Chapter 13 #2
“If I don’t sell, then everyone’s out of a job anyway. This would at least give us a chance of keeping people on staff.”
Ella turned to face me. “Promise me you won’t make any decision just yet. Won’t talk to any potential buyers.”
I shook my head, not wanting to lead her on. “Ella …”
“Just let me think, okay? I can come up with something. Just give me some time.”
Maybe if I could help save the store, then it’d be okay to miss Leo. To grieve him. Maybe I’d have earned the right.
So I said, “Okay.”
I went home at lunch, hoping to get a few hours of sleep. But even as I lay on Leo’s couch, I just stared at the ceiling with an aching heart and Emily Lickinson in my lap. So instead, I called my mom.
“Did you know it was this bad?” I asked.
“Not at all.”
“Really?” I asked, flatly. “You two talked all the time. You thought you were sneaky, but I could hear you on the phone.”
“Mostly about books, hon. I would’ve told you if I knew it was that bad.”
I sighed, scratching behind Emily’s ear. “I figured you would’ve.”
“It seems like Leo didn’t even know the reality of it,” my mom said gently.
“Looking back at it now, he had been acting strange the past couple of months. He had seemed weaker. I assumed he was just tired or getting old, but … he never told me he was sick. I guess his mind wasn’t as sharp those last few years and he didn’t want anyone to know. ”
Leo died of a heart attack. Heart issues ran in my family, taking my dad’s life, too.
Leo had had coronary artery disease and had been having issues for years and just told no one.
Had I known, I would’ve booked the first flight up.
I would’ve come to his office and begged for forgiveness and a chance to be with him for a few more months.
“Why? Why didn’t he tell us?” I asked, my throat thickening, tears threatening to spill.
In the background, I could hear the sounds of Tennessee calling me back home.
She must’ve been sitting on the rocking chair on her front porch.
I would take cicadas and chirping birds every day over sirens and honking cars.
“He hated handouts. He built The Last Page from the ground up, I’m sure he wanted to keep it that way. No one’s money but his.”
He and Ella must’ve bonded over their headstrongness, I mused.
“I don’t know what to do,” I confessed.
“What does Ella think you should do?”
“Alright, don’t say her name like that.” I rolled my eyes. “I’m not in middle school, you know. I don’t have a crush on every girl I speak to.”
“Who said anything about a crush? You’re the one that brought up having a crush,” she said innocently.
“Anyway. She asked me to give her some time to come up with something.”
“And what do you think?”
“What do you think?” I countered.
“Henry, this is your whole career. You don’t need my opinion.”
“This is different and you know it.”
“I’d do anything to save any bookstore or library, Henry, you know that.
” I came from a family of book people. In addition to my dad’s side, my mom worked at our local library.
When we’d first moved to Knoxville, I’d spent most of my afternoons after school at the Farragut Library.
“I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but if it were me … I’d want to save the store.”
“Mom, I really don’t think it’s possible. I should’ve never even come here.”
“Henry,” she said sternly. “You listen to me when I say this. If the store closes, regardless of what you do to try to save it, it’s not your fault. Just because you’re the one that might have to close it doesn’t mean you caused it.”
My throat tightened because of course that’s what I’d been thinking.
Part of me knew that putting the business up for sale was the right and smart thing to do.
But I wanted so desperately to be the one to save it, too.
To pay off all the debt and give the store enough of a cushion to get its feet back under itself.
If I let the store close, then it’d be like shutting the door on my relationship with my grandfather for good.
“I’m afraid to make the wrong choice,” I admitted quietly.
“That’s life. You make a decision and pray it doesn’t end in ruin.”
“I’m supposed to leave in a week.”
“So stay for a few more months.”
“I need to find a job,” I reasoned. After quitting my job back home, I was in limbo, hoping to find something that brought excitement to my life. While I was in New York, it felt like my real life in Tennessee was on hold.
“You just got a new one! You’re the owner of a bookstore.”
I clicked my tongue. “The pay’s abysmal.”
“Leo’s apartment is rent stabilized and dirt cheap,” she shot back. The lease had continued on in my name, but there was no point in keeping it if I wasn’t going to stay.
“A month has already felt like a really long time, Mom. Are you going to be—”
“Don’t you worry about me. The kids at the library keep me plenty busy. And Charlie comes every single day. I don’t know why Ava won’t let him take her out.”
“Charlie’s supposed to be checking up on you when he stops by, not flirting with her.”
“I’ll be fine, Henry. Do what you went to New York to do.” When I hesitated, she pulled out the big guns. “Think of what your father would do.”
“Cheap shot,” I muttered.
She laughed. “In all honesty, he wouldn’t know what to do either. But if saying that led you to one answer …”
“Okay, okay, I get it.”
I knew in my heart that the right thing to do was stay. Either I’d go back to Tennessee victorious or tired and broken from giving it my all.
The city was loud and uninviting. Every day, I’d look around and find myself in a crowd, just another face without an identity.
Everyone here was mean. Back home, you had to add a “bless your heart,” but here all they added was a “fuck you.” I yearned for my cozy Southern life where everyone smiled and said hello to each other.
This wasn’t just for me, though. The booksellers and Ella obviously had pieces of their hearts in the store. The Last Page meant as much to them as it had to Leo.
“Until the fall,” I said. “Then I get to come home.”
“Well, then I’ll see you for Thanksgiving.”