When eleven o'clock rolled around, I opened the front door just in time to see Evan pull into the driveway. Even through the glass of the windshield, I could see the smile appear on his face the moment he saw me. It caused my heart to flutter in my chest.

"Hey," he says after he got out of the car and started to walk towards me. He gently wrapped an arm around me and placed a his on the top of my head, causing me to blush slightly. "Ready to go?"

I nodded as I stuck my hand in the front pocket of my hoodie just to make sure I had everything I needed, which I did. "Yeah."

"So, what's on your list of things to buy?" he asked me as he started to help to to his car.

"Well, I'm in dire need of laundry soap," I tell him as I glance down at my clothes. "It was slim pickings today."

Evan chuckled as he looked my up and down. "What's wrong with your outfit?"

I glanced down at my shorts that I haven't worn in at least two years. They were a neon pink, and they were too short for my taste. Plus, they didn't really go with my dark blue hoodie. But there wasn't much I could do about this. These were the only clean clothes I had.

"At least several things," I say as he opens the passenger door and helps ease me down into it. He went even as far to push the seat back a few inches for me to make sure I had enough room for my leg.

"Well, I for one, think you look great," he tells me as he gave me a small wink before closing the door. My face immediately blushed, and I couldn't help but smile as I watched Evan walk around to the drivers side of the car. When he got in, he looked over at me with a smile. "Ready?"

I nodded, and Evan put the car in reverse and backed out of the driveway and onto the street. Music softly played, but it was to low and I wasn't able to hear it clearly. However, I didn't mind.

"So what did you want to ask me last night?" I asked Evan when we stopped at a stop sign. Evan turned to look at me, and it was obvious that he was a bit thrown by me bringing it up. "We are face to face now. Well, technically side by side."

"Yes, but it's not important right now," he said as he waved it off, but it only caused me to worry.

"Did I do something?" I asked him, my eyes narrowing in confusion.

"What? No, of course not. Why would you think that?"

I shrugged. "I don't know, really. I thought that you might have changed your mind and started to hate me or something."

Evan turned to me with a sad look on his face. He took his free hand and took mine in it before he gave it a squeeze. "I could never hate you, so don't think about it."

I let out a sigh of relief as before I looked back out the window. Houses zoomed past us as we drove down street after street. Neither one of talked, which was fine for me. I was still nervous about the fact that there was a slight chance that Evan might know what had happened last night.

A couple of streets away was a small grocery store called Berry's. It wasn't anything fancy, but it was much easier to go to this place rather than the big chain store that was twenty miles away. Besides, they bake the best chocolate cake.

"Are you good going here?" Evan asked as he pulled into the small parking lot that was nearly filled.

"Yeah," I say as I unbuckle my seat belt. He turned off the engine and held his keys in his hands.

Evan gave me a small smile before get started to get out of the car. Before I could even open my door, Evan was already on my side helping me to my good food. I had my hands balanced on top of the car as he grabbed my crutches.

"You think you'll be fine walking through the store?" he asked me as he glanced down at my leg with a worried look on his face.

"I should be," I say as the both of us start to walk to the front of the store. "Worse comes to worst I'll just crawl around the floor."

Evan laughed and shook his head. "I'll just put you inside the cart, how about that?"

I couldn't help but blush. "I'm pretty sure that's frowned upon."

"So?" he questioned with a shrug.

The door dinged as it opened for us, and Evan quickly grabbed a nearby cart as we walked through. There wasn't that many people around at first, but as we started to walk we saw that there was at least a couple people in each aisle. 

"What do you need?" he asked me.

"That's a good question," I tell him with a smile. "Let's just go up and down the aisles and go from there."

As we walked, I would occasionally throw things in the cart, and Evan would chuckle. He even had the nerve to fix things in the cart if they were sideways. But at least he stayed quiet as I placed a small bag of chocolate covered doughnuts in the cart.

"What's with all the soup?" he asked me in confusion as I placed at least ten cans of various soups in the cart.

