Dating by the Book

by Mary Ann Marlowe

  I laughed at the valid questions. “I don’t know much, and I’ve never laid eyes on him. I don’t even know his real name. Crazy.”

  “So you’re just going to go and hang around, waiting? What if he never shows? Or what if he’s, I dunno, a teenager?”

  I chortled. “I don’t think he is, but I’ve thought it through. I can scope out anyone hanging around and bounce if he seems too sketchy.” I tried to conjure an image of that meeting. “I don’t think he’ll be sketchy. I hope not. I hadn’t considered he might not even show up. What if he comes and scopes me out, then leaves?”

  “That would never happen. Look at you. This guy doesn’t stand a chance.”

  A clank from the alley revealed that we had company. I peered around the corner to discover Gentry behind the trash bins, closing a lid.

  “Evening, Gentry. Nice night for eavesdropping.”

  He harrumphed and continued past us into his restaurant.

  Shawna said, “Good luck tomorrow. You know I just want what’s best for you. I hope you figure things out.”

  So did I.

  Chapter 25

  As tempted as I was to message Silver Fox Saturday morning, I knew I’d be seeing him later, and I didn’t want to seem overeager. I wished I’d pressed him for his name or his picture, but then I would have had to give him mine. I got to the shop early to take care of some inventory so we could head out to the concert. I heard the toilet flush and carefully set down the books I’d been unpacking so I could make sure I didn’t miss a customer.

  I caught Gentry’s backside as he headed toward the front door and called out to stop him.

  He spun back. “Ah, here you are. I seem to have a bit of your mail.”

  I reached out and took the proffered envelope. It would be just my luck for the electricity bill to go errant. A quick glance showed it was nothing more than a credit card offer.

  “Thanks, Gentry.”

  He lingered. “I was wondering if I could get you to do me a small favor this evening. I hate to ask, but my pastry chef has me in a bind.”

  “Oh?” I didn’t like where this was going.

  “He needs extra refrigerator space. Just for this evening. I thought maybe—”

  I cut him off. “I’m not going to be around tonight. In fact, I’m closing the store a little bit early.” I fake winced. “Sorry. Can it wait until tomorrow?”

  “I’m afraid not.” His face brightened. “Perhaps when you get back. How late will you be gone?”

  “I don’t know, Gentry. Late.”

  He blinked. “If you left me a key—”

  That was not going to happen. “Nope.”

  He pouted. “What if you left it with Max?”

  “Sorry. He’ll be with me.”

  Because of course Max had invited himself to tag along to the concert. Secretly, I was glad because I had a friendship to repair, and it would be easier in the comfortable trio of yore. We could pretend like it was old times, and maybe it would be. Maybe he’d change his mind about leaving.

  As Gentry was heading out, Dylan showed up, and my heart skipped a beat.

  “Hey,” he said. “Just stopped in to check on you.”

  I pulled out a chair and beckoned him to sit. I took a seat across from him. “Are we good, Dylan?”

  “Always.”

  Those stormy eyes made me almost wish he’d pushed a little harder. That’s what she said, I thought. “I wish . . .” I trailed off, wanting to share with him every possibility I would’ve loved to have written into existence, but I worried such admissions would reopen a door I’d already closed.

  “Me, too.” He shrugged, like I didn’t need to put it into words. “But you were right. I shouldn’t have asked you to tie yourself to my goals.”

  “Dylan . . .”

  He slid his hand into mine. “You know, when I left the first time, I was full of myself with confidence, but it wasn’t long before I lost my way. I thought I needed you with me this time because you always give me courage.” He sat a little straighter and tightened his grip. “But I can do this on my own.”

  “I know you can.”

  “Will you promise to come see me whenever you can?”

  “Of course.” My heart broke a little, and I suddenly wished I could clone myself so one of me could run away with Dylan and lead a life of adventure. “When do you leave?”

  “Tuesday.” He checked his watch. Dylan was the kind of guy to still wear one. It wasn’t expensive, just a plain black leather strap with a functional clockface.

