Chapter Twenty-Eight
132 days until graduation
Spending my Saturday night in Meet in the Margins is not unusual, but being here with Jameson is.
Ever since our last time in this bookstore, I haven’t found the courage to spend more than an hour or two here at once, out of fear that I would run into Jameson again.
Now though, I’m not afraid of being civil with him. It no longer makes my skin crawl to sit across a table from him. It might help that we are both hungover, also.
Jameson approaches the table, two coffees from the Meet in the Margins Cafe in his hand. He holds one of them out to me, and I notice by the label that it’s my usual order.
It’s not like plain, black coffee is necessarily a hard order to remember, but the fact that Jameson knows it in the first place makes my stomach flutter just a touch.
“Thank you,” I say, sighing into the first sip.
He nods in reply. “Let’s get started on this speech,” he says, setting his backpack down on the floor next to his chair and his coffee on the table.
The speech.
The one that has been haunting us since the beginning of the year is finally rearing its head in, and while graduation is still a few months away, it’s going to creep up on us quickly.We need to get a first draft started, even if it’s not the definitive version.
I pull the binder I’ve been collecting since freshman year out of my bag and lay it on the table. “I’ve been saving statistics, and I think these could help us compile all the points we want to include,” I say, pushing it toward him.
“Twenty-seven years, is that right?” he asks, opening the binder.
“Since the last female Valedictorian? Yes.”
“And even then, she was accompanied by a boy,” he hums, flipping through the pages quickly.
To others, it looks as if he’s mindlessly skimming, but I’ve seen Jameson read before. He’s reading every word and retaining more of it than almost anyone else could.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t help you be the one to break this cycle, Genevieve,” he says in the most heartfelt way possible.
“That’s why we’re writing this speech—to prove that there is more to Fairwood Prep than the patriarchy of assholes who only get good grades because they play football,” I remind him. “The system of Fairwood may have screwed me over, but I will not allow it to continue to screw over the hard-working girls that are to come after me.”
“Great, so obviously we can’t bring up the issues straight out the gate or else they will cut the volume to the mic, so we need to be strategic,” he says, shutting the binder and pulling his laptop from his backpack.
“Agreed.” I nod.
After at least an hour of working on the speech, getting most of the outline and points we want to hit out of the way, I’d say we’re ahead of schedule to have it done by graduation.Now, we’re sitting in the bookstore, silently reading over what we have done so far.
“How many books do you think are in this giant store?” I ask.
She answers quickly. “Somewhere around eighteen thousand books.”
I look at her with widened eyes, “Have you counted?”
“One day, I got bored while I was sitting here trying to procrastinate. I wanted to calculate how long it would take me to read every book in here.”
“Did you figure it out?”
“Thirty bookcases, all having twelve shelves, averaging about fifty books per shelf. Typically, I can read a regular sized book in about two and a half hours. Considering most of these books are hefty, I rounded it to three. Multiply that all, it gives you about fifty-four thousand hours.”
Before she can think about the amount of days, I answer, “Two thousand, two hundred and fifty days.”
“As a kid, I used to wish I had enough spare time while I was in here to read all the books on at least one of the shelves.”
“How long would it take you?”
I could have figured out the answer on my own, but I want to hear her talk numbers; she’s good at it.
She answers shortly, “I estimate a little over eighteen hundred hours.”
“Okay, so it would take you seventy-six days.” I calculate in my head seamlessly. “I take it math is your best subject?” Referring to her quick, mathematical figuring—which is as fast as mine.
“I could say the same thing about you.” Her voice rolls easily, more so than any other person I’ve ever been forced to talk to. “I’m also shocked, Jameson. I thought you would know better than to think I have a favorite subject.”
Unlike whenever I talk to other people, every time I talk to Genevieve, I make another realization.
Today’s realization?
I’ve never felt forced to talk to her.
“You don’t have a preferred subject?”
Genevieve narrows her eyes. “You don’t need to have a preferred subject when you’re equally advanced in all of them.”
I hum in response. “Did you really used to dream about reading every book on one of those shelves?”
“It’s the only dream I’ve ever had that’s been out of reach. Seventy-six days straight of reading.” She looks off toward the shelves. “I haven’t even been here a combined seventy-six days over the nine years I”ve been coming here.”
“Maybe in your wildest fantasy, Miss Alderidge.”
She looks at the ceiling, a constellation covering it. Her eyes focus on the shooting star. “May all my wildest dreams become my wildest reality.” She says it with such authority that I think the heavens have no other choice but to obey her.
Nonetheless, I counter, “I don’t think it comes true when you say it out loud.”
“This isn’t a birthday cake, Jameson. I’m not blowing out candles.” She takes a step toward the stairs, her heel clacking against the marble of the first one. “Plus, it’s not a wish. It’s a declaration.”
She must be headed for the shelves full of books, which are promptly on the upper level with chairs scattered all around them.
“Why would you want to spend so much time reading anyway?” I admit, I enjoy reading more than the average person, but I would never want to spend seventy-six days doing so. It”s a false reality.
