Chapter 4 #2
“Manifesting, my friend, manifesting,” he says mildly. “Preferably someone who bakes bread and can assemble IKEA furniture without crying.” He gives Harper a look that’s pure mischief. “Unless your town has rules about locals only.”
Harper smiles with all her teeth. “We’re very welcoming. But if you break someone’s heart, Mrs. Henderson and the rest of the book club will put your face on a dartboard and throw rotten fruit and darts at it. Plus, Mr. Darcy will start treating you like he treats Dex.”
“Understood,” Cole says. “I would never cross the mustache.” He looks at the cat.
I ring him up; he tips like someone who doesn’t understand the Vermont economy and also has guilt from knocking over a general’s coffee once in 2016. Who tips when buying books?
The bell chimes again, and a couple of tourists wander in, lured by the cat, the autumn display, and the low--grade chaos Harper and I seem to trail like weather fronts wherever we go.
Cole tilts his head toward the back stacks. “Show me the haunted ladder.”
“It isn’t haunted,” Harper says. “It’s just... difficult.”
I walk him back anyway, because he won’t let it go. He inspects the ladder like a detective at a crime scene, then pats it. “Be nice to her,” he tells it. “She’s short and fierce, and she will win.”
“Thank you,” Harper says. “Finally, a man with taste.”
Cole angles me a look I recognize from a thousand patrol briefings. 'Say the thing you don’t want to say, man'. I don’t, and he sighs. “Okay. New topic.”
He lingers by the poetry shelf, thumbing a slim volume. “So I heard a rumor,” he says lightly, “About a broken engagement.”
Harper’s eyes flick to me, then away, like she’s not sure if she’s allowed to hear this part of the Dex file. I keep my tone calm. “That rumor exists, and it's true.”
“You don’t have to—” she walks away.
“It’s okay,” I say, and it mostly is. “I was going to marry someone who liked the version of me that stayed put. Army was fine as long as it was pictures in frames and stories after dinner. The reality was… less decorative.”
Cole leans his shoulder against the shelf. “She bailed when the headlines got too real.” It’s not a question.
“She wanted me to choose,” I say. “Her or the uniform. Then the knee decided for me.” My mouth tips wry. “I got the ring back and a medical discharge in the same month.”
Harper steps closer like she’s bracing a door against a draft. “I’m sorry,” she says, simply and sincerely. “That’s a lot of endings at once.”
I shrug because if I don’t, I’ll do something unwise like lean into her. “Gave me an excuse to come home. Fix things. Build things. Annoy a cat.”
“Cat says you excel at that,” she murmurs with a smile.
Cole bumps my arm. “For the record, she doesn’t deserve you.”
I aim for levity. “Says the man who once dated a woman who taxed him for being late to brunch.”
“She felt that fiscal responsibility was important,” Cole says solemnly.
“Also, brunch is sacred.” He glances at Harper.
“So, hypothetically. If two people in a very charming town in Vermont were fake -dating—purely for strategic purposes, obviously—and it started to feel less fake, would that be… a problem?”
Harper’s ears go a very appealing shade of pink. “Asking for a friend?”
“Friends,” Cole says innocently, gesturing between us.
I take mercy on all of us and change the subject before she can answer because she clearly is at a loss for words and doesn't want to answer. “Tour continues,” I announce. “Cole needs to see the covered bridge and the spot where Beatrice almost committed arson with a pumpkin spice candle.”
“Allegedly,” Harper says.
We close up for a lunch loop. Cole insists on carrying Harper’s tote like a chivalrous golden retriever. On the way out, Mr. Darcy leaps from the counter and lands on Cole’s shoulder like a pirate’s parrot, then rides there with supreme satisfaction to the front door.
“Traitor,” I tell the cat.
Harper laughs so hard she has to cling to the doorframe. “He’s chosen.”
“Obviously,” Cole says, walking carefully so as not to disturb his new monarch. “I will use my powers for good.”
We wander down Main Street. Cole points at storefronts and asks a thousand questions, each ridiculous.
“Which lamppost is haunted by the ghost of bad parking? Where’s the best maple creme?
If I proposed to someone under that tree, would a bluegrass band appear?
” I have no idea where he comes up with this shit.
“Yes, Mel’s,” “the gas station, surprisingly,” and “absolutely, they live in the gazebo,” Harper answers, earning herself an approving nod.
We end up back at the diner because of hunger. Mom deposits us in a booth with sandwiches before we can object. Cole gives my mother a progress report on pumpkin-lifting eligibility, and she pretends to take notes.
“So, Morales,” Mom says, pouring coffee. “How long are you in town?”
