Love Lettering

by Kate Clayborn

  “I think maybe,” he’d said to me once, “I could be good with kids who love math. Or . . . or with kids who could learn to love it.”

  I’d thought of that picture of Reid on his first day of school. That bubble-lettered chalkboard and that irrepressible smile. I’d told him I thought he could be good, too.

  Now, I brush a patch of chalk dust from his sleeve, while he looks toward the back of the shop.

  “Ah,” he says, smiling when he spots Sibby and Elijah, both of whom have grown to be close, trusted friends of Reid’s, especially after they’d shown him a lot of support in those initial, tumultuous months. “Did she like it?”

  “She loved it.”

  “Good.”

  Since it’s been a couple of days since Reid and I have been able to connect at home—both of us busy with work—I hear that “Good” in all the wrong ways for a public venue, and I take a step back from him.

  “I’ll go check on them one more time,” I say. “And then we can go.”

  He catches my hand and pulls me back toward him.

  “Now wait a minute,” he says, and I feel my skin flush. That was unmistakably bedroom voice.

  “Reid,” I whisper sternly, but not all that seriously.

  “I want to talk to you about what you left in my bag today,” he says. He lifts it from over his shoulder, sets it gingerly on one of the bare spaces of the display table.

  My heart taps in anticipation, the same way it always does for these moments. These games we still play together.

  From the front pouch he takes out a folded sheet of paper, uncreases it, and sets it on the table.

  “This letter,” he says, pointing down to the words I wrote there this morning—all-lowercase cursive, long and looping swashes at the start of each word. “It’s a very nice invitation to dinner this evening.”

  “Yes,” I say formally. “There’s a new noodles shop that’s just opened three blocks from here.” I gesture toward the words. “See? The lettering is all . . . noodle-y.”

  “I do see,” he says, trying to hide his swoonsh. “But I see something else here, too.”

  “Oh?”

  “It took me some time to decode it,” he says. But I can tell he’s lying. Sweet, stoic, playful Reid. Always up for a game.

  He moves his body so he stands behind me, reaches his arm around me, and points.

  “But I figured it out.” Slowly, he moves his fingertips along the page, pausing briefly at each of the letters I’ve ever so slightly made stand out. It’s only ever Reid I hide messages for now. My face heats as he moves through them, adding them up until they spell out a request. Whew. These words seemed a lot less dirty when I wrote them this morning.

  “Did I get it right?” he says quietly, his breath tickling my neck. I shudder with frustrated pleasure.

  “You always were good at reading codes,” I say.

  For the briefest seconds, his lips dip to press against that one spot—right there at my temple—and in his soft kiss I feel all the history we’ve made and are making together, all the letters and numbers we’re writing out and counting up.

  “And you, my love,” he says, “were always good at sending them.”

  Acknowledgments

  First, to readers: Thank you so much for inviting Meg and Reid into your imaginations and, I hope, into your hearts. It means so much to me to share this story with you, and I hope you’ll share in my thanks to some very special people who helped me bring it into the world.

  Two exceptional women deserve so much of the credit for Love Lettering. My agent, Taylor Haggerty, is the first person to have ever heard my idea about Meg and Reid and the secret code they shared, and throughout the process of my writing this book—everything from the very first synopsis to the very final sentence—she encouraged me by reading pages when I stumbled and rooting for me when I got back up again. Taylor, I adore you, and I am so grateful for everything you have done and continue to do for me.

  I have been fortunate to work with the incomparable Esi Sogah on five books now, and for each one, she has applied her keen eye for character, for story, for sound, and for sense to every one of my sentences. But for Love Lettering, a book that challenged me in unexpected ways, Esi did so much more— coaching me through the tough parts, accommodating me when I needed more time, and helping me see my way to the end more clearly than I would have been able to without her vision. And beyond all this: She is simply the most fun person to work with, the most fun person to know and be around. Esi, for all this and more, I owe you a front-row seat to some musical where you will take great joy in my hives of embarrassment.

  The team at Kensington Books more generally has my sincere gratitude for believing in this book and for helping it make its way into the world so beautifully. For their work and support, I thank Michelle Addo, Lynn Cully, Jackie Dinas, Vida Engstrand, Susanna Gruninger, Sheila Higgins, Norma Perez-Hernandez, Lauren Jernigan, Samantha McVeigh, Alexandra Nicolajsen, Kristine Noble, Carly Sommerstein, and Steve Zacharius.

  In the summer of 2018 I sat in a small, slightly overloud, somewhat poorly lit vegan restaurant in Brooklyn and met the brilliant Sarah MacLean for the first time, and to Sarah I owe a great debt—for loving this idea and for reading pages of it when I was stuck, and for becoming a devoted friend who has supported me a great deal. More generally, what I would say is that I am grateful, over these past few years, to have learned something that Meg learns in the pages of this book—being creative doesn’t mean being solitary, and so many friends in the romance community deserve my thanks. I can name only a small fraction of them here, for this book especially: Olivia Dade (who deserves particular credit for teaching me this lesson most patiently, and for helping me shape the first half of this manuscript), Therese Beharrie, Alyssa Cole, Jen DeLuca, Elizabeth Kingston, Ruby Lang, and Jennifer Prokop. Thank you for being writers I admire, and more importantly, thank you for being friends who listen and encourage and celebrate. I can only hope that for you I have done a small share of what you have done for me.

  To my family (immediate, extended, and in-lawed!)—thank you for believing in me, even when I am doing my level best not to believe in myself, and thank you for your patience and kindness each time I undertake a new project. To my lovely, supportive friends, who had to keep me from drowning in a difficult time—Amy (who read every page of this book, sometimes as it was being written), Elizabeth, Jackie, Joan, Niamh, Sarah, (other!) Amy—you are more precious to me than I could ever say. Your voices exist in this book, hidden messages of love I sent you along the way.

  Finally, to my husband—I hope you’ll take this as quite the compliment—you are and have been my inspiration, always. Thanks for spending hours chasing down signs with me in your not-favorite city, and thank you for never doubting I could turn those signs into something special.