Chapter 5
FIVE
JESSICA
I’m at the Twin Waves Library, researching how to host a literary reveal night that generates enough revenue and visibility to remind our town why The Fiction Nook matters.
The book club planning meeting is at two. I have three hours to figure out what I’m actually proposing.
I spread my materials across the study table in the back corner—the one with the view of the poetry section, not that I care who might be there on a Tuesday morning.
“Venue capacity,” I mutter, pulling up the library’s event space information. “Catering options. Ticket pricing for similar events.”
I’m fifteen minutes into a spreadsheet that would make Scott Avery proud when movement in my peripheral vision makes me look up.
Someone’s in the poetry section, tall, in an expensive suit, and my heart does a complicated acrobatic routine.
I should absolutely not abandon my research to go spy on my landlord’s reading habits. That would be creepy and counterproductive and exactly the kind of scattered, impractical behavior my ex-husband always criticized.
I’m already standing up.
I creep through the stacks, using the tall shelves as cover. This is reconnaissance. Completely normal behavior for a business owner who’s just...curious about her adversary’s vulnerabilities.
Scott sits in the corner chair with a book of poetry and a coffee cup from Michelle’s shop. He’s not performing for anyone. No sharp businessman mask. Just a man alone with words, one hand absently pressed against his chest like whatever he’s reading physically hurts.
He looks sad, the kind that comes from loneliness and longing and not knowing how to close the distance between who you are and who you want to be.
I know that feeling. I’ve been living it for eight years.
I should absolutely not stand here watching my landlord have feelings about poetry, but I can’t move.
Because this version of Scott—the unguarded one, the one who reads love poems when he thinks no one’s watching—this version makes me wonder if maybe we’re all more complicated than the roles we play.
His coffee cup tips. He catches it, looks up—
And sees me frozen mid-spy-crouch behind a shelf of Emily Dickinson.
We stare at each other.
“Jessica.”
“Scott.”
Silence.
“Are you...looking for something?” His tone offers me an escape route, which is unexpectedly merciful for a man who recently threatened my livelihood.
“Poetry,” I blurt. “For a customer. Who wants poetry. For...poetry reasons.”
Absolutely brilliant. Totally convincing.
“The poetry section is right here.” He gestures at the shelves surrounding us.
“Yes. I see that. Mission accomplished.” I should stop talking. “What are you reading?”
He glances down like he’s forgotten he’s holding a book. “Whitman.”
“‘I contain multitudes’ Whitman?”
His mouth twitches like he’s hiding a smile. “You know his work?”
“I own a bookstore. I know everyone’s work.” I edge out from behind the Dickinson shelf, attempting to salvage dignity. “I still can’t believe you’re a poetry reader.”
“No?”
“You seem more like a quarterly reports person. Spreadsheets with color-coded tabs.”
We’re standing too close now. I don’t remember moving toward him. The poetry section feels smaller than it should, crowded with words about love and longing and all the things neither of us seems capable of saying directly.
“I should get back to my research,” I say, retreating before this conversation can get any more confusing. “I’m planning an event. For the bookstore. Revenue generation. Very exciting stuff.”
“What kind of event?”
I pause. This is probably information I shouldn’t share with the man who holds my lease, but something about his expression—genuinely curious, not calculating—makes me answer honestly.
“A reveal night. For the Letters to Local Authors program. Anonymous pen pals meeting face-to-face.”
His face does something complicated that I can’t read. “That sounds...”
“Terrifying? Potentially disastrous? Like the kind of thing an impractical romantic would dream up?”
“I was going to say meaningful.”
I blink. “Oh.”
“Connections matter.” He says it quietly, like he’s admitting something he doesn’t usually admit. “The anonymous letters... they probably mean a lot to the people writing them. Revealing that—letting people see who they’ve really been talking to—that’s brave.”
“Or stupid.”
“Sometimes those are the same thing.”
We stare at each other for a long moment, and I have the strangest feeling that we’re not just talking about the event anymore.
“I should go,” I say again, actually meaning it this time. “Book club meeting. Event planning.”
“Good luck.”
“With the event or with book club?”
“Both.” He almost smiles. “I hope it works. The event. I hope it’s everything you want it to be.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I just nod and escape before I can do something stupid like ask him what poem made him look so sad.
But I think about it the whole way back to the coffee shop.
