Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Lennon
I’m in love.
I step out of the tiny grocery store, clutching a heavy tote bag against my chest, and I’m pretty sure I’m glowing. When I walked past this place looking for flowers that didn’t exist, I barely glanced at it. Now, I’m mad at myself for that.
Everything inside that place smells like it had been pulled from the earth five minutes ago. There were crates of apples, loaves of real crusty bread, and fresh butter.
God, I love good butter.
Good ingredients make me emotional on a normal day. On a bad one, they feel like proof that the world hasn’t gone completely rotten.
I went in planning to grab the basics for lemon-blueberry muffins, and somehow I walked out with all of that plus the most perfect sourdough boule I’ve ever seen in my life and a wedge of Brie I absolutely do not need but absolutely deserve. I haven’t eaten since the gas station burger.
Was that yesterday?
Time is soup, and my stomach is protesting loudly enough that a passing old lady gives me a sympathetic smile.
It’s fine. I will go home, make a sandwich the size of my face, change into comfy clothes, and take the longest nap any human has ever taken in the history of sleep. Then maybe, maybe, I’ll open the journal currently burning a hole through my tote bag and my conscience.
Or maybe I won’t.
I’m terrified of reading it. Hence, this detour.
I know there’s nothing written inside it that could magically fix anything. It can’t be more than a time capsule of a twenty-three-year-old Tessa. It can’t bring her back to me. Or my mom, my home.
I’m so lost in my own personal pity parade that I step straight into the crosswalk without looking.
A horn blares, making me jerk back, and my heart jumps into my throat as I hitch my bag onto one arm.
That’s when I realize two guys are already waiting for the light, standing next to me at the curb.
They’re young, probably high schoolers, both tall in that lanky way teenage boys typically are. One has glasses and a smug expression plastered onto his face, and the other stands out, catching my attention.
He looks like a fairy decided to try out a punk phase and absolutely nailed it.
He has black curls on top, fading into honey-blond underneath, a ton of freckles dotted across his cheeks, and eyes accentuated with dark eyeliner.
There’s silver everywhere—earrings, nose ring, and crystal rings stacked on every finger.
He’s practically drowning in an ancient leather jacket over a white band tee and the baggiest jeans known to mankind.
But he also looks small, way smaller than he should be, given his height and frame. His shoulders are curved in, and his chin tucked down as he seems to shrink away from Smug Glasses, who is leaning into his space with a little too much force and a lot too much entitlement.
“You’re such a freak, Shaw.” Glasses laughs in his face. “You trying to curse someone with those stupid rocks again? Your whole family’s a fucking embarrassment to this town.”
Fairy Boy—Shaw, apparently—takes another step back, eyes glued to the ground. He clearly wants to ignore him, but Glasses reaches out and grabs the front of his jacket.
Yeah. Hell, no.
Some things don’t require thought. A kitchen fire, a boiling over sauce, or a cruel boy with his hands on someone smaller.
You just move.
I take one big step and then slap my hand down hard on Glasses’ forearm, just above the wrist, and his grip slackens in shock. Then I slide between them and push Shaw behind me.
“Who said you could touch him?” I ask, using the tone that has made grown line cooks freeze mid-chop.
Glasses gawks at me. “Uh, nobody, ma’am.”
Ma’am? I almost snort.
“Yeah.” I reach back and wrap my hand around Shaw’s bracelet-covered wrist. “Respect your elders.”
The crosswalk sign turns to go, and I pull him after me across the street, only dropping his wrist when we make it to what feels like a safe distance away, about halfway down the next block. He stops moving and stares at me with the biggest blue eyes I’ve ever seen, peeking out under messy curls.
Then his face transforms, breaking into a crooked grin. Dimples. Of course, the fairy has dimples.
“Respect your elders?” He smirks. “How old are you, like… twenty-five?”
I snort for real this time. “I already rescued you. No need for flattery.”
“It’s not flattery. You look the same age as my brother. How old are you?”
“Add ten years, and you have it.”
His eyebrows shoot up, but I glance over his shoulder and see Glasses coming down the street toward us. I put a hand on Shaw’s back and get him walking. “Where do you actually need to go?”
“To the inn at the end of the street.” His curls bounce with every step.
“Good.” I tighten my grip on my grocery bag and keep marching, glancing back a few moments later to see Glasses is still trailing behind us. “Does that asshole bother you a lot?”
“On a daily basis, yeah.”
“Is he seriously following us right now?”
Shaw sighs. “Probably not. We’re kind of neighbors.”
“Okay. Then I’m staying with you.”
