The Printed Letter Bookshop

by Katherine Reay

  It was hard not to turn into it and kiss him, really kiss him, but I forced myself not to move. He was the one who’d ended an engagement, and I wasn’t sure . . . Did he still carry her in his heart? Are there rules for that kind of thing? Is there a set amount of time that ensures you aren’t a rebound? I wasn’t interested in being that.

  It was hard not to turn my head now too. I glanced at him and felt that punch in my gut, again. I wanted more—a lot more—from Chris. Drew had been right to break up with me, both times. I never saw him. I only saw what he meant for me, personally and professionally. With Chris, one look and I was terrified to lose something beloved. So much had already been lost, and according to this letter, more was about to go.

  I handed it to him. “Who sends this on tax day? Do banks find this funny?”

  I’d come home, depressed from the shop, grabbed the mail, and found more depressing news in my mailbox. Rather than extend the loan or threaten me with future action, or even give me a few weeks’ reprieve while they investigated my request, the bank had sent loan call notices for both the shop and Aunt Maddie’s house. The letters arrived on the same day, and on the very day Uncle Sam would deposit the last of the proceeds from my car to cover owed taxes.

  “Why are they calling them?” Chris’s eyes ran up and down the page.

  “Because they can. If I’d been Aunt Maddie’s lawyer I’d never have let her sign those terms, but she did and they’re valid. The loans can be called at any time for any reason.”

  “But why now?”

  “I expect they’re deemed more risky. You can be sure the bank manager noted our damage at the shop, especially as the police canvassed his employees and requisitioned his surveillance data, and Aunt Maddie had been transferring money for months before she died—all from her accounts at the same bank. They knew. And I’ve been doing the same, really, just selling off stuff to keep them afloat. Anyone looking at the accounts could tell that too.”

  “I thought the shop was doing better.”

  “The shop is doing great. Once given free rein, Claire’s been brilliant. But it’s not enough to fill the hole Aunt Maddie’s estate was already in.”

  “How can I help?” He wrapped an arm around me.

  I tipped into him. “Tell me it’s going to be okay. You don’t have to know it or believe it, but I’d love to hear it.”

  He tightened his grip and dropped a kiss on the top of my head. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Tucked under his arm and against his chest, I almost believed it. “How’d I get here? I played by all the rules, checked the boxes, did what I was told and did it well. I’m supposed to be a lawyer with job security, not a bankrupt bookshop owner overrun with debt and three properties she should never own and can’t pay for . . . Yet here I am.” I pushed off him. “The day I quit, one of the partners at my firm remarked that because I didn’t get a trophy I was giving up. Everyone says that about our generation. Is it cliché because it’s true? Isn’t that what I did? If I’d stayed, I could pay for all this.”

  “What’s the good in asking that now?”

  “Because if it’s true, then none of this was done for the right reasons.”

  “Maybe it didn’t start out that way, but you stayed for the right reasons.”

  “You’re giving me more credit than I deserve.”

  He leaned back and watched the sunset with me. “You could say the same thing about me.”

  I threw him a nice try glance.

  “I’m serious. Reality trashed my idealized version of saving the world, and I caved. I came back to the States, lay on my brother’s couch for six months, physically sick with nothing anyone could name, and then got a job I have no skills for, a job my brother got me because no one says no to their priest. If that’s not an ‘I’m picking up my ball and going home’ scenario, I’m not sure what is.”

  “You were—you are healing.”

  “Then why aren’t you? Thinking of your life and your work in a new way is hard. And just because no one was shooting at you doesn’t mean you didn’t need to heal, and that you didn’t land here for good and legitimate reasons, and not because of some Millennial temper tantrum.”

  I chuckled at the image, but not because he was right. As much as I wanted to believe him, there was a thread of truth to my version as well. My arrogance, my hubris thinking that I could step in, bend things to my will, and leave again was now going to destroy Aunt Maddie’s legacy—and everyone would lose by it.

  “What do I do now?” I tipped back into him.

  “I’m the wrong one to ask.” His kissed the top of my head again. “Luke always tells me that eternity only reaches us in the present. We can’t revisit the past and we can’t assume a future, so I guess I’d say don’t dwell on what’s done and don’t try to answer tomorrow’s questions. Deal with today.”

  “Then today I’m hungry. Can you stay for dinner?”

  “Yes, but I’m cooking.” He pushed off the steps, returned to his truck, and pulled out two bags of groceries.

  “You went shopping.” My voice cracked. After all that happened today, two bags of groceries—the care behind two bags of groceries—almost brought tears.

  “I have a confession.” He stood in front of me. “Janet told me you’d had a rough day.”

  “I love her.” I heard my words and chuckled again. “I never thought I’d say that. I didn’t tell her about the bank’s letter.”

  “She watched you all day and knew something was wrong. She’s got a soft spot for you too.” He winked and led the way into the house.

  Three hours and a glorious chicken parmesan later, we were back on my front porch. His hand wove through mine as he stepped down the first stair and we stood eye to eye. He lifted his other hand and twirled a loose curl forward onto my shoulder.

  “Don’t give up.”