Twin Waves Brewing Company is already chaotic when I arrive. Michelle has commandeered the large corner booth and covered the table with paper, markers, and what appears to be a hand-drawn floor plan of my bookstore.
“She’s here!” Amber waves me over. “We started without you. Jo had ideas.”
“Good ones or terrifying ones?”
“Both,” Jo says serenely. “I made a timeline.”
I slide into the booth, accepting the latte Michelle pushes toward me. The Bookaholics Anonymous crew is in full planning mode: Michelle with her laptop open, Amber taking notes on her phone, Hazel arguing with someone via text about catering options, and Jo presiding over it all.
“Okay.” Michelle pulls up a document. “Letters to Local Authors: The Reveal. We’ve got a venue decision to make. Your shop or the library community room.”
“Let’s do it in August. That gives us six weeks. Next: how does the reveal actually work?”
This is the part I’ve been avoiding thinking about.
“The anonymous correspondents would need to RSVP,” I say slowly, working through it. “Confirm they want to participate. Then on the night of the event, we do some kind of...matching ceremony? People find out who they’ve been writing to?”
“That’s adorable,” Amber says. “And also terrifying. What if someone’s been writing to their secret enemy? Or their ex? Or their—”
“We’re not helping,” Hazel interrupts. “How many active correspondences are there?”
“Twelve pairings currently. Some have been writing for months, some just started.”
“And you’re one of them,” Jo says. Not a question.
The table goes quiet.
“Yes,” I admit. “I’ve been corresponding with Coastal Quill for about six months.”
“The one whose letters make you look like you’re experiencing a religious awakening?” Michelle asks.
“Does everyone in this town discuss my facial expressions?”
“Yes,” all four of them say.
“The point is,” Jo continues gently, “you’ll have to meet your pen pal. Are you ready for that?”
I wrap my hands around my latte, buying time. “I’ve been telling him to be brave. To reveal himself and trust that vulnerability is worth the risk. It would be pretty hypocritical to back out now.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“I know.” I take a breath. “I’m terrified. What if the real me doesn’t match the letters? What if he’s disappointed? What if meeting destroys the connection instead of deepening it?”
“Or,” Amber offers, “what if it’s wonderful? What if he’s been just as nervous, and you meet, and everything you felt through the letters is even better in person?”
“That seems statistically unlikely.”
“Why?” Hazel sets down her phone, giving me her full attention. “You’re smart, kind, passionate. You run a bookstore that matters to people. Anyone would be lucky to know you.”
“My ex-husband didn’t think so.”
The words slip out before I can stop them. The table goes still.
“Your ex-husband,” Michelle says carefully, “was an idiot who didn’t deserve you. And his opinion has exactly zero bearing on who you are or what you’re worth.”
“I know that intellectually, but his voice is still in my head, you know? Telling me I’m too romantic and impractical, that my dreams are nice but not realistic.”
“Screw his voice,” Amber says firmly. “Replace it with ours. You’re brave enough to host this event and to meet your pen pal. And whatever happens, we’ll be there.”
“What she said.” Hazel raises her coffee cup. “To being brave and telling the voices in our heads to shut up.”
We all raise our cups.
“Now,” Michelle says, shifting back to business mode, “let’s talk promotion. We need to get word out about the event, encourage RSVPs from the pen pals, and generate ticket sales from the general public.”
“I can design flyers,” Jo offers. “And post in the Driftwood and Dreams window.”
“Social media campaign,” Amber adds. “I’ll coordinate with the restaurant’s accounts.”
“And I’ll manage the pen pal outreach,” Michelle says. “Draft a letter to all current participants explaining the event and asking if they want to participate in the reveal.”
They’re all looking at me.
“What’s my job?” I ask.
“Your job,” Michelle says, “is to write to Coastal Quill. Tell him about the event. Invite him personally.”
My stomach flips. “And if he doesn’t want to come?”
“Then you’ll know. But I don’t think that’s going to happen.” She reaches across the table and squeezes my hand. “Someone who writes letters like that—who’s been honest and vulnerable with you—isn’t going to run away from the chance to meet you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No. But I believe it.” She grins. “And I’m usually right about these things. Ask Grayson.”
The planning session continues for another hour. By the time we’re done, we have a timeline, task assignments, and a preliminary budget.
Six weeks until I meet Coastal Quill and to find out if any of this is real.