  I squeezed his hand. “We’ll talk later?”

  “I have to be somewhere this evening, but I’ll try to catch you before I head out.”

  I didn’t know if he meant for the day or forever, and the reality hit. He was leaving again. What if he never came back this time? But I’d made my choice, so I couldn’t cry about losing him now.

  * * *

  Layla spread out the blankets and shot pictures. I checked my phone. It was almost seven, and I didn’t know how long it would take to get to the totem. I stretched casually and was about to make an excuse to leave when Max jumped up.

  “I think I’m gonna go walk around a bit. I wanna see how small the children’s maze looks now.”

  Perfect. I could walk that far with him, then ditch him. I stood. “I’ll come with you.”

  Layla called after us. “Don’t be too long. You don’t wanna miss the show.”

  We moved against the crowd until we exited the concert area and found ourselves along a path that led toward the totem.

  Max snapped pictures. “Why do they even call this a maze?”

  Good question. It was nothing more than a bunch of long bench-height stones arranged in concentric circles. While he went through his photo roll, I walked ahead, hoping he’d linger, but he caught up and stayed at my side. I worried he might have created this moment to get me alone, but he didn’t look up from his phone, and I had to steer him around a couple pushing a stroller.

  A bit farther, we passed a tall modern sculpture. Max stopped again to take a picture, then messed around, typing in his phone. I tried to take the opportunity to leave him behind again, but he said, “Hold on.”

  He was going to make me miss Silver Fox. “Can you do Facebook later?”

  “I wasn’t doing Facebook. I was sending a picture to Layla.”

  “I’m sure she can wait for the photo gallery, but she’ll kill us if we miss the opening act.”

  “You can go back.”

  Not an option. I could see the totem from where we stood. A series of narrow canals ran along the path to our left and ended just beyond the meeting place. We walked along the path until we reached the Hall of Fame directly across from the totem, and I climbed the steps as if that had been my destination. I peered through the glass doors, then glanced at the statue.

  Would I know Silver Fox on sight?

  A woman posed for a picture, and a couple strolled past arm in arm. My fears of a throng of possible Foxies was mitigated. Instead, I might have been stood up. I checked the time on my phone. It was a little past seven. Maybe he’d come and left. Maybe he was late. Or maybe he had the same idea and stood watching for me from a distance. Max at my side would have thrown him off. He wouldn’t be looking for a couple.

  Max left me to walk beside the canal, taking pictures and stopping to upload them.

  He acted like nothing had happened between us the week before, like he always did, and I realized that what he’d said must be true. He’d been living with this reality for years and acting like he wasn’t suffering with an unrequited emotion.

  I pulled up my Twitter app and DMed. Where are you?

  A moment later, I had a response. I’m here.

  I rubbed my forehead and messaged. I don’t see you.

  Was I waiting for Godot?

  Max started to walk around the end of the canal, but I didn’t follow. I was too intrigued now to figure out where Foxy was. My phone vibrated.
r />   Now do you see me?

  There was still only Max there. I started to type, No.

  “Maddie?” The voice came from my left.

  I turned and there stood Peter, taking the last few steps toward me. Max started back, but when he saw Peter, he froze.

  Peter casually relaxed, with a hand in his pocket. He didn’t seem surprised to see me.

  I descended the steps. “What are you doing here?”

  “A little bird said you might be here.” He winked, like I should understand.

  Who knew I was coming here besides—“Layla?”

  “Nope.”

  I scanned the people passing through the area again but didn’t see anyone who appeared to be looking for me. Except Peter. The only person who knew I planned to come here besides Layla and Shawna was . . . Silver Fox.

  I clapped my hand to my mouth. No.

  “Silver Fox?”

  He laughed and ran his hand through his hair. “Why, thank you.”

  “How?”

  “How what?”

  “How is it possible? You’re . . . Are you—?”

  “You wanted to meet. I’m Peter.” He held out his hand like we were being introduced for the first time, and I shook it in a total stupor. “What a funny coincidence.”

