Chapter 13
13
Josie
I’m at Tabula Inscripta, packing online orders for a local author’s preorder campaign, when the door chimes. It’s Georgia, cane in one hand and phone in the other.
“I just got to Josie’s store!” Georgia says into the phone, flashing me a wide, hopeful smile.
And instantly, I know. She’s talking to our mother. The only person on earth who makes my smart, confident sister regress to an eager-to-please teenager.
I shake my head as Georgia whispers, “Mom’s about to leave for Mexico—she wants to say hello!” Before I can respond, she says into the phone, “Hey, Mom! Josie’s right here!”
She thrusts it at me, and I reluctantly take it. “Hello?”
“Josie!” My mother’s high-pitched voice fills my ear. “Sweetheart! How are you? Are you dating anyone? It’s been so long since you dated anyone, Jojo.”
It’s true , Georgia mouths, and I roll my eyes.
My mom continues, “Georgie sent a picture of you two, and it looks like you’re breaking out a little. I heard about a new acne cream that could help. Darrell can get it for you—he’s a doctor!”
I sigh, not even knowing how to respond. “Who’s Darrell?”
My mom’s laughter peals through my ear. “My fiancé, sweetheart, you know that.”
Fiancé? I mouth to Georgia, who shrugs. I’d bet good money Darrell isn’t actually her fiancé. Or a doctor. Last time my mother was dating a “doctor,” he was just a guy who worked at GNC.
Mom rattles on about Darrell and his time-share in Puerto Vallarta, how she got auburn highlights and bought a new sundress that accentuates her figure. I’m only half listening—until she says something about Georgia meeting her in Mexico.
What? I mouth to my sister, who gets a guilty look on her face and shrugs.
Mom has run out of topics to ramble about. “I’d better get back to Darrell,” she says. “Love you! Kisses and hugs!”
“Love you, too,” I say, but she’s already hung up.
I sigh again; I do love her—but that doesn’t mean I think she’s a healthy person to be close to.
I hand my sister the phone. “You’re going to Mexico?”
“Probably not,” Georgia says, shrugging. “Flights are expensive, and I can’t miss too many classes, but I want to meet Darrell. It sounds like this relationship is the real deal, Jo.”
I grimace. “Which is what she always says. Please tell me you see that.”
My voice is getting snippy—because I’m worried. Georgia, despite taking an entire course in family therapy, doesn’t recognize how damaged our upbringing was. She loves our mom when she’s like this, fun and enthusiastic, albeit a tad flighty and judgmental. But it’s like she forgets that at any moment, Fun Mom could morph into Absent Mom, then into Heartbroken Mom, and there’s nothing we can do.
I can feel my body tensing, like I’m bracing for impact. It’s how I always felt growing up, constantly on guard, never able to fully relax.
“Darrell is good for her,” Georgia insists. “He’s got her playing pickleball, he helped clean out her apartment—”
“Poor man,” I say under my breath.
Georgia’s face is flushed. “She’s going to therapy and taking care of herself and now she’s met a great guy—”
“Like all the other great guys?”
She presses her lips together, then shifts into that exasperating professional tone. “Maybe you should explore why you’re distrustful of relationships, Jojo—Mom’s right, you haven’t dated anyone for a while. And when you do date, you never let yourself get emotionally attached. Why do you think that is?”
I fold my arms and match her tone. “Hmm. What could possibly be the reason, Dr. Klein?”
Georgia swallows. “Okay, Mom wasn’t exactly a shining example of healthy relationships. But this time is different. I don’t understand why you’re not happy that she’s doing well.”
Because I know what happens next, when the knight in shining armor leaves. She’ll chase after this guy—and then she’ll crumble.
My eyes fill with tears, and I blink them away.
“I hope you have a wonderful time in Puerto Vallarta, if you decide to go,” I tell my sister.
And I mean it: I hope that when she arrives, Mom and Darrell are still deeply in love. I hope Mom stays happy forever. I hope she’s found her One and Only and spends the rest of her life with him, safe and secure and adored.
But hope without evidence to support it is a delusion.
Georgia leaves for class, and I turn my attention to my next task: moving a table back to the front of the store where it belongs, then stacking all the new releases on it. The plumber asked me to clear that area so he could work on the pipes in the ceiling, but he had to order parts that won’t arrive for a week, and I can’t handle an entire week with the table in the wrong place.
By evening, the store is empty, so I go into the back room and heat a frozen dinner. When it’s ready, I sit at the desk, which is strategically positioned so I can eat while keeping an eye on the store.
I pull out The Princess Bride . I wasn’t lying when I told RJ I think it’s genius. Ridiculous, yes, but self aware—like the author is having fun. It’s pure literary dessert, as RJ might say—and I’m savoring each bite.
I lose track of time as I read, occasionally pausing to look up and scan my store. But it’s drizzling outside, and no one is shopping, so even though I have a million things to do, I allow myself to get sucked into the story. The feeling reminds me of being twelve years old, reading under the covers with a flashlight because I had to know what happened next.
As Westley and Buttercup are making their way into the Fire Swamp, I become aware of a new sound, a light spattering. I glance into the store—it’s still raining outside—and keep reading.
But the spattering gets louder. Maybe the door is cracked? I force myself to close the book and check it out.
My heart drops.
In the front corner, where the ceiling is exposed, one of the pipes is leaking water. All over my freshly arranged table of new releases.
