The Quiet Ever After

Croissant City - 2

Axel sat up straight on the couch, phone in hand and anger simmering beneath the surface. He was alone in the living room. Li'l Raca was on the porch out back, the overhead light on revealing the grubby hands on that baby raccoon body munching away on some croissants. At least he enjoyed the food.

He muttered a few times to himself, attempting to let go of what he was seeing on his phone. It didn't matter. It didn't matter. Social media was fake. Why bother paying any attention to it? The platforms were meant to get you emotional for more interaction and clicks and...

No! This was rude. Maybe.

"Do you think this is about me?" Axel hollered up the stairs.

Nina's meditative LoFi playlist paused. "What are you—hold on!"

She blitzed down the stairs. Despite her superhuman strength and endurance, Nina could still work up a mean sweat during her yoga sessions. Those were, admittedly, also quite superhuman.

"Look. Carla posted this a few minutes ago. She got food poisoning and is blaming it on the taste testing event."

He handed his phone over. Nina read over the dramatic, overly-long Facebook post from Carla:

"I don't know how anyone else is feeling but I know I at least had a few questionable, homemade items that my husband also thought were a little suspect. I get that it was done in good spirits but I wonder if we shouldn't put a restriction on making things from scratch to make sure that the integrity of the meals is safe for everyone. I'm sorry that this has put a damper on what should be an otherwise fun event but now I am fearful for attending."

Nina scrolled to the comments before Axel had a chance to ask her to.

"I didn't plan on going because of that reason. Real food on the grill, I've found, is harder to mess up because there isn't as much to mess up. Plus it's easier to make for a bigger crowd." She raised an eyebrow at the next one. "It doesn't seem all that neighborly to be doing this in the first place because I wasn't given an invitation to go to this in the first place."

"It was an open invite," Axel said. "And that's not even what we're talking about."

"Did you see what Melinda said?" Nina asked. "She agrees with Carla and wasn't all that impressed with our showing and the lack of organization behind it and is apologizing on behalf of everyone that mistakes were made and some people felt excluded as if, lady, you couldn't have personally invited these people? Everyone knew it was happening! Even Ryan knows!"

"He did?"

"He was watching. You were too caught up in everything to sense him. I spotted him checking out the goings-on. I don't think he's going to brunch but whatever, who cares about him."

She handed the phone back to him. Li'l Raca stared into the house, beady eyes pleading that Axel and Nina shut up while he ate. Axel waved to him and the little raccoon got back eating.

Axel spoke softer. "It feels personal. You saw how she was judging the croissant. Plus, she specifically said from scratch."

"Did Jaime and Brittany make the quiches from scratch?"

"No, they didn't have the time. And nobody else really brought anything from scratch. Well, I guess if you count the fruit salad, but I doubt she got food poisoning from that."

Nina leaned against the couch. Axel laid flat on it, reading over the comments again. Nina snatched the phone out of his hands.

"Staring at comments isn't going to make you feel much better," Nina said. "Maybe go apologize to her in the morning, or at least say something."