The Devil Walks Among Us; Book l - Completed 4/21/22

High & Mighty

Mid-September, 2019

"What about these, Michael?" Mia asked, holding up a couple of baby outfits in front of him, letting him choose which outfit he liked better. Nodding and pointing to the jacket and socks, Mia smiled as he knew it was one she liked better, too. "I like it too. I wonder who's gonna spoil h-," She immediately corrected herself. She knew the gender of the baby, but upon Michael's request, he wanted to see if he could guess the gender before the baby was born. He watched her blush as she almost spilled the beans in front of him. "I almost spilled the secret, huh?"

Michael smirked at her and he followed behind her as she continued to push the cart throughout the farm and feed store, admiring the little Carhartt outfits the company made for toddlers and newborns. Michael was one to believe that Mia liked to spend money, however, she was glad she spent money wisely by what he could see. He watched her as she looked through multiple work shirts she thought Michael would like. Rolling his eyes, he knew she had given him more than enough.

Besides, he thought it was ridiculous to spend $14.99 on a work shirt.

With a sly smirk, he gently pulled her away as she flipped over the tag to look at the price, telling her that it wasn't necessary. "Fine," She pouted. "I guess we have everything we need?"

He nodded, looking at the feed bags on the flat cart and the smaller items in the basket. Michael nudged her out of the way as he didn't want her pushing the heavy cart in her condition. The store was rather busy that day, the front end smelling of cinnamon as they had a special on wax melts for the fall season. Michael was trying to stay patient as he didn't like being in a room with this many people that could have known who he was. "Excuse me, I'm sorry." An older woman asked Mia as she was standing in the way of the Coca-Cola cooler.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Mia nodded as she moved out of the way, standing closer to Michael as his attention was turned towards her. He recognized her immediately, except she looked different than forty years earlier. Instead of brown hair, she had grey hair and glasses.

Laurie.

Michael's grip on the cart tightened, his veins protruding as he imagined the handle on the cart to be Laurie's throat. She took his eye from him and stabbed him in the neck, the least he could do was get her back for it. Mia had no idea regarding the sudden tension between Michael and Laurie, except seeing how Laurie paused when she recognized Michael.

Laurie gripped the bottle of Coke before stammering, "I'm sorry, excuse me." She said to Mia, grabbing her basket and moving to the other line. Mia furrowed her brows at her, wondering why she was acting strangely around them.

"That was odd." Mia said to Michael, putting the smaller items on the counter for the cashier to scan as she pulled the tags off of the feed bags. "Are you okay?" She asked, taking note of Michael's defensive behavior, seeing that his grip was still tightened on the cart, keeping his eyes on the front door of the store as he watched Laurie rush out of the door, running once her feet his the concrete of the parking lot.

oOo

Laurie shook her leg impatiently in her Nissan truck, clutching the steering wheel with a bottle of Bootlegger clutched between her index finger and thumb, her second one in the half-hour as she sat in the parking lot of the restaurant Karen had stated she and Ray had been taking Allyson and Cameron to in celebration of Allyson's Honor Society scholarship.

"I-I found out that I'm part Cherokee. I guess my dad's, like, seven percent Cherokee." Cameron babbled, nervousness taking over as it was his first time meeting Allyson's parents.