"What do you mean?" 

He shrugged. "That's a lot of soup, I mean."

"Oh, well it's dinner for me, I guess," I tell him as I placed my crutch back underneath my arm. "I'm not exactly Martha Stewart in the kitchen these days."

"I thought that dick head was in charge of cooking?" he asked, and my smile fell.

"He's not coming over anymore," I tell him as I started to walk back down the aisle.

"Really? But don't you need help with things, I mean?"

I shrugged as I turned into another aisle with Evan closely following behind. "Not really. I basically did everything else while he was there. He was basically an annoying decoration."

"But-" Evan started to say, but stopped when he saw the upset look on my face. "Hey look, Goldfish. The snack the smiles back."

I couldn't help but smile as I turned to face him. "Put it in the cart."

Evan smiled as he picked up a bag and tossed it in. "Are you really going to eat soup for dinner?"

"I could have it for breakfast if I wanted, I guess."

"That's not what I meant," he said as he chuckled and shook his head. "How about I make dinner for us tonight?"

"I thought you had planned a whole day for us?"

"I did," he told me. "But I was very limited in things that you can do so I can scratch getting dinner out and cooking it instead. So, what do you think?"

I thought about it. Dinner would be nice, and it would be even nicer if I had leftovers too. "I don't see why not. But the real question is, can you cook?"

Evan looked at me and frowned. "Of course I can cook."

"Just making sure," I tell him as put my hands up to surrender. "I thought there was a reason as to why you're a delivery boy instead of a cook."

"I actually almost burned the kitchen down when I was twelve so that's probably the reason why."

I looked at him with wide eyes. "Please don't burn my kitchen down. I kind of live there."

"No promises," he says with a cocky grin on his face. I rolled my eyes as I shook my head.

"So, what are you making?"

Evan thought for a moment. "Do you like chicken?"

"Well, yeah," I told him with a weird look on my face.

"Them I'm going to make the best chicken you've ever had," he told me with a smile before he took the cart and walked right past me. "Come on, slow poke. You're burning daylight."

I rolled my eyes and started to walk after him, but he had already turned and disappeared from few. I couldn't help but chuckle at how excited he was about food, but I guess it was normal. He did grow up with a family who enjoyed cooking. I sort of wished I had a family like that, but I come from a long line of people who do take out instead.

Just as I was about to turn the corner, I heard a couple of voices that made me stop dead in my tracks. Fear started to spread through me, and awful flashbacks began to run through my head. 

There were three voices. One was Evan's, and the other two belong to two girls that were in the grade below me. Regina and Callie. I could tell it was them by their high pitched voices. Those two were one of Jasper's biggest supporters, and I happen to know for a fact that the two of them were both notches on Jasper's bed post. There were not enough pillows in the world to drown out the sound that came from that room.

"So, did you hear about the party that Dean is throwing tonight?" Callie asking in her annoying high pitched voice. I peered past the corner to see that those two had Evan backed up into a corner. "You're going, right? Dean managed to get a fake ID and he already got a couple of kegs."

"No, I got better plans tonight," Evan said as he started to look around for me, but his face fell when he didn't see me.

"Better than going to a party with your two favorite girls?" Regina asked as she batted her obviously fake eyelashes at him. She even went as far as to place her hand on top of his, which made my blood boil. However, that quickly faded when he pulled his hand away from hers. I couldn't help but smile when I saw a look of shock spread across Regina's face from being rejected.

"Actually, I only have one favorite girl, and she's around here somewhere," he said as he looked around again. My heart started to race in my chest. Was he talking about me?

Callie and Regina looked at each other with a confused look and turned to look back at Evan and spoke at the same time. "Who?"

"I don't think that's any of your business," he says as he crossed his arms over his chest. "Now, why don't you two go run along. It's supposed to rain today. You don't want your spray tan to run now, do you?"

Regina and Callie let out a huff as both of them stormed off towards the exit. I couldn't help but snicker at those two being shut down. 