  I blinked, trying to clear my head of assumptions and preconceptions. Had I been talking to Peter this whole time?

  Nothing made sense, and I couldn’t understand my disappointment. What had I been hoping? I’d wanted Silver Fox to be someone new, someone who could surprise me. But if Peter had been capable of saying everything he’d written, maybe I’d underestimated him.

  I stood there, mouth hanging open, gobsmacked, reeling with another mind-shattering world flip, trying to formulate a coherent question, but he just raised an eyebrow. Mischievous.

  “I don’t understand.” Before I could fully interrogate him, the screech of guitars alerted me that the show was beginning. I’d promised Layla I’d sit through the whole thing. “Do you have a ticket to the concert?”

  “I can get one.”

  I called to Max, and he looked around once more, like he’d lost his keys or something. He waved us away. Clearly, he didn’t want to be a third wheel.

  Before we moved out of view, I looked back. Max paced back and forth, probably killing time to avoid seeing me with Peter. I felt a twinge of guilt for the loss he must be feeling.

  If I was being honest, I was feeling it, too.

  Layla gave me a dirty look when Peter and I sat on her blanket. I couldn’t figure out if it was because I’d missed most of the opening act or because I’d brought Peter with me. After Peter had bought a ticket, I’d stopped to get four cups of beer, assuming Max would eventually get over his disappointment and make his way back. When I handed one of the beers to Layla, she begrudgingly took it with a sneer.

  I wanted to quiz Peter on every aspect of the correspondence we’d been having. There was so much that didn’t make sense. When did he start reviewing books? Why had he given me such an unfavorable review? How’d he even get a copy? Had he known it was mine all along? He knew I wrote, but I’d never told him my pen name.

  And those chats . . . He’d never been so flirtatious with me over text messages before. Silver Fox did say he’d changed. Had Peter changed?

  Did I owe him a chance to find out?

  I’d chided Silver Fox’s girl for failing to see past her preconceived notions of him. Had I misjudged Peter? Everything about Lizzie Bennet . . . had that been about me?

  As soon as the opening act left the stage, Layla launched into a monologue to bring me up to speed on the main band we’d come to see. “So, the lead singer is the brother of the girlfriend of the lead singer of the band I run the fan forum for. Got it?”

  I shared a glance with Peter. “Uh. Sure.” My questions would have to wait until later.

  “Micah is stunningly beautiful, but so is his lead guitarist, Noah. Noah is pretty like a girl, like a Duran Duran. Like a Hanson. He’s pretty.”

  “Like Scarlett Johanson?” I asked.

  Peter chuckled. “Did we come to hear a boy band?”

  Layla’s eyes went wide, and her cheeks filled with color. “Never! This is a rock show.”

  When she’d stopped enthusing, I turned to talk to Peter, but two things happened at once. First, Max appeared and kicked over the beer he didn’t know was there. Second, the featured band ran out onto the stage and started to play.

  We missed half the first song from checking everything that might have gotten wet, then moving the blanket over several feet while Layla cursed us out for talking over the music.

  At last we settled in and watched the show. I didn’t know the songs, and I was focused internally, walking back every conversation with Silver Fox. Had Peter written me a sex scene? Had I sent him a sex scene? My cheeks flamed.

  It came as a surprise when the sound system went silent, and the crowd chanted for an encore. I started to get up to leave. Encores were the time for beating the crowd out of the parking lot, but Layla grabbed my wrist. “Oh, no you don’t.”

  By the time we left, we had to shuffle out of the exits like zombies, one lumbered step at a time. Peter had brought his own car, but Layla would never forgive me if I bailed before the obligatory concert postmortem on the drive back. Peter asked if he could follow us to town. I agreed.

  We had a lot to talk about.

  Chapter 26

  It was late when Max pulled up along the curb to let me and Layla out. He hung his head as Peter’s headlights swung around the corner. I told Max I’d see him later and slammed the door.

