Prologue #2
So do the lights.
And the air-conditioning.
Because of course it does.
The power does this, occasionally.
It’s delicate , my gran was fond of saying whenever it happened. Like a flower.
It’s one of the shop’s quirks – one I used to love.
She’d turn the dark into an adventure. We’d go searching for treasure, we’d gaze at stars.
Sail a ship in the dark and fight pirates.
Become pirates, ourselves. Like something straight out of one of the books on her crooked shelves, but somehow better.
Today, sailing alone in a pirate ship in the dark feels cold and wet and difficult. So, instead, I slump down onto the floor.
The bookshop is silent, and I can almost imagine the books are asking me questions.
Why are we still here? Why are you here? Do you really think you can make this bookshop work?
The stories sound suspiciously like my mother. Or Jamie, just before he left. And, in the dark, I can’t help adding my own question:
What on earth am I doing?
It’s then that the bell above the door rings its jaunty, happy jingle.
I consider pretending I’m not there. I mean, really, even if whoever it is wants to steal something, how many books can someone feasibly carry out with their bare hands in the almost-dark?
‘Hello?’ calls a man’s voice, and I sink silently into one of the beat-up chairs. Stuff the stock.
But then I look up and even in the low light I can see the scratches in the wonky table my grandpa built when they first opened the bookshop fifty years ago.
The table I’ve sat at more times than I can count.
And I know that in this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, letting a customer go is only going to make me feel worse.
Also, it’s pretty dark in the bookshop and that feels very much like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
So I press my hand against the wall and I pull myself to my feet.
But – almost like my thoughts have somehow made it happen – I trip on the step on the way out of the kitchenette.
I bang my knee against the corner of the display shelf and shuffle over to try to – unsuccessfully – half hide behind the counter.
There is silence for a moment. Blessed, very strange silence. Maybe the man has gone. Maybe he has padded feet like a cat, and he somehow managed to find his way out without ringing the bell.
But then he clears his throat. ‘Are you . . . okay?’ His voice is low and a little gravelly, and I feel it in the base of my spine.
Not a cat.
I hunch behind the counter, rubbing my knee with much more ferocity than is entirely necessary. I don’t know how this stranger’s voice has somehow taken up residence in my abdomen, but I’m so distracted that my fingers catch the ladder in my stockings and in the heavy silence I hear it rip further.
Damn it.
I wait for another beat. Logically, I know that I can’t stay down here for ever, but I can’t seem to make myself stand up either.
I don’t have it in me to face a mysterious, gravelly voiced man today.
Yet, short of dropping to the floor and commando-crawling my way back to the kitchenette, I don’t have a whole lot of options.
The spine-tingling is probably just a by-product of whatever muscle I pulled in my groin , I tell myself.
I’m not in any way convincing, but it’s enough to motivate me to push to my feet, a tight smile forming on my lips.
It drops as I take him in.
He has a cap pulled low over his face, like he’s a famous person trying to hide.
Is he a celebrity? What kind of person wears a cap on a day like today?
His eyes glint in the dim light, and dark hair covers the lower half of his face in what might have been a five-o’clock shadow a month ago.
He’s wearing a half-smile that even in the dark I can tell invites people to smile back.
Mostly, though, he’s far too attractive, and he’s a man, so I’m immune to any charms he may have. It was, after all, a man who dumped me last night and told me that trying to save my grandparents’ legacy was a waste of time.
I stand up straighter and the man glances down. He can almost definitely see the ladder in my stockings. He looks back up and his eyes catch mine and hold. In the dim light I can’t quite make out the colour, and it makes me irrationally irritated.
‘Welcome to Brooks’ Books,’ I say, stumbling slightly over the words.
The man coughs, like he’s trying to cover a laugh. At me. He’s laughing at me. ‘Do you need another minute?’ he asks, and the words themselves are fine, but his voice is so patronising that a wave of fresh mortification washes over me.
