Disclaimer: I do not own Harvest Moon or its characters. This story was only written for entertainment purposes.

Save Me From Myself

Chapter Fifteen

Abigail watched in fascination as the purple haired farmer placed his sheep in place. It was something she wouldn't ever have the opportunity on doing, brushing and fawning over any sheep, and she was soaking it as much as humanly possible. He had given her small, tiny, advice about how to handle sheep, but it was minimal information. It was almost like he was expecting her to use it against him in the next Festival, which was ridicules since she'd never seen herself as a sheep person. Or a cow person. Or even a horse person. So the possibility of ever using any information against the purple haired farmer seemed highly unlikely. She was very content with her gardens.

As she held his brush, since he was busy moving freshly cut wool onto the display table, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Twirling her head towards the rested arm, her eyes traveled from the appendix to the owner of said arm. "Hi Blue."

The blond farmer nodded his head at her, but refrained from smiling, opting to keep a small frown on his face. His eyes dropped to the brush in her grasp and then they bounced towards Jamie, who was still placing the last few wools on the wooden table. Blue shook his head, in mock disappointment, and signaled towards his Festival rival. "Helping the enemy?"

"Of course not," She mumbled, rocking the brush in her grasp. "Just observing."

Blue chucked softly. "Observing? Well if that's all you're doing, you can come watch Bob and me. Jamie doesn't enjoy being pestered by the rest of the population, especially not during Festivals."

Jamie straightened his back and glared at the blond. He stood silent, however, and watched as she laughed, shaking her head at the blond farmer before sending him on his way. Blue threw him one last look. The universal look of 'good luck' and he mirrored the look back. A small smirk made itself present on Jamie's lips once the blond's back was turned to him. He wasn't in need of luck, he had this Festival in the bag.

"Here you go." She spoke, handing him his brush back, and briefly looking over his wool. He held the brush in his hand, suddenly nervous over her opinion concerning his wool. She looked up at him and smiled. "I may not know much about wool, but Martha once told me that if it looks shiny that it's the best." Her eyes jumped away from his face and she glanced at Blue's table before turning her attention back to him. She inched closer and cupped her hand next to her lips. "You're totally going to win, but don't tell him – " she nodded towards Blue, " – I said that."

He bit back a prideful smile and gave the brunette a short nod.

She straightened herself into a right position and poured her attention towards his sheep.

As she was distracted, Jamie remained vigilant. Casting cautious looks through the growing crowd. In attendance was a little less than half of the town. The Mayor stood on top of his podium, like he did every year, and announced that there was more or less half an hour left until the Festival came to its conclusion. One person in particular was kept on his radar at all times. The dark haired carpenter kept his distance, accompanied with his brother, and refrained from interacting with the brunette farmer.

With a second glance around the crowd, he noted a pair of eyes staring back at him. His back stiffened. Martha was watching with genuine interest. Their eyes locked and Jamie mentally cursed his luck. This wasn't the first, and it would never be the last, time he had felt at a complete loss around the gray haired woman. It was almost like she could read him like an open book and that was a feeling he wasn't too keen on being subjected to.

She walked towards the odd pair, slipping into nurse mode for a brief second to check on the brunette's condition before smiling. Jamie frowned at the smile. It was a knowing smile. Unfortunately, he couldn't figure out why she wore such a smile.

"You two see to be enjoying yourselves." She commented.

There was an undertone in the woman's voice. It forced a suspicious look to cross his face and, with a side glance towards the farmer at his side, he noted that she wore a blush. It seemed as if both woman had shared a silent conversation right in front of him.

Abigail laughed nervously and scratched her chin, trying desperately to rid herself of the heat consuming her face. Martha's ever present gleam wasn't helping matters either. With a shallow gulp of air, she tugged at her hair with one hand and pointed at the purple haired farmer's table with the other. "Jamie has some good looking wool, I was just looking at it."

She mentally slapped her hand over her head. What a horrible lie that was and by the weary look Martha was subjecting her too, she'd seen right though it. There was a glint in the woman's eyes that forced a tremor of nervousness to rack through her body. The nurse's mouth opened for a brief moment, much to her horror, but thankfully Mayor Theodore stepped into the conversation.

He made small talk with Martha and she silently thanked whatever deity had taken mercy on her. The conversation didn't last long, however, and the Mayor was quick to whisk the brunette away, something about wanting to have an update on her life. With a single look towards the purple haired farmer, she gave a small shrug and allowed herself to be taken away.

Jamie watched as the ringleader dressed Mayor of Flower Bud took the farmer away. Martha sighed and stood next to him. He tensed at the closeness and sought a route to distance himself from the older woman. Catching sight of a possible escape route, he began to inch away until she began to speak.

"She'll make some lucky man very happy one of these days." She started and it caught him completely off guard. "Such a lovely girl. Always smiling and lifting other up when they feel down. A real treasure if I don't say so myself. But she should honestly settle down sooner rather than later. There aren't that many available lads, after all."

He remained silent as his eyes tracked the brunette's movements. She made a sudden gesture, raising her hands chest-level and began shaking them, along with her head, giving a negative response. He then noticed Theodore hold his pot bellied stomach as he shook from laughter. She relaxed once more and he finally gave Martha an noise that he was listening. A graveled 'humph' and a half-hearted sneer.