"You can come out now, Hattie," Evan said when the two were out of view. I couldn't help but gasp as I peek out through the corner.

"How did you know I was here?" 

Evan motioned down to my feet. "Your crutch was sticking out."

I glance down to see the bottom on the crutch sticking out a couple of inches which could clearly be seen. "Whoops."

Evan let out a chuckle. "Thanks for all the help back there. I take it you're not a fan of those two, am I right?"

"They're the worst," I told him as I took a couple steps toward him. "Sorry, though. I just kind of froze back there."

"It's okay," he said as he wrapped a protective arm around my waist. "I'll make sure they won't bother you again. I promise."

"I'll hold you to that," I say with a chuckle as I glance into the cart to see a few items that I didn't put in there. "Did you get everything you needed?"

Evan looked down at the cart and glanced at the items. "Do you have onions?"

I thought for a moment. "I'm ninety-nine percent sure I have one floating around the fridge."

"Works for me," he said as he removed his arm and placed both hands back on the cart.

"What are you cooking?" 

"It's a surprise," he said as turned to me and smirked.

I shook my head and chuckled. "Why do I feel like I'm going to get food poisoning tonight?"

He shrugged as he steered the cart into the checkout lane. "Probably because you're weird."

I looked up and frowned. "You calling your favorite girl weird?"

Evans eyes snapped up to me and he was placing the cans of soup onto the counter. "You heard that?"

I nodded. "Of course I did. What? Was that all a lie?"

Evan chuckled as he shook his head. "You might have to fight my mom and grandmother for that position, but I'm rooting for you."  

"I can take them," I say as I reached into my front pocket and pulled out my wallets. When mom left, she left behind one of her credit cards for me to use for groceries. I quickly pulled it out and shoved it in the card reader when the cashier told me too.

Evan chuckled as he placed the last back into the cart and started to head towards the door. "I don't know about that. They're both hair pullers."

When we stepped back outside, the both of us were hit with a wave of hot air. I looked up at the sky to see that there wasn't a cloud in the sky.

"Is it really supposed to rain today?" 

Evan looked over at me and smirked. "Not that I know of. I was just trying to get them away from me and that was the only thing I could think of on the spot"

"Good choice, but I probably would have gone with them melting in the rain," I say as we turn into the parking lot. We were almost to the car, and when we approached it, the trunk popped open.

"Dang, that was a good one," he sighs as he walked over to the trunk and started to put the food away. "I'll have to remember that one."

I chuckled as I started to get in the front seat. It was getting easier to maneuver around with this big hunk of plaster on my leg, which was a good thing. Just as I got into my seat, Evan had finished placing the food in the trunk and began to take the cart back to the front of the store.

Just as I went to put on my seat belt, I suddenly got the feeling as if I was being watched. I straightened up in my seat and began to look around. At first, I thought the parking lot was empty. There wasn't another soul in sight, at least, that was until I saw two sets of eyes glaring daggers at me.

Directly across from where the car was parked was a candy apple red Volkswagen Beetle. And inside of it was Regina and Callie. The both of them were passing what looked like a cigarette back and forth as they stared at me with their cold dead eyes.

My stomach dropped as I sat there in my seat, and all I wanted to do was disappear. I knew that the both of them would approach me if I was by myself, but since I was with Evan they stayed put. The probably didn't want to ruin their chances with Evan. Just as Evan came back into view, Regina pulled the car out of the parking spot, but that wasn't before Callie motioned her thumb over her neck.

'You're dead', she mouthed, and with that, they were gone.    

"You okay?" Evan asked when he got inside the car and noticed that I was slightly shaking. I knew that those two couldn't do anything to me at the moment, but those two were known for holding grudges.

"I'm fine," I say as I turn to face him.

"You don't look okay," he says as he reached forward and placed the back of his hand on my forehead. "You're heads not warm. Do you feel sick?"

I chuckle as I reach up and pull his hand off of my head. "I'm fine. Now let's hurry up and get that chicken into the fridge."