‘I’m fine. Thank you.’
‘It’s just, you were down there a while.’
An expectant silence follows his words. And is he smirking ?
I clear my throat. ‘I’m fine,’ I repeat. ‘How can I help you?’ I turn towards the computer screen and click the mouse, ready to search for whatever it is he’s looking for and get him out as soon as possible. Nothing happens, so I click it again. The screen stays determinedly black. Wonderful.
‘I’m an author,’ says the man finally. ‘I was hoping to sign some copies of my book.’
I’ve been staring at the screen for long enough now that I don’t think I can tell him my computer isn’t working without making it really weird – that is, if he hasn’t already noticed that it’s not emitting any light in the dim store.
Now would be a great time for that pirate ship to appear to sail me anywhere but here.
‘Oh. What’s the book?’ I might know it off the top of my head, but it’s unlikely.
‘It’s called Flight Risk ,’ says the man, and in fact it’s worse than not knowing the book.
Because I do know it.
It was well written, worthy – and very boring. And I know that I sent the twenty copies of it we had back to the publisher yesterday.
‘Unfortunately, the power has just gone out. My computer isn’t working,’ I tell him, because, hell, at this point it feels better than the alternative.
‘Right,’ says the man, like he’s raising an eyebrow under his ridiculous cap. ‘Is that a recent development?’
‘Sorry?’
‘Your computer,’ says the man. ‘You’ve been staring at the screen for almost a minute. Did it just suddenly stop working when I asked about my book?’ There’s a thread of amusement in his voice again.
‘I . . .’ I blink back at him. ‘No.’
‘So you were just pretending your computer was working?’ His tone is mocking now.
‘I was . . . thinking about how to fix it.’ My voice is significantly more defensive than I’d like it to be. ‘Not that I need to explain myself to you.’
‘Sorry,’ says the man, sounding anything but. I swear his eyes are twinkling in the dark. ‘Should I come back another time, or are you expecting your computer to be down indefinitely?’
‘You know what?’ I tell him. ‘I can just have a quick look on the shelf for you now, save you having to come back again.’ I’ll try and fail to find the book, and then he’ll leave. There is no way I want this man and his dry amusement in Gran’s shop again.
I realise I’ve made a mistake as soon as I step out from behind the register.
Without the solidness of the counter between us, the space somehow tightens.
In the cold of the bookshop I can feel the warmth of his body as I move past. He shifts slightly on his feet, and I fix my eyes on the bookshelves ahead.
I stride over to where the book would be, running my finger along familiar spines. ‘Unfortunately, it looks like we’re all out of copies of Flight Risk ,’ I say. It’s vague enough that he might think the book has just sold out.
‘I guess that’s either good news or bad news,’ he replies, his gravelly voice even, with a calculated amount of self-deprecation.
I smile tightly at him, then go the long way back round the counter, trying to make it look like that’s my preferred route even when his too-big, too-warm body isn’t blocking the path. ‘Is there anything else I can do for you?’
He glances at the computer. ‘It seems unlikely.’ The corner of his mouth twitches and he touches the edge of his cap. I grip my hands together behind my back to stop myself reaching out to pull it down over his smug face.
Then finally, finally , he turns round and starts walking back out of the door. I close my eyes and exhale briefly in relief, then turn to make my way back to take refuge in the kitchenette.
Only to trip on the same freaking step.
I don’t fall but it’s loud and the ladder in my stocking rips all the way to my thigh.
The man pauses in the doorway.
‘Maybe you should fix a few things around here,’ he says.
‘Maybe you should write a better book,’ I mutter before I can swallow the retort.
For a second, I freeze, and I hear him still too. The words that I very definitely said out loud – the words that he very obviously heard – shuffle in the space between us.
Crap . Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap.
But before I can apologise or laugh it off, or even turn round, he speaks again.
‘I guess it was bad news, then,’ he says mildly.
Then the bell laughs merrily, and he is gone.