4 Library
ON MONDAY AT SCHOOL, I was still angry about Theo.
Mr. Arrogant. Weatherman. Mansplainer. In fact, I’d been ranting to Lennie about him all morning, and now it was everyone else’s turn to hear my tirade.
We sat outside for lunch at the same table we’d sat at for the last two years whenever the weather was nice enough.
“You should have heard him. ‘Subpar schooling.’ Ugh! It was so rude.” I rolled my eyes and Lennie nodded in support.
“Well.” Krista considered. “My sister goes to the community college, and maybe he has a point.”
“Krista!” I exclaimed.
“Just telling it like it is,” Krista said, taking a bite of her sandwich.
“Well, anyway, this guy, he mansplained the wind to me, he wants to study architecture, and he thinks he’s way too good for Oak Falls.
” I felt my rage building again, the same way it had burned last night at the library.
I ignored the other feeling, the one that sent shivers up my spine as the ladder incident replayed in my head.
“Yeah, Willa, that’s cool and all, but is he cute?” Avery asked with a grin.
“Why do you want to know if he’s cute?” Avery’s boyfriend, Wyatt, looked offended. But he was always offended about something. I think she was only going out with him because he worshipped the ground she walked on.
“No, he’s not cute,” I lied.
Lennie burst out laughing at that. “Even I know he’s cute,” she confirmed, “and I haven’t even met him.
Anyone who gets Willa so hot under the collar must be seriously cute.
Because otherwise you’re just all sweetness and light and making everything okay for everybody, blah, blah, blah! ” Lennie grinned at me.
“That is so not me,” I protested, but when I glanced around the table and saw the looks the girls and Wyatt were giving me, I knew it was an argument I wasn’t going to win. I tried to smile and get in on the fun.
Krista reached over and squeezed my arm. “Oh my God, Willa, you have to invite him to the Halloween party.”
“No way! He’d bring the whole vibe down.” I shook my head and sipped the cocoa I’d bought from the cafeteria. It was no match for the Little Acorn’s.
“I was thinking … of asking Sara to come … Is that okay?” Lennie asked Krista tentatively. I acted cool, but I knew it was such a huge deal for her to mention Sara in front of everyone.
“Sara Coldwood? Sure, of course, invite whoever you guys want. Oh, and I trust everyone will be at Harvest Festival?” Krista’s eyes went around the table, looking at all of us one by one.
“Dad’s sponsoring the whole thing again and Mom’s on the committee and already stressed about decorations, so I said I’d help get as many ‘young people’ there as possible.
” She rolled her eyes. “But seriously, it’ll be better this year, I think—live band, s’mores station, hayrides for the kids.
Mrs. Burrows is making like a thousand pies. ”
“Are we going, babe?” Wyatt asked Avery.
“Of course we’re going. And to the game on Friday? Is that still happening?” Avery looked at everyone in turn, like she was hoping for one of us to put an end to that plan.
“I’m on board for some school spirit,” I said. I wanted it to happen for Lennie and Sara, so I’d be there. Lennie squeezed my hand.
“Watching some jocks run up and down a field isn’t exactly my idea of a great night,” Avery complained.
Wyatt took his chance. “We could hang out alone instead if you wanted? Go to the diner?”
Avery sighed, and we all waited for her answer. “No, babe, I have to do this. For our team.” Avery nodded solemnly, and Wyatt looked confused.
“The Oak High Hawks?” he asked.
“No, our team of friends! Just forget it, I’m out of here.” Avery stood up with her tray and walked away, with Wyatt running after her.
“You two are going to Harvest Festival, right?” Krista confirmed with me and Lennie.
“Wouldn’t miss it,” I said, and I meant it.
Krista looked me up and down. “You know, Willa, that haircut is great on you.”
“Thanks, Kris. You know it was actually Melissa who gave me the idea. I saw her in the bookstore a few weeks ago, and she said she thought I could pull it off.” I played with a piece of the short hair I was still getting used to.
“What was my sister doing in the bookstore?” Krista asked. She shrugged. “Must have been lost or something.”
I shook my head. Sometimes I wished my family didn’t just mean me and Pop—I’d have loved a sibling. But I couldn’t imagine talking about them like this.
Lennie and I walked slowly to class, since my regular calc class was right next to her AP Chem.
“Do you think Sara will go to Harvest Festival?” Lennie asked me hopefully.
“I mean, doesn’t everyone go, really? Sara has that girl-next-door thing going on. She totally looks like a Harvest Festival kind of girl.”
“She might be too cool for it. But there’s literally nothing else to do, so maybe she’ll be forced to go, dragged from her bedroom that probably looks like a Pinterest board.” Lennie sighed and held her hand over her heart.