“That’s not necessary,” he says quickly. “He does this every day. And it’s not like he’s wrong about the weird part.”
I stop dead and look at him straight on. “He is wrong.”
“You don’t know me yet.” He huffs a soft laugh. “And everybody who does says so.”
“Then everybody else is wrong.”
His smile brightens, and I smile back before I start walking again. “Listen, I got bullied plenty in school, but you know what? I have never once been hated by someone I’d want to trade places with.”
“What if I do want to trade? Most of them have money and normal families. They fit in…” His voice is barely more than a mumble, and it makes my heart hurt.
Poor baby.
“If they have the time and energy to be that cruel for zero reason? Trust me, honey, you do not want their life.”
Dad used to say the exact same thing when I came home crying. “Lenny, miserable people only know how to make more misery. You stay sweet.”
God, I hated high school.
I glance back one more time, and there’s no sign of Glasses anymore, so I take a step away from Fairy Boy, and we both sort of hover.
“I’m sorry.” I shift the grocery bag again. “That was… probably too handsy.”
He shrugs. “Don’t worry…. ma’am.”
Little shit.
“Ha-ha,” I deadpan, holding back my smile at his pleased grin. “How old are you, anyway?”
“I’m turning nineteen on the Winter Solstice.”
My smile breaks free. “So you’re a Sagittarius.”
December twenty-first is Tessa’s birthday too.
Figures. She’s always been a little shit as well.
His smile grows even brighter. “Technically Sagittarius–cusp–Capricorn, but I feel way more Capricorn. Probably because my moon is in Capricorn.”
Of course, he knows his moon sign. I mean, look at him.
“I’m a Taurus,” I offer. “No idea what my moon is, though.”
“Oh my God.” He throws his hands in the air, his silver jewelry flashing in the sunlight. “I can pull your whole chart! If you tell me your exact birth time and place, I can tell you everything. Your personality, life patterns, soul purpose, all of it.”
He looks at me expectantly, and I stare back.
Do I believe in this stuff?
Not particularly.
But the kid is glowing, and I just told him that he’s not weird for liking what he does. And honestly? Finding my soul purpose does sound wildly appealing at the moment. Maybe an eighteen-year-old punk fairy actually can tell me what the hell I’m supposed to do with my life.
So not desperate, Lennon. Totally sane.
“Sure, I could use some direction.”
His answering squeal is delighted. He grabs my wrist this time and starts speed walking so fast that I have to jog to keep up with his long strides.
“I’m practicing tarot too,” he gushes. “We could do a reading for your purpose. It would be even better for you if you need immediate direction.”
I laugh, letting him drag me. “Only if I can stash my groceries in your fridge first. The butter is probably judging me.”
“No problem! We have a walk-in fridge at the inn.”
We round the corner, and I plant my feet, forcing him to stop. A large, gorgeous old building stands there, framed by colorful leaves. A swinging sign hangs above the entryway, gold lettering carved into dark wood with Bennett’s Inn.
I tighten my grip on my bag. “Damn, that’s pretty.”
“Right?” he says proudly, then he tugs me up the front steps, through a lobby that smells faintly of cinnamon and wood polish, past a couple of guests, and straight into a restaurant.
There are maybe twelve tables inside, half of them full. I inhale, fully prepared to be seduced by fresh bread, roasting chicken, or something cozy and comforting, fitting the vibe of the inn, but my throat involuntarily closes up as I choke.
“Oh.”
It smells like something burned… recently.
Shaw pulls out a chair for me with a flourish, apparently not having a functioning nose.
“Here, sit! I’m gonna go grab my cards and a notebook, and then we can stash your stuff in the walk-in before we hang out in the garden.
It’s quieter there, plus my brother doesn’t like me doing this kind of thing in front of guests. ”
I drop into the chair, and the moment I sit, exhaustion hits me like a frying pan to the face. I yawn so hard my eyes water.
“Sure,” I mumble around another yawn. “I’ll sit here and try to stay conscious.”
He frowns, suddenly serious. “Are you okay?”
“I am,” I lie, forcing a smile.
“You promise?”
He looks legitimately worried, and God, he’s adorable.
Like a little woodland sprite, someone plugged into a battery pack.
He also reminds me of what it looked like when Tessa worried about me—not performing concern but actually feeling it.
Tessa was always more like a sister than a friend, and somehow, in the span of six minutes, he feels like the kid brother I never had. Maybe it’s because I’ve always had a weakness for people who wear their strange on the outside so the world can aim for it faster.
I’m one of them.
“Promise. I just haven’t slept properly in forever.”
“Why not?”
Oh, because, you know, my entire life is falling apart.