Page 43 of The Bookbinder's Guide to Love

“Have you had to let people go often?” he asked. “You mentioned your parents died and you were put in foster care, but I don’t know much more.”

Normally she’d shrug and change the subject if someone asked her this so bluntly, but being in Ford’s house after his funeral made her want to share more about her life. Ford had been the one to encourage her to open up. But she’d never really done it. She had been able to talk to him about books, but that was it.

Tonight, though, she wanted to reveal more of herself. She wanted to have the closeness that came only from sharing something real with another person.

There was the added bonus that she and Wes were only sort of friends. He was leaving in less than six weeks, so whatever she shared would only temporarily link them. And temporary was definitely her comfort zone. Even if she couldn’t stop thinking about Wes, even if her heart beat a little faster whenever he was around. She knew no one stayed. No matter how much she liked them and wanted them to.

“My parents died when I was six. I really don’t remember them. There was a house fire, so I don’t have any pictures of them,” she said. “There were no relatives who were close and could raise me, so I went to foster care. Until I was thirteen, I was in a Catholic group home, and then went into an individual foster home and the system. So I moved around a lot and nothing felt permanent.”

He tipped his head to the side, staring at her. People did that when they learned she didn’t have a nuclear family or even a single-parent family. Most didn’t know what to say.

“That sounds rough. Was it?” he asked.

“Sometimes. The houses where I was placed were mostly good to me. No physical abuse. But I always knew I was leaving.” She paused, taking a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”

“You just did,” he said with that half smile of his she was coming to like a little too much.

“What happened to your family?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“You do,” she said, not willing to let him dodge since she’d just been open with him. “If you don’t want to say, that’s fine. But don’t pretend something didn’t drive a wedge in your family. Because it’s obvious to me there is more to it than distance.”

He rubbed the back of his neck and then shook his head. “There is. But I can’t today. I’ll tell you about it later, when Dad and Oz are gone.”

Whatever it was, it weighed on him. In a flash she realized that if she was casual about him, she’d let it be. But she wasn’t. She didn’t want to think too hard about why helping someone who was bound to leave was important to her.

Eleven

Sera stayed at the house after her friends and Hamish left. His brother and dad got their stuff packed up and headed back to Portland after dinner. Wes didn’t really want to be alone. The talk with his dad had been interesting and he’d expected Benjamin to be his usual surly self with Sera and her friends. But he’d been nice, friendly, for him.

“Do you want me to go?” she asked after everyone was gone. “I think I’m hanging around because I feel closer to Ford here. It’s like he’s going to come in with a cup of tea or a new book he’s gone away to look for.”

She sat on an overstuffed settee that was in front of an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling bookcases. They were overstuffed as well, with worn books, both antiquarian pieces that had been in his family for generations and hardcovers and paperbacks from the last few decades. One of his favorites was a copy ofRobinson Crusoe, which had been in their family since the early 1800s; the edition was old and worn and needed repair, but since it had been shared from father to son in each generation, Wes had always been reluctant to restore it himself.

“I don’t want to be alone,” he said.

“I get it. Me either,” she admitted. She’d slipped her shoes off and curled her legs underneath her.

For the funeral she’d put her hair into a bun at the back of her neck. He wasn’t sure how, but her hair wasn’t curly at all in the way she’d styled it. “What happened to your curls?”

“I tamed them with super control gel and a comb,” she said. “I have to do it when it’s still wet. The hair at the back of my neck is still wet.”

He moved to sit next to her, reaching out to touch her hair, but hesitated. “Can I?”

She nodded quickly. “Part of it will feel crunchy. Have you ever used gel?”

He touched her hair; it wasn’t whatever she thought crunchy was. But it was still damp. Up close, he noticed a tendril had escaped her bun and was curling down her back. He wrapped it around his finger and then let it go.

He loved her hair. He had spent a lot of time thinking about it and wishing they’d had more time the night they’d hooked up. To him, her hair represented that untamed part of Sera. Though today she’d tamped that down for the funeral service.

Grief. It was the one thing they were both trying to manage. His cut through him. Sharing this night with her was making things both easy and harder.

“Wes?”

She’d asked him something about hair gel. “One time. I went to a punk party at college. So my roommates and I spiked up our hair. I put way too much in and it took three days to wash it out.”

She laughed. “Rookie mistake.”

---