“I like the feeling of being whoever I want to be, in whatever world I want to live,” she responds. “I wish I had enough time in my life to not just read every book but experience them too.”
I smile. “I like that.” Her longing for escapism—while it may draw some questions—doesn’t alter her perspective.
All she does is smile, continuing her path up the stairs, and I decide to follow a few short steps behind.
“You know, if you weren’t wearing heels, you would be able to get up these stairs a lot faster.”It’s a bit odd to me, considering I usually see her wearing mary janes or some type of platform shoe.
I take on a quicker stride, grabbing the inside banister of the spiral staircase. The sound of her heels intensifies as I reach the step that she’s on, keeping pace with her.
“I’m sure that I could, but I would never succumb to the idea of comfort over fashion.”
She’s always so literal; it has to be exhausting. Those heels probably are too. “What about practicality? Ever think about that?”
Genevieve smiles, more to herself than anything. “My mom always told me that if you’re a woman powerful enough to be on a pedestal, it might as well be a good pair of heels.”
“Of course, your mother would say something like that.” We’re still traveling up the staircase, our feet hitting the steps at the same time.
“She wanted to raise a strong, independent daughter. Mostly because I always dreamed of going into a professional field, which is mainly dominated by men. My mom wanted me to hold my own, even when people thought less of me.”
We finally reach the top of the staircase.
“I think she succeeded.”
“Thank you.” She speaks sincerely.
We both take a lap around the upper floor, looking at the first floor over the railing. It’s odd to look down at the lower level of the bookstore, seeing where we have been sitting for the last few hours. All our books are skewed across the table and our backpacks are laying open.
“I’d like to think so too.” She’s looking around just as I am. “God, the way we’re talking makes it sound like my mom’s dead.”
We laugh. Not because we’re best friends, and not because we thought the possibility of her mother being dead was funny, but because it is true. We were both speaking so morbidly when there was nothing morbid to be spoken about.
Once we make it around the entire circumference of the upper level and back to the staircase where we started, Genevieve cuts loose from the path we set, reverting her gaze to one chair that sits next to one of the bookshelves. She sits, smoothing out her skirt as she crosses her right leg over her left. I’ve always been in awe of her pristine and composed ambience—much more now than ever. So much so that I can’t help but stare.
Genevieve looks at me, her face staying neutral. She pulls a single book off the shelf next to her; her manicured fingers run up and down the binding, and her eyebrows furrow as she surveys the book.
I can’t see the title, but I desperately want to know.
What could have her so entranced?
“This was the first book I remember reading.” She answers my question for me.
I take a step closer; she tilts the book up for me to see the cover.
Pride and Prejudice.
“You’re kidding.” I gape, not believing her. “This is the first book you ever read?”
“Not the first, just the first I remember loving.” She shrugs, her shoulders finally relaxing in the chair. “I watched the movie when I was like nine. Then, I immediately read the book.”
“When you were nine?” The seat next to her is open, so I take it.
She shrugs, flipping through the pages. “I began comprehending literature at an early age.”
I pick up another copy of the book, flipping it over to read the back of it. “I haven’t read it in a while, I don’t remember much about it.”
Genevieve looks as if she could have audibly gasped at my confession. “What do you mean you don’t remember much about it?” We make eye contact. “It’s a classic!”
“I didn’t really like romance stories when I read it. I only read it because it was on the classics table at the bookstore, and I was determined to read every book on the table.”I am not trying to create more issues with Genevieve, so I keep my mouth shut about how little I like the book.
“Are you kidding? That’s what you’re calling it? A romance story?” She looks as if she wants to jump out of her seat. “It’s not just about love, Jameson. It’s about the respect that comes with it.”
It’s evident why she loves this book so much, and maybe that’s the reason I see so much of Elizabeth Bennet in her. She’s the exact type of strong-willed, prideful girl that Mr. Darcy would fall for.
“That’s important to you, I presume?”
“I don’t know if you’ve forgotten, but I have been raised in such a way that allowed me to respect myself as much as I respect the people around me.” She stands from her seat, placing the book down where she had been sitting. “I expect the same.”
I stand with her, “Do you really respect the people around you?”
“The ones I value are the ones I respect.”
I’m curious. “Do you respect me?”
Genevieve stops, not even turning to face me as she puts the book back on the shelf. She leans back, looking at the books all in order, but stops when she sees one in the incorrect spot.
For a moment, I think she didn’t hear me. I don’t want to repeat myself though, in case she was listening and is only choosing to ignore me. Then, she turns away from the bookshelf, the incorrect book in hand. She walks along the railing, peering her head up and down at all the different shelves. Eventually, she finds the correct spot for the misplaced book and crouches to push it into the shelf. Now, the book blends in among about a dozen others.
I don’t mind that she didn’t answer my question, and I don’t even know if I would have wanted to know the proper answer now that it’s long forgotten.
But then, she speaks up as she heads for the staircase. “Of course, I do.” She gives me a light smile, which makes a similar one cover my face.
“There has never been a day where you didn’t garner all of my respect,” I tell her genuinely.
She finally makes eye contact with me as I join her on the stairs. “I’m glad the feeling is mutual.”