Page 68 of Finding Love at the Magical Curiosity Shop
‘I saw you k-i-s-s-i-n-g,’ she sing-songs when she pulls back. ‘You two aresoooooin love!’
‘You know this doesn’t change anything, right?’ I say, becausethisis uncharted territory to me and I’m not sure how to handle it. ‘I’m not going to try to be your mum or anything.’
‘I don’t want a new mum, I’ve got more than enough parental challenges to handle with my dad, but Ihavealways wanted a really cool older sister…’ She motions for me to come closer so she can whisper to me. ‘Can you persuade him to let me get a puppy?’
‘I heard that!’ Ren says with an indignant laugh.
He looks so blissfully happy and as intoxicated as if the single bite of dragon fruit had been half a bottle of wine, and I’m filled with a rush of love. ‘To be honest, he owes me for that dragon fruit, we could probably go for a puppyanda pony right now.’
He’s laughing as he holds my gaze. ‘It’s a good job I love you.’
‘I love you.’ I stand back upright as I realise what I’ve said. It’s the first time in so many years that I’ve said those words in a romantic way, but it feels so very, very right, and the butterflies that burst into existence when he clonked his head on a Victorian birdcage all those weeks ago are still alive and well and living their best life inside me.
‘I love you too, Mickey. And you, Dad, even though you’re my history teacher and you’resoooooembarrassing. Apart from today. Today you did good because you got Mickey back for us.’
I’m wiping tears from my eyes while giggling at the same time. ‘How am I supposed to work after this? I’m an emotional wreck!’
‘We can help, right, Dad? This means I can come and helpeveryday, right?’ Ava dances over to touch the blue scales of the mermaid’s tail statue outside my shop window. ‘I’m sorry the diary wasn’t written by a real mermaid. I wish she really had been.’
‘Me too, but it’s okay. The diary brought us together, and maybe that was its real purpose. We’ve still got plenty of time to find proof that mermaids may once have existed.’
‘Oh,nooo,’ Ren groans jokingly, but in a probably-not-joking way.
‘Maybe mermaids live not just in stories, but in the hearts of every person who stands on the shore and looks out at the ocean, wondering what might be out there, and that’s all they were ever meant to be.’ I grin at them both. ‘And who knows, maybe one day, wewillfind proof that those stories are real.’
Ava squeals her agreement, and Ren puts his arms around us both and turns his head to murmur the words against my hair. ‘I love this place.’
I’m not sure if he means Ever After Street or being between the two of us, but I agree on both counts. I love my place on this fairytale little street and I love these two gorgeous humans I’m lucky enough to call my own.
They say mermaids sing songs to find love, and somehow I managed to find it with a little help from a lighthouse keeper of so many years ago, who proves that, no matter how unlikely, sometimes your happy ending can burst into your life when you least expect it.
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