“No!” I cry, running over. It’s not a full-on stream of water, more like a spray, but it’s covering a large area—the entire table, plus a few feet surrounding it.
Stacked with hardcovers, the table’s too heavy to move, so I start grabbing books—only to realize that exposes the lower layers of books to the water, too. Frantically, I look around for something to cover the table. The construction workers have left plastic tarps here before, but of course, not today. I run into my back room, find a box of trash bags, and race back to the front of the store.
I groan. The top layer of books is dotted with water—the beautiful dust jackets ruined, unsellable. Trying not to cry, I yank trash bags out and spread them across the books. The spray coats my hair, dripping into my eyes and blurring my vision—though that might be tears, too.
“Why is this happening to me?” I wail, out loud.
Out of the corner of my waterlogged eyes, I see a large blur coming toward me.
“What the—?”
I step back and wipe my eyes to clear them, shocked: Ryan Lawson is here. In my store. Voluntarily.
He’s bending at the waist, putting both hands on the heavy wood table and giving it a giant heave. The table moves a full foot across the floor, and he keeps pushing, grunting with the effort, until it’s clear of the water.
Then he straightens up, brushing wet hair out of his face, and turns toward me. Our eyes meet, and it’s like the entire world slows down. He’s not wearing his glasses, his hair is swept back, and he’s giving off serious Clark Kent vibes—only, like, midtransformation. It’s unexpectedly appealing. Hot nerd meets superhero.
“You moved my table,” I say stupidly.
He removes the earbuds from his ears. “Yes.”
“Why?”
One corner of his mouth lifts. “Because it was getting wet? Like I said, I’d help you if you needed it.”
He doesn’t sound smug, though. He sounds awkward. I’m still staring at him, so I clear my throat and turn my attention back to the table. All these beautiful hardcovers, destroyed. Thousands of dollars of stock. My stomach twists.
“This is bad,” I say quietly.
Ryan comes up next to me. “Xander has insurance, right?”
“Yes, but…” My throat swells with panic. One of the baristas at Beans once accidentally left a metal spoon in a blender, which caused it to explode. Xander decided not to file a claim because he didn’t want to pay the deductible. He made Eddie eat the cost. “I don’t think he’ll use it for this.”
“The plumber must have done something wrong—he should cover the damages,” Ryan says, looking up at the ceiling.
I shake my head, despair creeping over me. “He told me to leave the area clear until he could come back next week, but it was blocking the flow of the store.” I shrug helplessly. “It’s my fault. That’s how Xander will see it, anyway.”
This will destroy my bottom line.
Ryan picks up a book. “The top layer of books might be ruined, but the ones underneath aren’t bad.” He takes off the dust jacket and peers at it. “Some might be salvageable. You couldn’t sell them for full price, but maybe at a discount?”
His tone is so peculiar. He sounds…concerned?
“Here, let’s get these off and see how it goes,” he says, and starts removing dust jackets. “Do you have any towels? And something to put around that pipe?”
Robotically, I grab paper towels, duct tape, and more trash bags from the back room, then return to the table.
Ryan is taking the wettest books off and setting them on the floor. The books underneath the top layer just have a few water speckles on them, and the relief I feel is overwhelming.
As Ryan duct-tapes layers of trash bag around the leaky pipe, I call the plumber, who says he’ll come soon to take care of it. Ryan and I turn our attention back to the books. Some are ruined, but fewer than I expected. Fewer than there would have been, if he hadn’t come.
“Why are you helping me?” I ask, my voice wobbling.
Ryan looks up. Again, his face startles me. The strong jawline, the way his eyes catch the light, his easy, unguarded expression—it’s doing things to me. “Because your books were getting damaged?”
“Yes…but I’m your competition. You could have let everything get ruined.”
If our situations were reversed, I might have done exactly that. That’s how badly I’ve wanted to crush him.
Ryan’s forehead wrinkles; he looks genuinely upset. “Books are too important to be casualties in our war, Josie.”
His words hit me in the chest, and I nod without speaking. We work silently, stacking the ruined books in the back room, removing the dust jackets from the damp ones and spreading them across the floor, arranging the dry ones back on the table.
Ryan is meticulous, handling the books with care in his big hands, his eyes narrowed as he inspects the spines and pages. We don’t talk, and I’m glad—my throat feels swollen and raw. I keep worrying that I might start crying, not because of the damage, but from relief. From the sense of solidarity, the comfort of having someone at my side who understands exactly how awful this is.
I wonder what would’ve happened if we’d met some other way, not as competitors but as two fellow booksellers. Maybe we could’ve been…friends?
After we finish, Ryan follows me to the back room with one last armful of soggy books and sets them on the floor next to my desk. I don’t know how to express my gratitude for this unexpected kindness that I don’t deserve.
“Ryan,” I say, “I owe you—”
“Are you reading that?” he asks sharply.
Startled, I follow his gaze. He’s staring at the paperback copy of The Princess Bride on my desk.
Instantly, my hackles go up. “Yes.”
All that openness I saw earlier in his face? Gone. His eyes dart between the book and me.
“No way,” he says, almost to himself.
“Are you judging my reading choices?” I demand, hands on hips.
He doesn’t seem to hear; he’s running both hands through his hair in agitation, staring at me with the strangest expression. Like he’s seeing me for the first time.
“No fucking way,” he says.
And without another word, he’s gone.