  “I don’t have anything left to give. Until that stupid condo sells. And now, unless a miracle happens in fifteen days, the bank takes this and the shop and I’m back downtown.”

  “You’ll move back?”

  “I have to until the condo sells and I can find something cheaper. I got a call from a firm too. I have an interview next Thursday.” I shrugged. “Funny thing is, everything points me back downtown, right as I felt this is where I’m supposed to be.”

  “As I said, don’t give up.” Chris brushed my cheek with his fingers. “Let’s simply trust we’re where we need to be.”

  I nodded.

  With that he closed the distance between us. His movement wasn’t hesitant or questioning; it was bold, consuming, and confident. His kiss was a declaration. This was no rebound. This was no fleeting affair. This was real, and meaningful, and now—and nothing from yesterday or tomorrow mattered.

  After a few seconds, he pulled back and searched my eyes. His didn’t ask the questions one might expect after a first kiss. Was that okay? Was that too much?

  Are you with me? was the question I saw in his eyes.

  My lengthy reply filled our second kiss, third, and countless more, until he gently pulled away.

  My answer still played in my head as I stood until his truck’s taillights rounded the corner.

  I am.

  * * *

  Claire

  Brittany passes me on the stairs. “Did you go in my room?”

  Out of instinct, I brace myself. We had come to blows countless times over this issue in the past year—violating her privacy, encroaching upon her freedom, whatever she called it. I was always the bad guy, and she had created countless teenage ways to tell me to get out and leave her alone.

  “Laundry. I put your whites and T-shirts on your bed.”

  “Did you see the drawing of Yellow Bear?”

  I blink. “Yellow Bear?”

  “Come see.” She races up the stairs ahead of me. “I drew it last night.”

  I follow her into her room. There is a new watercolor pinned above her desk. In fact, there are several new drawings since
the last time I looked. A large yellow Labrador sits staring out at me. He has a certain tubby Winnie-the-Pooh quality that makes you want to throw your arms around his neck, squeeze, and say “Silly old dog,” which was why Matt named him Yellow Bear.

  I run my finger down the edge of the paper. “That’s how I remember him. Did you draw it from a picture?”

  “The one I took the afternoon he wouldn’t come in because of the butterflies. Remember how he sat there and watched them? . . . Do you think we’ll get another?”

  “A dog? I stopped researching them . . . We’re busy right now.”

  “And you work.”

  When I took the job at the Printed Letter—when Maddie foisted it on me—I felt useless at home and lost in Winsome. Only recently, on that afternoon when Brian forced Brittany to work at the shop, did I realize my daughter thought I had stolen it from her. I can give it up now—if I need to.

  “We can consider a dog.”

  Brittany spins on me. “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing to worry about. Nothing that involves you.” I busy myself with collecting odds and ends to take to the kitchen—two empty glasses, a dirty plate and a bowl.

  Brittany steps in front of me. “That’s not true. Almost everything about the Printed Letter involves me.”

  I sink onto her bed and she plops next to me. “If I’d been here more, if I’d been here to listen, to notice, then maybe . . .”

  I let the words trail away. I am not trying to pass on my sense of guilt. She carries enough already. Again, I wonder if I am trying to be mom or friend. Drat, that line is so thin.

  “I’m not two.”

  Her reply jolts me.

  “I’ll be eighteen in two weeks, Mom. I knew what I was doing. I didn’t stop myself. That was a choice, my choice, and you being here wouldn’t have changed anything. And you are here. You are here practically each and every day when we get home. You can’t keep me safe, not like you could when I was two. That’s becoming my job now.”

  “When did you get so wise?”

  “Since I got charged with a municipal ordinance violation.”

  I sputter out a soppy laugh and pull her close. “I love you.”

  “I love you too. So don’t quit the Printed Letter. Please. I loved working in that place when we first moved here because it felt good. It’s a good shop. Your friend . . .”

  “Maddie?”

  “She was a very special lady, and that shop matters.”

  I sit back and straighten her hair. My hug pushed one side up and untangled it from her ponytail. “It does matter, but it also may not be my choice. Madeline got a letter from the bank today calling the store’s loan. Maddie had a lot leveraged, personally and professionally. Madeline’s been working to negotiate the debt, but there still aren’t sufficient funds. The shop will go.”

  “Why don’t you buy it?”

  “She turned down our offer to pay for the damages. I think she feels it’s one thing to be awarded damages in a settlement and another to extract them from a friend. I couldn’t change her mind, and she won’t file suit against us either. I actually asked her to do that.”

  “But what if you, with that money, offered to buy some of the store or pay it toward the loan? Wouldn’t that make the bank happy? You could secure the loan.”

  “How do you know about securing loans?”

  “Please, Mom. I got an A in Consumer Economics.”

  “Maybe.” I kiss the top of her head. “That’s not a bad idea, Brit.” Balancing all the dishware, I head out of the room and down the stairs. Why don’t you buy it?

  Why don’t we buy it?

  Brian is watching baseball in the family room. I sit on the ottoman in front of him and rest the dishes in my lap. He stretches up to look around me, fully notices me, and, bless him, drops back into his chair and turns off the television.

  “I’ve seen that look. What’s up?”

