Page 82 of The Pumpkin Spice Spell
“You’re both waiting for the other shoe to drop,” she says. “You’re both bracing for impact. Acting like happiness is a trap instead of a choice.”
My heart lurches. She’s right. Even though I don’t want to admit it.
She stops in front of me, gentle but fierce. “And here’s the thing. If you keep expecting love to break, you’re going to destroy it before you can get to enjoy it. Could you imagine if I had done that with your dad? Not been with him because he would have left too soon? I would have missed out on him, you girls, and the greatest part of my life.”
She looks at me so deeply it makes my eyes water again.
“Real love?” she says, soft now. “It’s worth anchoring yourself to. Even when you’re scared.”
I can’t speak. Because I know she’s right.
She brushes my hair back behind my ear, just once, like she did when I was seven, too tired and fighting sleep.
Then she hands me the scarf and walks away without another word. The shop is quiet again.
I just sit there feeling cracked wide open.
Later, after Ivy makes another pot of tea and Rowan insists we all eat muffins for emotional grounding, I go upstairs to the apartment and curl up in the window seat.
Cobweb jumps into my lap like she knew this was coming. She tucks her little paws under her chest and stares out at the harbor with me like she’s keeping watch.
I think about the way Tate looks at me.
The way he kisses me like I’m the only thing tethering him to shore.
The way he pulled away, not because he didn’t care, but because hedid.
And I think…
Maybe we’re both just scared of the same thing, and we’ve both been hurt enough to think happiness is a trick. But maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s a choice. And if I want to keep him, I might have to be the first one to choose it.
The bell over the door jingles, and I wipe my face quickly with the sleeve of my cardigan, praying it doesn’t look like I just had a breakdown in the tea nook. Again.
It’s late afternoon, the sun slipping golden through the front windows. Ivy and Rowan have stepped out to “forage cider and talk shit.” The bookstore’s quiet now.
“Hi there,” the woman says, stepping inside.
She’s probably mid-sixties, bundled in a deep burgundy pea coat with mittens still clipped to her sleeves. Her gray curls are frizzy from the wind, and her smile is warm enough to melt chocolate.
“Welcome in,” I say softly, trying to reset my face into something not sowrecked.
“I’m looking for a book,” she says, glancing around. “A romance. But not one of those ‘young things fall in lust and figure it out after 250 pages’ types.”
I blink. “Okay. More slow burn?”
She waves her hand. “No, no. Not slow burn. I want something withgrit. I want a love story that almost breaks them apart. But they find their way back. Theyfightfor it.”
I swallow.
“Like...a second chance story?” I ask, throat a little tight.
“Yes!” she says, lighting up. “Second chances. Third ones, too. Real messy love. The kind that leaves bruises, but you still choose it.”
Something stirs in my chest. I know that love.
She leans in, eyes searching mine like we’re in on some kind of secret. “My husband and I divorced when we were forty-two. Didn’t speak for five years. Then one day he showed up at mywork with a sandwich and said, ‘I’m tired of pretending I don’t still love you.’”
I blink hard. “What happened?”
