His frown got even…frownier.

There was no getting around it now. “I’ll explain in a minute. But here.” I took the basket from him and returned the pots to the shelf before I put the basket down. “Come with me.” I led him toward the store’s office in the back of the building. The door was open, and Mr. Lansky—the store’s owner—was sitting at his desk, looking at his computer.

“Hi, Mr. Lansky,” I said to get his attention.

He lifted his head and smiled at me. “Why, hello! How are you doing, Evelyn?”

“Good, thanks. This is Oren. We’re here to pick up the pots,” I told him. “Mom said you had some for me?”

He grabbed a box on the corner of his desk. “Yes. Right here.”

I stepped into the office and held open my shopping bag with both hands, so he could place the box directly in it.

“Awesome, thanks!”

Mr. Lansky laughed as he made an embarrassed face. “I dropped a box of brand-new pots when I was stocking the shelves last week. At least they’re useful for something.”

I noticed Oren looking from Mr. Lansky to me. He was very confused.

He waved me off when I pulled out the money Mom had given me. “I can’t sell broken pots, especially to your parents. No charge.”

Now Oren looked really confused. I realized he probably thought we had come to buy regular pots. Like, unbroken pots for planting stuff in. But nope. The box Mr. Lansky had given me was full of broken pieces of pottery.

There were so many pieces, in fact, that I wouldn’t have to buy any whole pots just to break up. Which meant Oren and I could both get banana splits if we wanted.

I’d have to explain it all to Oren later.

“Thank you,” I said to Mr. Lansky. “We’d better go.”

“Nice to see you, Evelyn. Say hi to your parents. Nice to meet you, Oren,” he said before he turned back to his computer.

“Come on,” I said to Oren, who was still looking very confused. “I’ll tell you on the way.”

But as we walked out of the store, I wasn’t sure how to explain. Maybe I shouldn’t have promised to show him things at the funeral home. If I didn’t know how to tell him about the pots, how was I ever going to show him the other stuff? The really serious stuff? The scary stuff? I knew we were supposed to face our fears, but this felt different.

We’d gotten about twenty steps from the store when Oren poked my arm and pointed at the shopping bag. “Oh, you want to carry it?” I asked.

His left eyebrow went up like he was saying, Nice try!

“Fine,” I sighed and then blurted, “They’re for the funeral home.”

Now both eyebrows went up.

“You sure you want to hear about it?”

He inhaled and nodded.

“You won’t be able to unknow it if I tell you,” I warned. “And it’s kind of creepy.”