Chapter 11
THE BELL JINGLED AS I pushed open the door to And Then There Were Books.
From the old, worn, mismatched throw rugs that covered the floors, to the endless rows of books crowded on the towering shelves like New Yorkers on a too-full subway car, to the familiar scent of coffee and old books that filled my senses as soon as I’d stepped inside, it was as if time stood still.
As if the bookshop had been holding its breath since my last visit, patiently and loyally awaiting my return.
“Well, look who it is.”
Edith stood behind her desk, just the same as she always had been—with her glasses perched on her nose, her white hair pulled into a neat, low bun, her knit cardigan buttoned high, and her simple gold cross around her neck.
She beamed and rushed out from behind the desk, folding me into a warm, long hug.
“Hi, Edith.” I smiled. She smelled the same way she always had too. Like vanilla with a hint of cinnamon.
“Oh, my, what a treat it is to see you, sweetheart.”
“The feeling’s mutual.”
She pulled back, took a good look at me, and lovingly cupped my face.
Interestingly, Edith didn’t look much older than when I’d last seen her.
She had never not had those fine lines or that ivory hair.
She was the type of woman who, in my mind, had always been eighty years old. A surrogate grandmother of a sort.
Edith hadn’t ever had children of her own, though she told me she’d prayed for them.
Many times. “But the Lord showed me other ways forward,” she’d always said, often with as much acceptance as her voice could muster.
Of course, her voice always held notes of sorrow that I’m sure she thought she’d concealed better, while her gaze would drift off for a few moments.
I’d always guessed she was picturing what might have been.
After Edith had suddenly and tragically lost her husband to heart failure a few decades ago, she had been left all alone with a life that looked nothing like what she’d thought it would.
In the midst of that we had become fast friends, close confidantes of one another.
“There’s no doubt about it. God brought you to me.
I needed you just as much as you needed this bookstore,” she’d said over the years.
“And you, I needed you too,” I had always replied.
I understood her need to grasp on to some meaning in her deep disappointment, but more than anything else, I’d felt angry for her.
Angry at God, at his apparent lack of care.
It didn’t make sense to me that God would have allowed something for her life that was the opposite of what she prayed for, what she yearned for, what she hoped for. What she deserved. It wasn’t fair.
“Still as beautiful as ever! Your hair has grown so much. Goodness, how long has it been?” she asked.
“Five years, I think?” I said guiltily, as if I didn’t already know. Edith pursued her lips and wrinkled her eyebrows.
“No, no, that can’t be right. Weren’t you here a year or so ago?”
“No . . . I definitely wasn’t.”
She stared for a few moments, thinking, before shaking her head bashfully. “You’ll have to forgive me, dear. My memory just isn’t what it used to be.”
“Oh, hush, Edith. You’ll outlive us all.”
That got a hearty chuckle out of her. I smiled lightheartedly, but a seed of concern had been planted in my mind.
I’d never really worried about her before.
She was the kind of woman who could get on, who could find her way, no matter what life threw at her.
But still, worry gnawed at my mind. Was Edith okay? How old was she these days?
“How are your sweet parents?”
“They’re, uh, good. I think,” I said in the peppiest voice I could muster. She squeezed my wrist. A kind, knowing smile that I’d seen more times than I could count swept across her face.
“They love you more than anything in the world. You know that, right?”
She was correct, of course. My parents did love me, despite our vast differences that would never not be there.
And I loved them too. Still, Edith had caught on over the years that my parents and I were simply different breeds of people.
Why else would a kid have spent so much time wandering the aisles of her bookstore and befriending a woman who was decades older than her?
“I know, they do. You’re right.”
“That’s not to say it will never not have some challenges, your relationship with them. But if you could know the way those parents of yours talk about you when you’re not around . . .” Edith’s eyes got misty as she smiled softly.
Just then, the bell jingled. In the doorway of And Then There Were Books stood none other than Noah Elliot.