Chapter Eight
Eight
Freshly motivated from her lunch with Claudia, Shelby walked a few blocks to one of her favorite SoHo coffee shops, aptly named Back to the Grind. Actually, writing wasn’t a grind. Not even with the pressure of a deadline.
She’d always wanted to be a writer. Maybe every book lover felt that way at some point, and for Shelby, it just stuck. She suspected it was because her family moved around a lot when she was a child. Until high school, she was never in the same place for more than two or three years because of her father’s job. Since she couldn’t keep friends, books were her only constant and reliable companion. In sixth grade, marooned in yet another new school where no one talked to her, she read Sarah Dessen, Ellen Hopkins, even the Eragon novels by Christopher Paolini even though fantasy wasn’t her thing. It didn’t matter: a book was a book. A book was company. A book was belonging.
It was funny, though. She thought once she found a literary agent, she’d have “arrived.” Like she’d reached the finish mark—from wannabe to being . But then, the mark moved: she would feel like she belonged once her agent sold her manuscript. And after that, she’d feel it once the book was published. And after that, she’d feel it if the book became a bestseller. Well, now she had a bestseller. But the mark, that tricky little thing, had moved again: she had to write another one.
Her phone rang. She still half expected it to be Noah, but they hadn’t spoken since the night he came over to pick up his things from her apartment. Instead, it was Colleen. Shelby resisted the urge to send it to voicemail.
Although they’d been messaging back and forth as usual, she hadn’t actually spoken since Shelby left town.
“Hey, Colleen,” she said, trying to sound upbeat.
“Hi! Is this an okay time?”
“I’m at a coffee shop. It’s a little loud. But I can talk for a sec. What’s up?”
There was a long silence. Shelby checked her phone screen to make sure the call dropped. “Colleen?” she said.
“Yeah, yeah—I’m here. Um, I was wondering: Can you come back to Provincetown?”
Shelby frowned. What did that mean? Was she worried she’d never come back because of the blowup with Hunter?
“Of course I will. I just feel like I should give Hunter some space. Maybe in the fall.” She resisted the urge to ask if Hunter had said anything more to her, to gauge if Hunter had softened towards her even a little. But didn’t say anything. She had to focus on work.
“I was thinking more...immediately,” Colleen said.
Shelby picked up on the urgency in her voice. She hadn’t noticed at first.
“How immediately?”
“This week? For the summer. To run the bookstore.”
So, she was teasing her. “Very funny,” Shelby said.
“I’m serious.”
Shelby froze. At the table next to her, two women passed their phones back and forth with loud TikTok videos.
“Hold on a second, okay?”
Shelby stood from the table, scooped up her laptop and bag, and walked outside. Spring Street was hot and crowded and she squinted at the sunlight that hit her from above. She had the urge to walk, as if movement would ward off whatever Colleen was going to say to justify such a request. As a friend, she’d listen. She’d take the time to talk Colleen gently down from whatever ledge she’d climbed onto.
She crossed the street to the shady side, the cobblestones knobby through the thin soles of her sandals. She leaned against the building on the corner, out of the way of people rushing along the sidewalk.
“Colleen, what’s going on?”
“I just found out I can’t work right now. And you’re literally the only one I can reasonably ask to manage the bookstore. You worked here for three summers, my parents love you. They trust you.”
“I don’t understand: Why can’t you work in the bookstore?”
“I have to restrict my activity,” Colleen said. “For at least a few weeks.”
Shelby pressed her hand to her mouth. Was she ill? Recovering from an injury Shelby didn’t know about? She closed her eyes, hating herself for being so self-absorbed that she hadn’t noticed something was wrong. And Colleen probably hadn’t wanted to tell her because she didn’t want to ruin Shelby’s book tour. That was so like Colleen!
“Are you okay? Are you...sick?”
Colleen didn’t say anything for a beat, and Shelby’s heart raced.
“I’m not sick,” she finally said. “I’m pregnant.”
Hunter found out the new bookstore was opening by the end of June. She walked to Land’s End to tell Colleen.
“Hey, Mia. Is Colleen around?” Hunter asked the part-timer, a local high schooler on summer break. The girl had to pull her Beats headphones off to hear what Hunter was saying. Colleen would not be happy to find Mia just hanging around listening to music. Colleen was under pressure to make the bookstore work. Her parents were looking at the summer as a test run. If it went badly, they were likely to go ahead with a sale.
The eighty-year-old bookshop had barely changed since Colleen’s great-great-grandfather, Augustine Miller, first opened its doors. Much of the wood shelving was original, and the tables stacked with books were in the same spot as in the old family photos. One wall had framed vintage, sepia-toned photographs of beachgoers at Herring Cove. Customers could still find a pay phone in one back corner. Handwritten signs, faded from years and bleached from the sun, directed customers to various sections, and an antique iron chandelier hung above the checkout counter. The only thing that changed were the titles on the shelves. And Land’s End customers liked it that way.
“Colleen didn’t come in today,” Mia said.
“Not at all?” Hunter frowned. That was unlike her. Since the day Colleen dropped the shock of the millennium with her pregnancy news, she seemed to be in denial that she’d ever slow down.
“What about managing the store?” Hunter had asked. At the publishing company, one of her colleagues had a baby and went on maternity leave for months.
“I’ve got it all figured out,” Colleen had said, clearly unfazed. “My parents will come in the fall to help with the babies. And while they’re here to help, I’ll hire and train a part-timer. I just need to have a strong sales summer so that I can afford it.”
Now, thinking about that conversation, Hunter felt more uneasy about Colleen being absent. Every day counted towards making or breaking the summer season. That was true for all Ptown business owners. But Colleen’s situation made it seem especially true for her.
Hunter checked her phone for the time. In a half hour, she had a meeting at the Seaport Press office (aka Duke’s living room). Talking to Colleen would have to wait until after work.
She turned to leave, and a familiar blue book cover caught her eye. There it was: Shelby Archer’s damn book on the New York Times bestseller shelf.
Hunter walked out.