This chapter kicked my butt and will plague my nightmares and I still don't really like it but you know what we're just moving on. I know it's not my best but I'm tired of looking at it. Just a small note, the Reina I refer to in this fic is the one from Pioneers of Olive Town, not ToTT/SoS. Anyway please enjoy the cause of my suffering. ~Shaymie

Angela

"You worry too much, Ange! Mollipop's probably just having womanly troubles or whatever!"

Angela cringed, regretting calling her cousin for advice on what to do about her sister. She couldn't believe he was still using that stupid nickname for Molly, either. Then again, Fritz was just a kid, a few years younger than Molly. She didn't know what she expected. She just wanted somebody to rant to about what had happened earlier this morning. She had promised to not fuss over Molly, but how could she not when her sister was crying in her sleep and muttering that bitch's name?

Chelsea Jacobs deserved to burn in hell for what she did.

Angela shook her head and uttered a quick goodbye, hanging up before she wound up blowing up at Fritz. The kid was just trying to help. But still... She couldn't call Kasey about this development. Not just because she knew he'd book the first boat here, job be damned, but he wasn't answering the phone. She gave up calling him after the third voicemail. Today was one of his days off, so maybe he was out with his friends or something. Bastard had a bad habit of not answering his phone when he was at the bar.

"Knock knock!" Luke opened the door before Angela could respond, a huge grin on his face. She rolled her eyes. She didn't think she would ever get used to the friendliness of people here, the way they would just walk in unannounced. She'd almost punched poor Mira her second night here when the older lady came by to give the sisters a slightly belated welcoming gift.

"You know, one of these days you're gonna walk in on me naked," she teased, laughing at the flustered expression on his face.

"W-Why would you be walking around naked?!"

"Sometimes you just gotta let the girls breathe." She groped her chest for emphasis, a wicked grin spreading across her face when Luke's face grew as red as the strawberries growing out in the fields. If she teased him any more, he'd probably have a nosebleed. Angela laughed at the way he was trying to look anywhere but her chest. He was just too much fun to mess with. "Whatcha doing here, anyway? Forget something with the repairs?"

Much to her chagrin, Luke had repaired the barn and coop completely free of charge after finishing with the house. He said that he'd accidentally brought too much material and would prefer to use it on something instead of lugging it back up to the shop and risking a verbal lashing from his dad. Though she hated free handouts, she grudgingly accepted it for her sister's sake. Maybe it would cheer Molly up. She loved her animals like they were her own children. Angela had caught her singing to them when she thought nobody was around and making flower crowns for them.

"It's Chase's birthday today so me and Owen were gonna head down to the bar and see if we could score some free drinks. You in?"

"If it's his birthday, wouldn't he be the one getting the— never mind. I'm in." Angela had long since given up trying to understand how Luke's brain worked. She tied her short hair back in a ponytail and shot the phone one last glare. Hopefully Kasey dragged himself out of whatever ditch he had fallen into and called her back sometime soon. She didn't want to admit it, but his worries about Molly had some substance to them.

The only issue is... what do they do now? This was just one thing, but it could lead to a whole lot more. She refused to be complacent again. Back in the city, she knew something had been bothering Molly, but chalked it down to grief. She should've known there was something more to it, should've noticed the skipped meals and the increasingly baggy clothes. But she had been too focused on trying to salvage the remains of her broken relationship. Not like it mattered in the end.

Angela shook the depressing thoughts from her mind with a sigh. Mikhail was long gone now. She didn't even know why she was thinking about him. She should have listened when Reina said he wasn't good for her. He moved around too much, she'd said. How can you be happy in a relationship where your partner's always on the move and refuses to bring you with him? How can you trust he's not cheating?

"What's the city like?" Luke looked over at her curiously, shoving his hands in his pockets. "We get things imported from there all the time, but I've never been."

"...Annoying," Angela murmured after a few moments of thought, mostly referring to the people there. Nearly everyone she'd known back home was two-faced, pretending to be nice to her face only to turn around and make snide comments behind her back. Reina and Muffy were the only two people apart from her family that she'd trust with her life. Kasey only saw them as airheaded party girls, but he'd never bothered getting to know them. Reina was practically a genius and working to get a job at a museum a few towns over, so hopefully Angela would be able to visit her. Muffy was... okay, she parties a bit too hard, but she's street smart.

"Why don't you like it? Isn't it home?" She frowned at Luke's questions. Her emotions towards the city were complicated. It was her hometown and she'd lived there her whole life, but there were just too many bad things that happened there, practically weighing out the good. She'd been born there, but her mother had also died there. She took her first steps there, but her first (and only) heartbreak had happened there. Molly was born there, but she also nearly—

"I never said I didn't like it." Don't think about that.

"You didn't look happy while you were thinking about it," Luke pointed out. Well... shit. He got her there. Luckily she was saved from making a response by them arriving at the bar. She wasn't in the mood to break down her conflicting feelings about her hometown. Honestly she was surprised Luke had seen through her. She thought she'd put up a pretty good mask of indifference. She looked up at Luke, into his earnest golden eyes, and smiled slightly. He's the first person she's met to see through her so effortlessly.

Maybe I underestimated him...