The Nerd's QB

Groceries

Rex has been acting pretty weird these past few days. He's been including me in his and Aiden's conversations, talking to me, acknowledging my presence, sometimes even innocent touches, which I did not believe were innocent at all.

For instance, this morning I climbed up a stool to take out a bowl from the top shelf. But when I was about to fall because of my clumsy nature, Rex caught me. Coincidence? I don't think so.

And right now, he's offering to join me in my grocery shopping. What's up with him?

"Fine but we're taking my car," I put my chin up defiantly and cross my arms over my chest.

"Alright."

I pinched my brows together. He just agreed to ride my pink car. Something is seriously wrong with him. The question is, what?

***

"Hey, look," Rex held up a weirdly round potato. "It's so smooth."

I give a quizzical look. So what? I ignore him and push the cart down the isle, not waiting for Rex to follow. But he follows anyway. And he puts random things we don't need in the cart. "Rex we don't need," I hold the packet up to read the name, "Pickle-Ice. What even is this?"

He shrugs. "We won't know until we try."

I give him a disgusted look and shove it back in his hands. "Put it back." He huffs but complies.

Then he puts another thing. Candy sushi. "No," I deadpan and he puts it back on the rack.

"No, Rex." This time I stop him from even touching the gummies in shape of actual human hearts and he whines.

"You don't let me get anything," he complains.

I feel like the mother of an unreasonable child right now. "Get something non-weird and I'll allow it."

I clearly should not have said that because now he's just putting random cereals and chips in our cart. He even put a questionable green drink. "Rex, I don't think you're going to like most of these snacks."

"I will." He looks so confident that I just let him have it. Grocery shopping with Rex is like grocery shopping with a toddler.

***

When we reach home, I start putting away the groceries and Rex opens the green drink and take one sip. "How is it?"

His pucker lips, pinched eyebrows, narrowed eyes and scrunched nose is enough to tell me he didn't like it. "It's delicious."

I raise an eyebrow at his very obvious lie. "Oh really? Finish it then."

He gives me a pleading look, and I almost concede. But then I remind myself that he bothered me the whole time we were at the store and this is my time for revenge. So I shake my head and put my hands on my waist, waiting for him to finish the drink.

Rex sighs in defeat and takes another sip. "I'm sorry, I give up." He throws the bottle in the trash. "It's horrible."

I raise an eyebrow, waiting for him to admit that I was right. But that never comes. "I bet the other stuff I got are good, though," he rummages through the bags and takes out the pickle flavored chips. Once again his face contorts into one of utter disgust as the chip touches his taste buds. But he's stubborn and keeps chewing and swallows it. "Not bad."

I narrow my eyes at him. Does he think I'm stupid? But after a while of glaring at him, and him not doing anything other than staring out window, I give up. I can't win with a person as stubborn as Rex. I start stashing away the groceries angrily, making sure to slam the cupboard doors.

"You were right, I didn't like any of them."

I turn around, surprised by his confession. I was happy until I noticed that he had opened every one of the things he bought and tried them. "You opened all of them?"

He nods. "How else would I know whether I like it or not."

I grit my teeth in anger. "Now what are we going to do with all these opened snacks? We can't just keep them like this, it'll attract ants."

But Rex doesn't care about any of that. "Throw 'em out."

I take my glasses off. "K don't want to see you right now."

"You're blind without your glasses," he asks while mock-punching me. I yelp and jump away. "You can see!" He points an accusatory finger at me.

I roll my eyes. "I'm not blind, Rex. Everything's just a little blurry without my glasses."

"Oh." He snatches my glasses from the counter and tries them on. "Ugh-" his brows pinch together and eyes close shut tightly. "This hurts my eyes."

I pluck them off his nose and put them on. "Because your eyes are fine. And don't do that again, you'll end up needing glasses too if you keep doing it."

"Yeah," he nods. "That'll be a problem. Nobody wants a football player who wears glasses. I'll look like a frumpy nerd."

"Hey!" I smack his chest with Saran wrap package but he just laughs.