23- Lincoln

“Okay.” I tried for a smile as I stood. But my cheeks ached from all the fake smiling I’d been doing for the last hour.

The red-headed woman, who I was pretty sure was at least twenty years older than I was, looked confused. “Okay?” She stood up from the table across from me, a paintbrush still in her raised hand.

“Right,” I said. “Goodbye then.”

“Um,” she said, glancing around like maybe she thought she was being pranked. “Goodbye?”

Her name was Kami, and a lot of the things Kami said sounded like questions, but technically should have been statements. It was one of the things that made me certain that this setup—like every single one of those my mother had orchestrated so far—was not going to result in any kind of happily ever after.

“Yep,” I confirmed, since she insisted on continuing to look confused.

“Okay,” she said.

I took that as agreement and picked up my latest hastily painted ceramic frog and delivered it to the tall dark-haired girl behind the counter, who offered m