“Looking, I’m just looking.” Said the woman to the shop clerk.

“What ingredients are you looking for?” He questioned in hopes of assisting her.

“Love, compassion, promise, tears, fertility, fidelity, honesty, passion, communication, butterflies, knots, kindness, chivalry, joy, climax, and eternal happiness.” She replied with her eyes gazing curiously over shelves of “curse,” and “virus.”

The clerk stared at her with surprise in his eyes and said “W-wow! Are you attempting to bake the ‘Lover’s pie’!?”

As she turned to him she smiled and said softly “This is not an attempt my dear, I have made it on many occasions…but lately no one seems to sell the ingredients I need. Oh dear, this seems to be the case for you as well.” She sighed and her gaze dwindled.

“Y-you can substitute m-most of these ingredients though ma’am.” He said as he gestured toward a shelf that harbored spices of “anger,” “envy,” “hope,” and “lust.”

“You cannot make a “Lover’s pie” with such selfish deeds…” She sighed and checked her watch which read 6:57. “It’s getting late anyone can see that you cannot help me.”

The clerk broke a sweat and stared at her with look of determination as she took slow, depressing strides towards the exit. And then a rush hit him, the next thing he knew was that he was standing next to her with his hand firmly clenched around her pale arm. Seeing the shock in her eyes he let her go and hid his hands behind his back and sent his discomfited eyes towards the speckled garnet floor. Her pale skin glistened red where he had held her and finally he said “Ma’am, I can help you. I can help you get these ingredients but you must promise me that you will never tell another soul what you are about to see.” He spoke in serious tone as he brought his eyes back up to meet hers, coy and blue.

“And what could you possibly reveal to me that an oath be required?” She smirked.

“Trust me. Trust me and just promise.” He replied repetitively.

She smiled and sighed, nodding in approval as she said sincerely that she “Promises not to tell a soul.”

The clerk smiled timidly and crept to lock the door behind her. He walked cautiously to the back of his shop with her at his tail and he led her silently to a hidden corridor. As they walked through this shadowy place candles lit themselves bringing amazement to her eyes. Eventually the hall came to a stop and the pair met a painting, a panting whose colors reeked of pain and agony. And there the clerk stood with a smile on his face, so grim and grotesque; he rushed hurriedly behind the woman and pushed her to the portrait which stretched and screamed the furious cries of woman’s cries. The two struggled a dance of rage—him pushing her and her pulling him, back and forth they went with screams and grunts too criminal to extend and there had spun those words of hatred, the clerk was a man who hated love. And he killed romantic women so they would never find their way until this day… they fought and fought until she kicked him forcefully into the canvas. Hands pulled and tore apart his clothes, his skin, and left not even his skeletal robe. And there she stood breathing heavily and partly frozen and mostly frightened. She had learned that the “Lover’s pie” was a criminal delicacy that can be a lover’s lie. And there she stood checking her watch once again which now read 7:00, an inch in time. And her world faded.