my partner, Kara, to earn money for a new Cuisinart-something that Kara absolutely had to have but her parents refused to buy for her; and the joint post office/town hall/government building across from the gazebo.

  Every second, every scene and sidewalk and side alley, every inch held a memory. My heart would always belong here.

  At a stop sign, Mrs. Pantoja awkwardly tried to wave as she crossed the street, hands full of leashes for the ten dogs she walked. She’d worked at the local shelter for as long as I had known her. The scene looked a bit like a picture you’d randomly see online.

  A digital painting of a lady walking too many dogs on a breezy day in the middle of a quaint town that made you smile and get all warm and fuzzy.

  Summer in Misty Haven had that kind of artistic, frozen feel to it.

  Almost like it could make you believe time didn’t exist and everything would be perfect forever. Plentiful trees, flowering bushes, green grass full of picket signs asking people to not walk on it, little kids with scraped knees running around and yelling because they had nothing better to do.

  A place where you’d be just as likely to be eaten alive by mosquitos, born and bred in the swampy parts of the man-made lake at the west edge of town, as you would be to have a hate-to-love romance with a cutie-with-a-booty who had moved to Misty during the spring and had a supernatural affinity for math and working out, and also adored kids.

  I pulled into an empty parking spot in front of Winter Wonderland Books. The door chimed as I entered, but no one greeted me. No one at the front desk meant Kara was on duty and had abandoned her post to go bake something.

  Easily fixable.

  “DO LIBRARY RULES APPLY IN THIS PLACE? I HAVE A LOUD SPEAKING VOICE BUT REQUIRE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR BOOKS.”

  One.

  Two.

  Three.

  A scream shattered the silence of the bookshop moments before Kara appeared. She ran at a full sprint, arms outstretched as she launched herself straight into my waiting arms.

  In the five years I had known Kara, she’d barely changed. She still had the same super curly, auburn-colored hair; face full of the same-colored freckles; and the same olive-toned skin. She always wore the same rectangular deep-purply-red glasses and a shrewd, calculating look on her face at all times. She hadn’t even grown a single inch, still clocking in at an impressive five feet zero, with the same slightly chubby build and penchant for wearing jumpsuits.

  And my heart still thumped extra hard against my rib cage every time I saw her. Truth be told, I wasn’t always sequestered away in Goldeen’s. Winter Wonderland Books took third place on the where-to-find-Winnie list. Second place? Kara’s room upstairs.

  “You didn’t tell me you were coming over, punk!” She let go, slapping my arm.

  “I like it when you scream for me. Makes me feel special and wanted, and also kind of scared. Keeps me on my toes.”

  Kara laughed. “Working?”

  “Eternally.”

  “Figured. How long you got?”

  “Not very. Just wanted to see your face.”

  “I like it when you make good life choices. Come on.” She didn’t wait, grasping my wrist and leading me forward. “I just finished making waffles.”

  “Scratch or Eggo?”

  “Girl, please.” Kara gave me a withering look.

  The tiny kitchen with its rounded retro teal refrigerator and oven/stove combo looked and smelled like the single greatest bakery disaster area in the history of explosions. Collateral damage included flour everywhere; a fleet of similar-sized bowls dripping sticky glaze onto the counters; piles of unfrosted cupcakes arranged haphazardly on cooling racks; baking sheets stacked with a multitude of cookies; a seven-layer rainbow cake practically screaming for fondant, pearls, and sprinkles; and icing stuck to the cabinet doors like she had flung it to check its consistency.

  I’d actually seen her do that last one once. Kara baking in the kitchen was An Experience™, but she ignored it all, not attempting to explain, apologize, or make excuses for the mess. Instead, she marched to the wooden table in the center of the room, where a red Belgian waffle iron steamed and hissed with urgency, and pulled out a chair for me.

  “Why does it smell like brownies? You said waffles.” I sat down. Above the scents of sweetened cream cheese, irrepressible vanilla everything, German chocolate heavy on the coconut, powdered sugar delightfulness, chocolate with that slightly burnt smell that never stopped it from still being delicious, cinnamon, and graham crackers, I caught a whiff of something cooking that didn’t quite make sense.

  “It’s the best of both worlds.” Kara grinned with feverish pride as she lifted the lid. “My two-hour-old secret recipe for crisp brownie waffles. Toppings pending, but I’m leaning toward ice cream, whipped cream, and/or fruit to give it that familiar funnel-cake vibe.” She inhaled. “Doesn’t it smell amazing?”

  It did. Truly. But it was unfortunately off-limits, as were just about all of the baked goods in the kitchen. A severe gluten intolerance was nothing to mess with. I had finally been diagnosed a year ago, after enduring a solid two years of mysterious and at times debilitating pain. Not even the most delicious looking and smelling brownie waffle would be enough to tempt me to try it. That pain aimed
to jack up your whole life. Enduring that was not worth even a single second of delectable happiness.

  Not even if Kara made it.

  “I got the idea from s’mores,” Kara continued. “I used a combination of marshmallows in my scratch chocolate-chunk brownie batter recipe that I came up with last year to give it that magnificent sticky-gooey crunch. The heat and steam from the waffle iron keeps the white-chocolate Chex mix from getting soggy, but only if you place them just right. Oh, and I’m working on a gluten-free version exclusively for that special someone in my life.”

  “You’re too good to me,” I said, voice slipping into that everlasting-awe tone reserved solely for when Kara immersed herself in her craft and allowed me inside her world.

  “It’s what you deserve.” Kara grinned at her quote-joke, and the world got that much brighter. “I’ve been testing out potential entries for the Sana Starlight contest.”

  “Sana Starlight?” I choked on air, sputtering in disbelief. “The Sana Starlight? Cooking show, bestselling books, and national tours, Sana Starlight? What the what?”

  “She’s filming a pilot for a new show here.” Kara removed a bright orange piece of paper held to the fridge by a giant seashell magnet. “Small Town Spotlight with Sana Starlight.”

  I managed to stop myself from being a complete heathen and didn’t snatch the flyer out of her hands.

  Sana Starlight, the next big foodie mogul, and her crew planned to film the pilot episode of her show, calling it “My Sweet and Savory Haven.” Her inspiration for the theme came from the dual towns’ history, with sweet representing Misty and savory representing Merry. A preliminary round to narrow down the contestants to ten per category would be held first, followed by the final competition and taping taking place at the annual M&M Carnival. There’d be three winners, one for both categories, and a grand prize overall.

  “They started filming B-roll about two weeks ago.” She sat in the seat next to me. “The camera crews are gone now, but they’re supposed to come back for town events. Shelley gave them a schedule, I think. Everyone’s saying they’ll be here tomorrow to get some shots of the HSR.”