Page 7 of Red Flag, Green Light

It’s not my fault she’s chatty and was always appointed to bring my grocery order to my car. Anything can happen when faced with a chatty person in the wild. Which is why I try to avoid the wild.

Whenever I go outside, the outside tries to get me.

Amelia Christmas isn’t the only friendly, bubbly, bright person to have latched onto me without warning throughout all my years upon this earth. She isn’t even the only person I’ve been unable to avoid in this town.

Lyra Gold, the local plant nursery owner, also treats me like a friend any time I call to ask about her plants. Graciously, she does deliver and hasn’t prompted a deeper relationship like Amelia, but it is still harrowing to realize this pattern ofpeople collectingpersists, even now, even here, in small town Bandera.

It’s not even thefriendlypeople, either. It’s just…

I have a problem.

When I meet someone, I become someone else. Someone who isn’t me. Someone the other person will like, accept, I don’t know. It takes a while to find my way back tomein the aftermath, and generally, once I do, things begin to fall apart, so I pick the act up again and call everything I actually am abadday.

It’s been the vicious cycle my entire life.

With everyone.

Except, notably, Amelia.

Who not only seems to accept me despite my real blunt, detached character but also seems to enjoy spending time with it.

Even when I do things like this:

“Bye, Mellie,” I say into the self-imposed silence following her little comment about how Brianisn’t my type. No one’s my type. Because my type belongs in dark romance novels. Like the one I am supposed to be editing. Right this very second. I have provided her with that information, so now I am going to go. And she won’t even hate me for it. She’ll call again in a few days, and I’ll learn more about Brian than anyone ever should.

“Will I see you at work tomorrow?” she asks hopefully, as though putting groceries in my car is a lavish get-together.

“Hm…” I guide my attention toward my computer calendar. Since it’s a holiday week, I placed my order yesterday to make sure I’d be able to pick up tomorrow, considering I am all but entirely out of food and have possibly only a few grains of rice left to eat. My meal plan rotates monthly, and I go through phases of what I feel like eating, so my order is generally simple, just bulk. Each month, I only need to throw it together and add whatever I’ve decided on for my special treat. The novelty of my treat is what motivates me to retrieve my order instead of staying home until I starve to death. Tickling apprehension niggles in my stomach, but I say, “Should, yes.”

“Yay!” Amelia cheers. “I can’t wait! See you tomorrow.”

When my phone screen goes black, tension eases from my shoulders.

“Why am I like this?” I mumble as I get my work documents pulled up.

Talking to Amelia on video chat for hours on end isfine. Messaging Rouge, my favorite client, off and on all day long isfine.

I don’t know what it is about physical people and being outside my literal comfort zone that spikes my adrenaline, curdles my stomach, and compels me into a state offlight, fight, fawnwhere I inevitably choosefawnwith a commitment that is deeply concerning.

Here, in my house, there’s a level of control I don’t get outside. If something goes terribly wrong, I pull the plug. I end the call. I curl up under my comforter, take deep breaths, and remember there’s a block button.

Escape isn’t as simple beyond the virtual landscape I’ve crafted for myself here.

The worst part is: I don’t even know why I feel like Ineedto escape. I don’t know why I feel like Ineedto be liked by strangers.

I grew up in the city surrounded by people that I knew how to make like me. I have no horror stories to report. Nothinghappenedthat was so devastating it makes sense for me to have lost all trust in humanity—even amid general crime and unavoidable congestion. I wasn’t teased. I wasn’t afraid or anxious. I’d walk to Walmart from my neighborhood to pick up candy when I was younger than is advised. I’d talk to strangers along the way. They’d all be kind and like me before our conversation ended.

The worst thing I can remember ever almost happening is when some new kid in high school tried to tell me thatgingers had no souls. Within seconds, half the class was on him, a barricade between us, demanding he shut up and apologize.

So he did. And he never spoke to me again.

This power results in protection, but it also results in learning more than I know how to handle about completestrangers. Being safe around people means carrying too many burdens. It means creating the peace. It means becomingsomeone else.

So, when I got old enough and had saved enough, I came here. To this backwater town in no man’s land. Where, finally, I was allowed to justbe.

Chapter Two

Intruder alert.

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