Chapter 15
Chapter fifteen
It’s been a few days since the reopening of Inkwell tattoos peeking out and trailing down his arm, dark jeans, and a slightly crooked smile. With Jasper trailing behind him.
Jasper easily spots Rey, judging by the goofy smile on his face. But Lucas—he has his eyes locked on me. Heat builds in my stomach as my skin prickles at the intensity of his stare.
He is here. I mean, of course, he is. Of course, he’d look like a walking rom-com male lead. Of course, my face is probably blotchy from the cocktail I practically just inhaled and I probably look like—
Tess nudges me, interrupting my thoughts. ‘Lilah, he is walking over here. Stop staring and say hello.’
I swat her lightly and laugh under my breath. ‘I wasn’t staring.’
Jasper greets Rey like they were old friends. ‘Didn’t think I’d see you outside a coffee machine,’ he jokes, as she tells him to sit next to her.
Lucas slides into the booth beside me, one elbow resting casually on the wooden table.
‘Mind if we join?’ he asks, his voice low enough not to broadcast over the music.
Marley claps her hands enthusiastically. ‘Please! We need all the brain power we can get.’
Lucas turns to me with that warm smile, so close I can feel his breathe on my cheek. ‘Hey. Ready to crush some trivia?’
‘More than ever,’ I say, matching his smile.
Rey raises her glass. ‘To new teammates!’
Tess taps her pen against the trivia cards. ‘Let’s do this.’
The music dims and the chatter softens as the trivia host—Oscar—steps up to the mic.
Rey leans forward, urgency in her voice, ‘We need a team name stat.’
Without missing a beat, Jasper declares, ‘Drop It Like It’s Plot.’
Laughter ripples around the table, and just like that, we are a team. I find myself laughing a little too loudly at a joke Lucas makes, his eyes crinkling in that genuinely amused way, and something flutters in my chest.
Oscar’s voice crackles over the speakers, announcing the start of “Round One.” Lucas and I exchange a conspiratorial glance, then lean in to start.
Question 1: What popular blogging platform was launched in 2003, allowing users to create personal websites easily?
‘WordPress,’ I whisper and jot down the answer quickly.
Question 2: What social networking site launched in 2004 is initially exclusive to college students?
‘Ooh Facebook,’ Marley shouts.
Rey smiles at Marley. ‘Of course, you would know that one.’
‘It’s all part of the job babe.’
Question 3: Name the 2004 rom-com where Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams brought Nicholas Sparks’ words to life.
‘The Notebook,’ Lucas jumps in.
Jasper gets in a quick jab at him, something about knowing it because he is Australia's own Nicholas Sparks. Which is funny because he’s not a writer. At least, I don’t think he is. Then again, neither was Eli Carter until I made him one.
Either way, I’m paying too much attention to Lucas. The way he glances a heartbeat longer than necessary, catches me off guard. It’s the same type of look I once wrote for Eli and Savannah. Quiet, a moment stretched thin between sentences. It feels like being seen and safely hidden all at once.
The next few questions keep coming and we answer them as best we can.
Pens scratch, glasses clink, laughter rolls between tables.
Still, I’m hyperaware of him beside me. The way his arm brushes mine when we both reach for the answer sheet, how his sleeve smells faintly of citrus and paint.
It’s such a small, ordinary closeness, but it hums.
He leans in, voice low enough to feel private. ‘It’s funny,’ he whispers, eyes still on the page. ‘Trivia loves facts, but people don’t. The right question’s what makes you feel seen.’
My pen stills. Ink blooms across my thumb, the tell-tale stain of who I really am.
Lola leaking through the cracks. The words hang there, familiar in a way they shouldn’t be.
Word for word, they belong to Eli, sitting on a park bench at dusk, telling Savannah that sometimes being understood is the rarest thing of all.
The bench scene unspools in my mind, twilight, the soft hum of cicadas, a question that opens a door. The hush that lives between two people when everything else keeps moving. Heat rises in my throat. I straighten the answer sheet like that might steady my hands.
He doesn’t speak again but he studies me. Head tilted slightly, like he’s chasing an echo he can’t quite name. Maybe the universe has a sense of irony, writing a moment, then walking straight into it.
I breathe, nod, and pretend my heart isn’t drumming in my wrist.
Tess, sitting beside me, catches the same spark. She leans in and murmurs, ‘Is it just me or does tonight feel like déjà vu? Like we are living in chapter twelve of your book?’
‘The trivia night. Eli, the spark. It’s like word for word,’ I whisper so that only she can hear me.
My chest tightens. I glance down at the pen in my hand, still hovering above the answer sheet.
I remember writing that line a year ago, late at night, imagining a character just as curious, just as unsettled by possibility.
I wrote this. The bar’s décor had changed, sure.
But the energy? The banter? The pull of someone really noticing me? That is straight off the page.
When I look up again, Lucas’s warm eyes meet mine, inviting me into a story that feels both terrifyingly new and eerily familiar.
The table roared with laughter as Jasper slips into his dramatic movie trailer voice, saying something about “bookish babes and small-town drama.” Lucas groans, rubbing his face, but the tug at his lips gives him away—he secretly loves Jasper’s silly bookish puns.
‘We can’t let him drink espresso after 6 p.m,’ Lucas mutters in my direction. ‘He gets ideas.’
Jasper points his drink at him. ‘You love my ideas. Admit it.’
‘I love some of your ideas,’ Lucas shoots back. ‘Others are lawsuits waiting to happen.’
More laughter ripples around the table. I smile, but something tugs at the edge of my mind.
My old therapist had once told me that sometimes life will echo your imagination before you’re ready to live it.
I hadn't understood what she meant at the time.
But now? Sitting here with friends, Lucas laughing beside me, and my heart thudding too loud in my chest; it feels a little too on the nose.
A girl catches my eye as she walks towards the table. She works at Sweet Fern Pantry. She’s smiling at the man sitting next to me, as if she knew him already.
Does she know him?
‘Hello again,’ she says to Lucas, hand grazing his shoulder. ‘I thought I would see you again sooner.’