"And you're telling me this why?"

She gave a small shrug. "Oh, I'm just staring small talk, is all. She's got a beautiful garden, don't you think?" Jamie gave a short nod. "I love going down by the beach and looking at the different flowers and crops she grows each season. She's been a wonderful help with herbs for Alex and myself. If it weren't for her, I honestly don't know what we'd do at the Clinic. Nina only seems to be interested in flowers, which is nice, but it doesn't help with medicines much."

He tensed at the mention of the pink haired gardener. Giving his surroundings one last look, he viable relaxed at at realization that the gardener in question wasn't present at the Festival. Jamie gave another short nod during his discreet search, not really listening to what Martha was saying.. And she took note.

She smiled secretly to herself. "That bug of hers must be contagious."

He was about to give a third nod, when the words slowly registered in his head. He turned his full attention towards the older woman and eyed her suspiciously. "What?"

Abigail held back the urge to groan aloud. Mayor Theodore had once again pulled her aside to talk about the 'M' word. She watched silently as he continued to sweet talk her into taking the available bachelors into consideration. But neither Kurt nor Dan had her interest at the moment and she couldn't exactly tell the Mayor that she was falling for the town outcast without being lectured about it.

"You're not getting any younger," she heard him say for the tenth time this year.

"I know, but I'm just not – "

Theodore sighed again, his heavy brown eyes looking at her with disappointment. "Everyone around us is fulfilling their happy endings. I just want to see you happy as well."

She smiled at the nurturing older man and nodded. "I know."

The plump Mayor shifted from foot to foot and closed the distance between them. He glanced around his surroundings, making sure they there were no eavesdroppers, and finally stared at the brunette with a serious expression. "I've heard you've been hanging around Jamie quite a bit these last few weeks. Is this true?"

She hesitated for a second before nodding. "I have."

"May I ask why?"

With a quick shrug, she took a step away from the Mayor and bit the inside of her cheek. "Everyone needs someone to dump their problems on, right? I'm just... um being that for Jamie."

"Hmm." Was the only response the heavy set man gave her. "Very well, you can run along now. I'll be announcing the winner soon. Any guesses?"

She bit her tongue to refrain from answering quickly and shrugged, blatantly voicing the opposite of what she was thinking. "I'm rooting for Blue." And with that she escaped from Theodore's critical gaze.

As it turned out Jamie had indeed won the competition, wasn't much of a surprise to the brunette farmer. She took next to Martha as the purple haired farmer accepted his award, an arrogant smirk plastered on his face along with the twinkle of victory shinning through his azure eyes. The claps around her didn't hold the same excitement, nor the same happiness, her smile gave, but it wasn't a shock. It was almost impossible for the town to be truly happy for the distant farmer with the air of superiority he exuded on the podium.

She briefly looked away and laughed to herself quietly.

"... Thank you all for participating. Until next time."

With those words, the crowd began to disburse. Martha briefly touched her shoulder and whispered her goodbye, lecturing her about resting for a few more days before diving into any hard labor. She nodded and waved the motherly woman off, promising to follow her instructions. From the corner of her eye, she saw Blue, along with Ellen, Bob, and Ann, all working together to usher their sheep back to their farmer. On the opposite side, she saw Jamie doing the same, but all by himself.

She quietly made her way towards the lone farmer and smiled. "Need some help?"

Jamie stared at her over his shoulder and stared. She didn't look sick. On the contrary, she looked like her usual bubbly, happy-go-lucky self. There was still a healthy glow on her face, even though she hadn't been doing much work outside in the sun. Where she ill, that glow would have diminished. Maybe Martha had been lying, but it was hard to believe that the older nurse would lie to anyone. He hadn't had a change to get her to explain, she had weaseled her way out of the conversation before finishing.

"Congratulations, by the way." She pulled off her pack and opened it in front of her. "You can put your brush and stuff in here, less things we'll have to carry."

He looked towards the blond farmer and found his staring at them, curiosity easily been read off his face. "I'm fine." He finally answered, turning his back towards the brunette.

"Oh." The sound of her sullen voice pricked at his, once encased in ice, heart. He sighed silently and listened to the fumbling behind him, she was obviously placing her pack into place. "Okay, then."

With one final glance towards the blond farmer, he noticed Blue and his crowd were gone, leaving them alone. He fully turned towards her and wasn't surprised to see her eyes down casted. Pushing aside the foreign guilty feeling beginning to bubble at the pit of his stomach, he placed his hands on her shoulder and turned her away from him. She made a small noise of surprise, but remained still as he stuffed his tools into her pack.

"What did the Mayor say." He mumbled after a few minutes of awkward silence.

"Oh. Well. You know. Stuff."

"Hn." He voiced, silently taking the fact that she was avoiding giving a direct answer. "Stuff."

"Yeah, stuff. Dumb things, really. Nothing interesting."

He narrowed his eyes, not at all liking how vague she was being about this 'stuff' one bit.

"So, I saw Martha stuck around after I left... What did you two talk about?"

"Oh... we talked about – " He closed her pact and turned back to his sheep. " – Stuff."