  “The money we were going to pay Madeline? Why don’t we invest it in the shop? Buy a percentage of it? She can draft the LLC or partnership papers or whatever they are, but the Printed Letter is in trouble, and we could help by buying part of it, at least until her condo sells.”

  “Is it a good investment?”

  “Does it matter?”

  We stare at each other in a silent conversation, one born of twenty years of marriage.

  His face softens. “You can make a go of it, can’t you?”

  “I can, especially with Janet and Madeline. The three of us . . . We can do it. It’s an amazing place, Brian, and this community needs it. I need it. And it’s different now. With all the social media Madeline’s added, it’s younger, without losing all that was good before. We’ve brought in a whole new clientele base, and her law work has done that too. People who never stepped foot in the shop are coming in, asking for recommendations, buying books, and joining book clubs. It was always important to Winsome, but it’s changing Winsome now . . . It’s changing me.”

  Brian doesn’t speak for so long I think he is going to say no. It isn’t like we have a ton of money, and it isn’t like putting money into the bookshop is a sound and secure move. But it is the right move. I know it.

  He rubs the top of his head, and for the first time I link it to Brittany’s hair pulling. Like father like daughter.

  I stand. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “Wait a minute.” He gently pulls at my elbow so as not to disturb my tower of dishes. “Don’t rush away. I was going to say part of me feels guilty about this. This money was earmarked for Madeline, and now it’ll be used to take her store from her.”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “She might think it is.”

  “I’ll tell her that’s not what we mean, but I don’t want to lose it either, Brian, so it’s worth the risk. We have fun there. We’re sharing stories, sharing our lives, and . . . Nobody saw me.” I feel the horrid pressure of tears fill my sinuses and will them not to come out, not to crack my voice. “I got lost and I’m getting found.”

  His face falls. I set the dishes on the floor and pull it close to mine.

  “It’s not your fault, don’t look like that. It was mine. But Maddie saw me and she offered me a job, and Janet, for all her flaws, saw me, and Madeline too.”

  “I see you.”

  “We both got busy. It’s hard moving. Everyone has to find their place and . . . Don’t. You’re a good man and I love you, but you have to admit we’ve been going through the motions. This thing with Brittany . . . I go over it day and night, and you do the same. I’m not sleeping and you’re certainly not. Who knows if we could’ve prevented it, but it was the culmination of time, of slipping apart, and me not . . . I was the one who chose to be home, and yet I can’t say I held them accountable enough or that I was present enough. And I’ll never answer those questions because I can’t go back, but I am waking up from wherever or whatever I let happen to me.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  “Because I didn’t tell you.”

  And as much as I want to share everything with him, there are places he still can’t go. I have no way to tell him of the cacophonous emotions jangling within me—to feel wired for others yet irrelevant; to need community but equally to be unable to find one; that cleaning, cooking, and caring for my family is a pleasure and a blessing, but it isn’t the same as feeling connected to them; to do things for others isn’t the same as being with them; that watching television side by side isn’t always “spending an evening together.” And that each year I feel gravity pull at my face, my breasts, my soul, and I wonder . . . I wonder what within me is compelling enough that anyone would stay with me. God, Brian, my kids, even friends. But I say none of this and maybe I don’t need to. I offer it up in prayer.

  “Let’s do it.”

  “Really?” The first tear falls.

  “Yes.”

  One word. Brian says nothing more. He doesn’t lay out a plan or terms or do anything I suspect he itche
s to do. This is what he does for a living, after all. He takes over businesses and turns them around. Yet by saying only that one word, we both understand the Printed Letter lies in my hands. This is my venture, and however I fashion it and whatever plans I make for it, he supports me.

  The second tear falls as I recognize the blessing of twenty years of marriage and I realize the skills for this next step have been within me all along . . .

  “Madeline mentioned the other day that she’d let Brittany work there, pay off her debt in kind. And we’re going to expand our community outreach. Madeline and Greg Frankel have established really great relationships across Winsome. We have tremendous support from a whole area of the community that never entered the shop before. We need to build on that, perhaps with in-shop book clubs. And the cat. I’m going to bring in that cat that lives outside the back door, once I bathe it. What’s more welcoming than a bookshop cat? And Janet is starting up her art again. She already sold two pieces we displayed in the window, and she’s there at all hours, asked if she could have the late Thursday shift. She could be ready for a hosted event at the end of the summer . . . And I know . . . I know what to do about Maddie’s smashed letters.”

  “What?”

  “It’s a surprise.”

  Brian laughs at my enthusiasm.

  “And let’s make that date night again we used to do years ago, and maybe we can get the kids to play a game on Sundays like we used to. Brittany will be gone to college in four months, and Matt is three years from walking out the door too . . . And it’s spring. Let’s take a weekend and go somewhere. Take a vacation with me, Brian, the two of us, and let’s make love more, and go to the movies more. Remember when we used to do that?”

  “Slow down.” His eyes dance. “Yes. Yes, to all of it.”

  I feel a smile bloom—something lovely and true that age and gravity can’t touch. “I should let you get back to your baseball.”

  “After all that? I don’t think so.” He hooks a hand around my neck and pulls me close.

  Chapter 22