One thing leads to another

 Tristan was along for the ride to the grocery store with Nic. Oddly, he felt like he might be dating Nic more than Mona was and somehow that pleased him. Still, he did not want to go to the mega grocery store where his sister worked. She was sure to be there at this time.

Nic drove right past it. Tristan looked over at him blankly.

"What? We can't go there," Nic told him. "It's so expensive. We're looking for deals." Tristan nodded. 

He still kept waiting for Nic to say something. Like how Mona had a lot of bad stuff to say about him. That night the four of them were on the Fifth of July eating nachos, Nic drove the girls home. Tristan was with him then and Mona was the first to be dropped off. Nic didn't even walk her to the door. 

Tristan guessed they were just friends so maybe it was best to keep his cool. Of course, the medication made him feel he was walking in cement most of the time. Still, he wasn't exactly sluggish. 

Soon enough, they were at Aldi with a grocery cart. Making the rounds. Nic picked up bags of nuts. "You can make the chocolate bars go farther if you melt them and put some extra nuts in them." 

Tristan had never thought of that. 

Nic stocked up on every fruit on sale. And there was veg he went for too. He said he liked eating zucchini raw.

"Oh." Tristan winced. Green things really weren't in his diet. And here Nic was holding up a yellow squash. "Have you ever had it roasted?"

Tristan did his best to keep from laughing. He shook his head, no. He looked around, hoping nobody thought Nic was his boyfriend. Luckily, no one really noticed how animated Nic could be over vegetables.

"We should roast everything up with some ground meat," Nic looked at him blankly. "Do you think Jade would eat it?"

"I have no idea." Tristan shrugged.

"You need to find out what she likes," Nic told him. "Mona likes carrots." He put an extra bag in the cart as if they were just for her.

This puzzled Tristan. He never knew this.

 "She won't admit it, but she eats a lot of lot dark chocolate too."

Tristan pressed his lips. He wished Nic would shut up about her.

"Oh, we have to have bacon," Nic remembered as he went toward the dairy goods. He picked up some ham steaks too. "We can  use this for white bean soup."

Tristan followed with his hands in his cargo pants pockets.

"Is anything wrong?" Nic looked back at him. 

"Should..should I be doing something?"

"Look for noodles, oh and rice," Nic told him as he was getting eggs. "Get some oatmeal too."

Tristan gave him a nod. He wondered in the end how much it would cost him, but Nic paid for everything.