Page 13 of The Nook for Brooks
“Hell no. He’d break out in hives.” Bud plucked a few tall bright stems from a bucket by the counter. “Sunflowers. Clean, cheerful, not too complicated. Says ‘sorry’ without screaming it.”
Just then Maggie came barreling back in, a pad of paper clutched in her hand. “Okay, here’s my list so far. Shot glasses, coasters, magnets, key chains, and maybe a snow globe. Do they have snow globes? Wait, no, it’s a tropical island, duh. What about asandglobe? Yes!” She scribbled out snow globe and scrawled “sand globe” on her list, underlining it twice.
Bud groaned softly, but his smile never faltered. “See what you started?”
Maggie shoved the list at me. “I’ll see what I can do,” I told her.
She jabbed a finger at the paper. “Good. And throw in a jar of Vegemite while you’re at it. It looks just like Nutella. Should be delicious on a batch of puppy chow.”
Bud wrapped the flowers and handed them to me. “On the house. Consider it a welcome to Mulligan’s Mill—and good luck with Brooks. You’ll need it.”
BROOKS
The soundof the front door opening made me flinch. I’d just spent the last two hours alphabetizing a new poetry section near the counter—even poets need love, probably more so than anyone else—organizing the shelves by author then subdividing by theme. The Sylvia Plath subsection alone took me half an hour. Trying to find her unique voice in a single heading proved difficult until I finally settled for “Sylvia Plath: the Oven Years.”
For a fleeting, precious moment, order had reigned. It was perfect. I smoothed down my bow tie and prepared myself for the usual afternoon crowd:
Mrs. Roper trying to return another a book because she didn’t like the villain, even though I’d explained to her time and time again you’re not supposed to;
Or maybe Old Walt from the hardware store who only ever asked for medical thrillers, then described in far too much detail his latest colonoscopy results from Doc Morgan;
Or maybe Milton the nerdy teenager who liked to loiter in the fantasy aisle and whisper loudly about dragons. I had a soft spot for that kid.
Instead, I got…him.
Compass boy. The Australian. The human hazard sign who’d managed to weaponize a friendly pat on the shoulder and catapult me into my own travel shelf.
And now he was carrying flowers?
Not discreet, sensible flowers either—oh no. An explosion of sunflowers, so bright and yellow they looked like someone just popped the sun.
He pushed open the front door, saw me standing in front of my new poetry section, and walked right up with that insufferably easy smile. “G’day. I brought you something.”
I froze. “Why?”
“To apologize for earlier. I didn’t mean to body-slam you into Bolivia.”
“I do believe it was Lithuania,” I corrected automatically.
“Yeah, but there’s no rhyme or alliteration in that. Doesn’t quite land.”
Did he just sound like a real writer? I cracked my neck. “Well, thank you for the gesture… albeit completely unnecessary and a tad gaudy.”
“Gaudy? Bud said you’d like sunflowers.”
“That’s because Budisa sunflower.”
“Still,” he said cheerfully, shoving the flowers closer. “Flowers never hurt.”
“They do, actually,” I muttered, staring at the oversized stems. “Pollen. Allergies. Spores.”
He laughed like I was being charming. I wasn’t.
Before I could stop him, he spotted the small glass vase I kept for my collection of antique quills—tall, delicate, slender, completely unsuited to horticultural abuse. He scooped it up, emptied the quills onto the counter nearby, then jammed the sunflowers inside, sat it on the counter, and stepped back like Michelangelo unveiling David.
“There,” he said proudly. “Brightens the place up.”
I stared at the tragic arrangement—sunflowers drooping like drunkards, petals already scattering across my counter, the vase straining under the weight like it might topple over any second.