“Couple of days,” he says. “Long enough to embarrass Dex and buy out Harper’s staff picks.”
“Ambitious,” Mom says, which is the Rowen word for I like you.
Cole gestures between Harper and me. “Do you two realize you talk like a married couple renovating a house? Half banter, half threats, and a shocking amount of competence.”
Harper points her straw at him. “We’re not married. We’re not renovating. We’re not dating.”
“Right,” Cole says, nodding earnestly. “And the air between you is not crackling. It’s perfectly inert. Silica gel.”
I rub my jaw to hide a smile. “Are you done?”
“Not even a little,” he says, delighted. "But I am for now."
The afternoon drifts warm and fast, like we’re all orbiting the same joke and none of us wants to land.
Cole tells a story about Afghanistan, where he mistook a goat for a crashed drone at twilight, and I laugh until I wheeze.
Harper counters with a tale about Mr. Darcy trapping a town councilman on a chair for thirty minutes because of a wool scarf he wanted.
“Good taste,” Cole says. “Never trust a man in summer wool.”
At some point, my ex -fiancée’s name tries to push up through the conversation like a weed. Harper doesn’t ask for it and I don’t offer. It’s enough that she knows the shape of the hole without poking it.
On our way back to the bookstore, the three of us pass Mrs. Henderson, who is already shepherding two teenagers into holding a ribbon while she eyeballs distances like a general mapping a battle. She gives us a look over her glasses that reads: I see you, and I will text everyone later.
“Run,” Harper whispers.
We do not run, but we speed up quickly.
Inside the shop, Cole reluctantly dismounts his feline epaulette. Mr. Darcy launches to the counter from his post above the register, turns his back to me, and curls his tail around Cole’s wrist in a move I believe is called spite bonding .
“I’m wounded,” I tell him.
Harper steps beside me, shoulder brushing mine, voice pitched low. “For what it’s worth, I prefer you.”
My heart punches a hole in my ribs. “That’s good,” I manage.
Cole clears his throat theatrically. “Well, I have to go look at a bridge and contemplate my life choices. Harper, it was a pleasure to meet you. Rowen, try not to fuck this up.”
I squint. “Which part?”
“All of it,” he says, backing toward the door. “The town, the cat monarchy, and the thing you’re not calling a thing.” He winks at Harper and then at me, a synchronized insult, and is gone in a whirl of leather jacket and overconfidence.
Silence blooms for a second in his wake. The shop hums. Outside, leaves scrape along the sidewalk like mice in tap shoes.
Harper toys with the edge of a bookmark. “Your friend is… a lot.”
“Yep,” I say. “He’s also not wrong very often.”
She looks up at me under her lashes; it’s lethal. “About what?”
I could lie. I could crack a joke about silica gel and pretend nothing’s buzzing between us, but the words stick in my throat.
Instead, I let the truth settle heavy and real.
.. there’s something here, and we both feel it.
Harper drops her gaze to the bookmark, cheeks tinged pink, and Mr. Darcy flicks his tail like he’s bored with waiting for us to catch up.
Outside, the wind rattles the windows, and for the first time in a long time, I want the storm to last forever.
We work until the streetlights buzz. Harper finishes a last call to a vendor who insists he needs two outlets and emotional support. I lock the till, flip the sign, and we step out into a night that smells like wood-smoke and wet leaves.
“I’ll walk you both home,” I say, pointing at Mr. Darcy. It’s not a question.
“It’s four blocks,” she says, but she tucks the strap of her tote higher on her shoulder like she’s already agreed.
We keep a steady pace down Main Street .
The shop windows throw rectangles of light onto the sidewalk like a movie we can walk through.
Harper talks with her hands when she’s tired; her fingers sketch little arcs that fade in the air.
Every so often, our elbows brush, and I pretend it’s accidental. It’s not.
Her porch is a narrow rectangle with two pumpkins, a galvanized bucket of mums, and a crooked wind chime that sounds like someone trying to remember a song. She unlocks the door and pauses.
“Tea?” she asks.
“Always,” I say, and she rolls her eyes because she expected me to say no, and I didn’t.
Inside is soft. Books on the built-ins, blankets in a basket, a lamp that makes everything look gentler than it is. Mr. Darcy runs into the other room. He’s gracious enough to hate me mostly during business hours.
Harper fills a kettle. “Chamomile or mint?”
“Dealer’s choice,” I say, taking the mug she hands me a minute later. We carry them back to the porch and sit on the top step. The street is quiet except for a faraway laugh and tires crunching leaves. The quiet where truth feels possible.