Chapter 10 Rosie #2
“Exactly. One bite will lift anyone’s spirits, just like a good chocolate chip cookie should.
Her magic also keeps the chips perfectly melty and the center warm and gooey.
Poppy’s not as obvious, though she does occasionally do arrangements to help people out.
Apology bouquets make the recipient more receptive to hearing the apology, and sympathy arrangements help to alleviate some of the sting of their grief, if only for a moment.
For weddings, she puts love spells on everything, so everyone at the wedding is in an amazing mood, a little love drunk.
But her real power is making ingredients for potions and tonics.
” He raises an eyebrow, and I shake my head.
“Whatever I need from her is already in my place, so don’t worry. She just has the basics. Lavender dried under a July sun, mugwort.” He nods, even though he obviously does not know the basics at all. “It’s in the room behind her main shop.”
“How does yours work? I know you help them pick out a book and they fall in love, but… is it that simple?” I sit for a moment, realizing I haven’t actually had to explain my gifts to anyone, and I’m suddenly eager to. I shift in my seat, turning to him before explaining further.
“So people come into the store looking for a book. If they’re true of heart and ready to find love, I get…
I don’t know. A jolt or something? A tug?
I can’t explain it, but my magic takes hold, and I assist the customer, guiding them to the right book they need to find their person.
The right one will be on a shelf, sparkling like my normal magic does.
Once they read the book, they meet their true love.
Sometimes it’s right after, sometimes it takes a bit, but the next person they date is their…
person.” I let out a humorless laugh and shake my head.
“So you’ve spent a good chunk of your life being the catalyst for other people finding their love stories—literal and just books—but because of my grandfather, you’ve been unable to fall in love yourself?”
I bend forward a bit, letting my hair fall to hide my face as I grimace.
“What happens if they don’t read the book right away?”
I shrug. “Then it sits there. Sometimes they take a bit to read it, adding it to their to-be-read pile, but when they’re ready… they pick it up. A little magic, a little faith, a little good timing. They all work together, you know?”
“Have you never tried it on yourself?” he asks. I roll my eyes.
“Of course, I have,” I grumble, a little bitter.
“And?”
“And it didn’t work, obviously.”
“Is that typical?”
“What?”
“Is it typical for your magic not to work on yourself?”
“No. Normal spells work just fine. It’s just my own magic.
” The first time I tried my magic on myself was three weeks after I opened Meet Cute Magic, following a horrendous date.
Even though I’d known for some time my magic was most powerful in love, I’d been wary to try it on myself.
I worried that if I intervened and tricked fate, it would be doomed from the start.
But one day after closing, I wandered the shop, moving from book to book to try and find the story that spoke to me until I landed on a dragon-shifter romance.
I read the entire thing that night, staying up way too late to get to the happily ever after.
When I hit the end, a sense of peace and calm washed over me, and I thought that was it.
The following week, I went on a date with George at the auto mechanic shop two towns over, thinking it was going to be perfect.
Unfortunately, we dated for six months, six months where I chewed my nails to the quick trying to decide if I was brave enough to test the curse and tell him I loved him, or if I wanted to live in my little fairy tale for just a little bit longer.
When I finally mustered the nerve, he instantly turned green, telling me he was married and that he thought I knew all along.
So yes, I’ve tried my love magic on myself, and it undeniably just doesn’t work.
“Okay, enough about me,” I say, with a shake of my head, needing to stop thinking about that depressing topic. “Tell me something no one knows about you.”
“What? Why?”
“Because you know some of my deepest, darkest secrets, and you’re a complete blank slate.
I know nothing about you. And since we’re stuck together for five more weeks, I think I might as well get to know the man I’ve lived across the street from for three years.
” When he doesn’t bite, I add, suddenly desperate to know more about the man who typically keeps to himself, “Honestly, you won’t even have to think that hard, since I know nothing about you besides you run the Gaming Den and your grandfather is named Phillip. ”
“Okay, okay…” he says begrudgingly before thinking for a long minute. Finally, he smiles, and I know it’s going to be a good one from that look alone. “I was almost expelled in middle school.” I turn my entire body to him quickly, staring at him with wide eyes.
“What?”
He smiles and shakes his head. “I had a gambling ring. I was selling trading cards and playing the games in the boys’ bathroom. I was taking kids’ allowances, selling them cards I knew weren’t worth that much, and running games for money. It was kind of wild.”
“Oh my god, a rebel!” I say, fully entertained and clapping now.
“My parents were not what one would call happy about it,” he says with a laugh and a shake of his head. “My grandfather, though, was impressed. Got me a new pack of cards when he was supposed to be giving me a stern life lesson talk. He even gave me some cash and tips on how to be more secretive.”
I smile, able to picture Phillip sitting with a much younger Jack and clapping him on the shoulder, quietly proud of his illegal actions.
“So you kept it going?”
“For years. It grew after a while, and I started an online store selling and trading rare cards as a side business while I was going through college.”
I stare at him, impressed and warmed by this new knowledge. “And then it became the Gaming Den?”
“And then it became the Gaming Den,” he confirms with a smile.
“Wow. That’s… I won’t lie, that is not at all what I expected.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“You absolutely should.” I’m still in awe, trying to picture nerdy, shy Jack at twelve or thirteen running a gambling ring in the middle school boys’ bathroom and hustling them for their allowances, when he breaks into my daze.
“Your turn.”
“My turn?”
“Something I can’t find out just from town gossip. Something that’s just… Rosie Mayfield at her core.” I smile, but my pulse starts to pound at his request because I’m not sure what to say.
Who is Rosie Mayfield at her core? I’m not completely sure.
I’ve always been Poppy and Vi’s big sister.
That poor girl who lost her parents too young.
Sarah Mayfield’s oldest daughter.
Gertrude Mayfield’s granddaughter or Sandra Mayfield’s niece.
The romance bookstore owner.
What else is there really to know?
But because I know I owe him that for sharing with me, I give him something I’ve never told a soul. “I…” I push aside the embarrassment at what I’m about to confess. “I always wanted to travel.” His brows furrow.
“Travel? That’s it? That’s not a secret.”
I give him a deadpan look. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t know there was a level for the things not a lot of people know about me, Mr. Underground-Gambling-Ring-for-Kids.
” He lets out a laugh then and raises one hand as if to say go on before I explain more.
“My dad died when I was a kid, and my mom died when I was nineteen. I went from oldest daughter to makeshift mom overnight, trying to help my sisters. Poppy was only sixteen, though Vi was eighteen. I spent every moment since making sure my little sisters never felt that loss too heavily, taking care of them, helping, and supporting them. There wasn’t time to spend my early twenties traveling the world, but I read about all of these places so different than the town I never left and always dreamed of going there.
Now I have the store. I’ve barely ever left Heartwood Hollow. ” He looks at me like he’s shocked.
“I know. It’s embarrassing that I’m a twenty-seven-year-old who has never left her hometown. I love it here, though, so I don’t feel like I’m missing too much. I just always wanted to travel. Meet new people, try new foods. That kind of thing.”
“No, no. That’s not embarrassing at all.
” I side-eye him and he shakes his head.
“Really. It’s not.” Suddenly, I believe him.
Even more so when he speaks again. “It’s admirable, dropping everything to help and be there for your sisters.
You could be jaded or closed off, but you’re not.
I don’t know many people who could say the same if they were in your shoes.
” A beat passes, and I take in his side profile, his strong jaw, his straight nose, and the five o’clock shadow coming in, and warmth fills me.
“You know, Jack, you’re not as bad as I thought. Maybe we can be friends after all of this.” And when he smiles over at me, I really, truly believe it.