  As I waited on the sidewalk for Peter, something caught my eye in my bookstore. A light was on, and someone was moving inside. I jogged over and noticed the glass on the front door was shattered, and the door stood ajar.

  Max got out of the car. “What’s going on?”

  I walked inside and flipped on the overhead light. I stopped dead. I was standing in a stream winding across the floor.

  “Maddie?” It didn’t even surprise me to find Gentry poking his head in. “I noticed water out on the sidewalk and called Jack. We had to break your window to get in. If you’d left me a key . . .”

  If I’d left him a key, how would that have kept my bookstore from turning into a flood zone?

  Jack emerged from the bathroom, wearing rubber shit-stomping boots and carrying an augur. “The valve wasn’t closing properly in the tank. Looks like the water could’ve been running over for hours.”

  “Holy shit!” said Max, pushing past the others and treading carefully around the puddles. The wooden floors would be forever ruined. God only knew if this reached into the storeroom to the boxes all over the floor. I’d have to close down to deal with this.

  I’d be lucky to sell this place at all now.

  Then again, Gentry wanted to demolish it anyway.

  “This is too much,” I said to nobody in particular. “I can’t do this anymore.”

  I backed out of the store into Peter waiting on the sidewalk. He put an arm around me. “We’ll call the insurance company in the morning and—”

  “I’m going to sell it. You were right the whole time.”

  “What?”

  “That bookstore has been treating me like a rejected transplant ever since you left. It clearly doesn’t want me here. There’s nothing for me here.”

  “Maddie, you’re in shock.” He rubbed my back. “Come on. Let me take you home, and we can make plans in the morning.”

  I started toward my apartment, but he tightened his arm around my back and urged me toward his car. “Peter, this isn’t the way home.”

  He stopped and spun to face me, grasping both my shoulders. “Come home with me, Maddie. You can’t fix anything tonight, and we need to catch up.” That was true. I had so much to ask him. He stepped in close. His forehead slowly met mine, more by inertia than by its own propulsion, like an astronaut touching down on the moon through weak gravity.
Something about that gentleness cracked me, and I started to sob.

  His thumbs brushed my cheeks, then tucked loose hair behind my ear. His fingers tangled into what had started out as a braid, and he tilted my head up so I was forced to face him.

  His lips pressed against mine, but they might as well have been made of wax. He’d won. After all my efforts, he’d get everything he wanted.

  And why not? All the people I cared about would soon leave me. I could open a new bookstore and start over. Maybe Peter and I could take up where we left off.

  Everything he’d said to me as Silver Fox had proven he could be more than I’d given him credit for. I’d never suspected him of the level of adoration he’d written in that one steamy scene. I’d fallen back in love with him through his words in the end after all.

  I broke away from him, and sighed. “It’s weird to think that all this time, I’ve been your Lizzie.”

  He scowled. “My what?”

  “Lizzie? From the book? You know—” Did he? “—Pride and Prejudice?”

  He shot double finger pistols at me. “Oh, right! Because Elizabeth Bennet’s such a stubborn character.”

  How could he forget something so critical to our conversations?

  I took a step back. “Do you remember talking about this?”

  He frowned. “Uh—”

  I narrowed my eyes. Gears turned. Maybe this all felt wrong because it was.

  “By any chance, have you ever de-tasseled corn?”

  “Done what?”

  “And what’s your opinion on The Little Prince?” I pictured the ugly little knit figures sitting even now on the shelf of the bookstore.

  “I haven’t read that book in years. Why are you asking me all this? Is it about the bookstore? You know I’ll support you when—”

  “Have you read my book?”

  “Well, yeah, of course.” He scratched his neck. “I mean the parts you showed me before. It’s really great. I was surprised at how good.”

  “Oh, God.” I dropped my face into my palms, and my shoulders slumped. It was a miracle my bones held me upright at all. I looked up at him. “Would you excuse me? I need to think.”

  I walked down the sidewalk past the bookstore. Max had found a Shop-Vac and was sucking up toilet water. I continued until the sidewalk ran out. How had Peter known to meet me if I hadn’t been talking to him?