“Why don’t you just ask her?” I whispered, because just then Sara walked through the door to take her seat in class. Lennie grabbed my hand and we stopped in the hall.
“I can’t just ask her. Oh, and just to throw it right back at ya: Are you going to tell everyone about London?”
I nodded. “I will, soon. Maybe when I’m definitely sure?”
“Got it,” Lennie agreed. “Though I think you know you are definitely sure …?” She lowered her voice. “You could ask him to Harvest Festival …”
“Who?” I pretended not to know who she was talking about.
She rolled her eyes. “The Weatherman!!”
“What? So he can make fun of our town even more?” My lip curled in disgust.
“Because you think he’s cute?”
Lennie grinned, but I looked away and dodged the question. “I wish he’d just go back to wherever he came from.” But then that mountain scent was in my head again. That memory of being in his arms.
“I hate to tell you, but you’re blushing,” Lennie teased.
“I am not! We’re going to be late for class.” I turned and felt Lennie laughing at my total lie until I closed the door behind me.
Lennie wanted to stop in Main Street Books on the way home after school.
“Sara finished her book today in calc,” she reported.
“She was reading it under her desk. So … she’ll definitely need a new one!
” Lennie nodded like she’d figured it all out already (and like Sara would never think of going to the library instead).
“Okay, Miss Marple,” I laughed. “I’m up for playing Cupid. And I’ll have a look at the new travel section? Or maybe it’s not new, and Mary Ellen has just moved books around again, I can never tell …” My stomach flipped as I thought of London.
On our way down Main Street, Lennie told me the plan. “Okay, we need to go and stand near classic fiction,” she said.
“I don’t know what she likes, but I think if we stand near that section then she’ll think we’re really smart.” Lennie’s words were all running into each other, and she wiped her palms on her favorite red sweater.
I raised an eyebrow under my green woolen hat. “You are really smart.”
“Oh, I know, in like school stuff, but she doesn’t know that. I need her to know I’m like world-smart and interesting. Maybe I’ll pick up a really thick novel and pretend to read?” Lennie raised her eyebrows.
I laughed. “Okay. Classics it is.”
I’d always loved Main Street Books. Pop used to take me there after school sometimes when I was little, and I still remembered the smell of its old paperbacks, transporting us back in time. The store smelled exactly the same today when I pushed open the rickety door.
It was small and cramped, with books piled everywhere in a sort of order.
All the classics were on a table near the back, and the rest of the fiction was supposed to be in alphabetical order, but last time I checked, Rebecca Yarros and Stephen King didn’t belong beside each other.
It all made for good browsing, anyway. Perfect for Lennie.
The bookstore owner, Mary-Ellen, had put up string lights shaped like little pumpkins. They cascaded down the bookshelves haphazardly, adding to the whole messy comfort of the store.
Mary-Ellen appeared from behind a pile of books, her big round glasses grubby as ever—I had no idea how she saw through them. “Can I help you girls find anything?”
“Oh, no thanks, Mary-Ellen, just here to browse. I really like your lights.” I nodded at the tangled string on the bookshelf in front of me.
Mary-Ellen went to “tidy” the upstairs part of the store, and Lennie whispered, “Do you think she’ll come?”
And then by some weird coincidence, or fate if you’re into that sort of thing, Sara walked through the door.
She was in a camel-colored sweater and blue jeans, her brown hair pulled into a ponytail, and she stared intently at a row of books near the door.
I could see why Lennie thought she was cute.
She was pretty, but she also had a kind of warm, twinkly expression that drew you in.
Which was why I didn’t mind making the first move.
“Hey, Sara?”
I could feel Lennie freeze behind me. “This wasn’t in the plan,” she hissed.
Sara looked up, confused for a second. “Oh, hi. Willa, right?”
“Yeah, you were in my calculus class until you moved to AP with my friend Lennie. I suck so bad at math.” I laughed and moved out of the way so Sara could see I wasn’t alone.
“Oh, I bet you don’t, and I don’t blame you for not doing AP Calc. It hurts my head all the time.” Sara’s eyes fell on Lennie and lit up. “Hey, Lennie.”
“I love math,” Lennie blurted.
“Really?” Sara cocked her head and walked toward Lennie. “Because I distinctly remember you cussing out Ms. Gabel under your breath when she announced the last pop quiz,” she teased.
“Well, I hate pop quizzes …” Lennie’s face flushed as she started talking a mile a minute.
I subtly moved out of the way and over to the travel section, where I kept one eye on the budding romance and another on the guide to London I’d just picked up.
Even after I paid for it, Lennie and Sara were still talking.