Jerrie Oneshot Book

Pumpkin Patch

A/N: This one has been on my drafts since the start of the summer but I thought it didn't fit the summer vibes, but now it has been raining buckets for almost a week now and the temperature is constantly under 20 degrees so... here's an autumn-y one shot for you guys!

Summary: Jade takes her nephew Karl to a pumpkin patch and finds herself falling for the beautiful blonde selling the pumpkins. Literally.

Edwards' Pumpkin Patch and Corn Maze is packed, and that alone would be enough for Jade to dislike it. She's barely stepped foot out of her car, her nephew Karl bobbing along beside her, when her headache forms. It's cold outside and the air is filled with the sounds of enthusiastic chatter, laughter, and adrenalized screams. There are children and families everywhere, picking through the vegetables, standing in line for hot apple cider, standing in a longer line awaiting a tractor ride through the corn maze, taking photos in the life-size cardboard cutout of three farmers. Jade sighs.

"Okay, let's be quick about this please," she begs Karl as he bounces excitedly toward the gate.

"Don't be such a stick in the mud, Auntie Jade," he tells her with all the carefree anticipation of a nine-year-old about to pick out the perfect pumpkin to carve a batman signal on. "Dad said you have to get two pumpkins, by the way. Just in case I mess up on the first one."

"Sure he did," grouses Jade, but she trails along behind him as they enter the huge patch littered with countless pumpkins. Jade's taken one step inside when she looks up and sees her.

Her being the most gorgeous girl she's ever laid eyes on, wearing a pair of overalls with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and a red beanie tucked down over blonde hair that shines gold in the morning sunlight. Even from this distance, Jade can see the blue of her eyes, the pink of her lips, the breathtaking smile she has as she speaks to a family, hitching up the large pumpkin she's showing to them. Wow, Jade thinks. She tells herself the pumpkin is impressive but she's more concerned with the blonde attached to it.

So concerned, in fact, that she doesn't watch where she's going and her boot-clad foot gets caught in whatever leafy vines she's walking over, and she hits the dust. Oh, god. She face-plants and she can hear someone shout out so it must have looked bad enough to draw attention and Jade wishes she could melt right through the ground. When a concerned voice asks her if she's okay and soft hands on her shoulders urge her up and she knows, she just knows it's the beautiful blonde who had come over to check on her. Jade wishes she never set foot in this pumpkin patch.

"I'm fine," she interjects over the sound of the blonde ordering someone to bring her a cup of cider. She staggers up to her feet with the help of the girl grabbing her hand, and when she looks up to meet striking blue eyes, Jade once again wishes she could have head-butted a pumpkin and knocked herself out because she's never, ever going to get over this mortifying moment for the rest of her life.

"Are you sure you're okay?" says the girl, and to her credit she isn't laughing at all, just peering at Jade in concern. Karl, on the other hand, is sporting a shit-eating grin from where he hovers somewhere at elbow-level below them.

"Not the first time you fell for a girl, Jadey," he says, and she wants to swat at him, but he's already darted a few feet away out of distance, grin growing.

The blonde glances at him curiously, muted amusement in her eyes before she looks back at Jade. "Girls, huh?"

"My nephew," Jade manages to say with an attempt to roll her eyes that comes out as more of a weird twitch. Jesus, she wishes a kid would throw a pumpkin at her head and end her of this misery. The blonde stares at her expectantly and Jade realizes what she's waiting for. "Karl. That's his name."