Love at First Write

by Jae

  “Let me guess… It involves superpowers too.”

  Tricia thought of the T-shirt she had worn earlier today. “Oh yeah. Lots and lots of them.”

  Jennifer lifted her mug. “To jobs with superpowers.”

  They clinked their mugs against each other.

  ~ ~ ~

  The barista cleared her throat next to them. “Excuse me, ladies. We’re about to close.”

  Tricia looked up. The coffee shop was deserted, and the staff had already flipped up the chairs on the tables surrounding theirs. Wow. When had that happened?

  Jennifer stared at her, apparently just as amazed at how fast time had flown by while they had talked about books, their families, and college adventures. “Sorry. We should be going.”

  They stood and made their way through the empty bookstore to the exit.

  Outside, Jennifer—Jen, as she had told Tricia to call her—shivered a little, making Tricia smile. She wished she had worn a jacket so she could offer it to her. Next time, she’d come prepared. There would be a next time, no doubt about it.

  “So…,” they both said at the same time and bobbed up and down on the balls of their feet, then smiled at each other.

  “Want to give me your number?” Jen lowered her gaze to the ground before looking back up with a grin. “To discuss the possible loan of my books, you know?” She hefted the bag with her purchases.

  “Why don’t I call you? I’ve already got your number from Sarah.”

  Jen’s brow knitted. “You do?”

  Tricia nodded and tapped her phone. “Yep.”

  “Well, then…”

  They looked at each other.

  Should she kiss her? Her characters probably would have. But Jen had said she couldn’t relate to her characters, so she opted for a quick hug instead.

  Jen smelled like hot chocolate, books, and honey shampoo. She shivered a little, but Tricia couldn’t tell whether it was from the evening air or their physical closeness.

  She stepped back. “I had a great time. Now go home before you freeze to death.”

  Jen laughed. “Me too. Talk to you soon.” With a soft touch to Tricia’s arm, she walked away, a spring in her step and cheerfully swinging her bag.

  Tricia watched her retreating back until Jen disappeared around a corner. Her phone started to ring. She fumbled it out of her pocket.

  “How did it go?” Chi Lo asked without a greeting.

  “Great!” For once, she didn’t have to fake an enthusiastic response.

  “Nuh-uh. I know what you are doing. You think if you pretend to like her, I won’t set you up on another blind date anytime soon. Let me guess… Jenny was a complete bore and about as entertaining as cleaning out your cat’s litter box.”

  “What? No!” Tricia scowled at the now dimly lit bookstore, surprised at how defensive of Jen she already felt. “She was…she was…wonderful. She reads more than I do, has a wicked sense of humor, and gets cold when it’s seventy-two degrees outside. It’s the cutest thing ever.”

  Only silence filtered through the line. Then came Chi Lo’s suspicious voice. “You’re not shitting me, are you?”

  “No. We really hit it off. I’m definitely going to call her and ask her out on a second date.”

  “Huh,” Chi Lo murmured. “Just when I thought I’d spend my evening listening to you whine about your horrible blind date.”

  “Nope. No whining this time.” She started walking in the direction of her car, which was parked two blocks away. “Hey, Chi Lo? Have you ever thought my characters might be a little too…flashy? Too unrealistic?”

  Chi Lo paused. “Uh, it’s fiction, right?”

  “Yeah, but I still want readers to be able to relate to them.” Readers like Jen. “I’m thinking of rewriting my work in progress a little. Do you think it would work if I make Corey into a psychologist or a social worker or something?”

  “What? She’s a millionaire. Why would she have to work? Are you drunk?”

  Tricia grinned. “Maybe a little high from all the hot chocolate.”

  “Hot chocolate?”

  “I’ll tell you the details later.” Once they had said goodbye, Tricia unlocked her car and slid behind the wheel. She put the phone down on the passenger seat and stared at it for a moment. How long did she have to wait until she could call Jen for a second date without appearing desperate?

  ~ ~ ~

  Just as Tricia walked into her house, her phone rang again. Apparently, Chi Lo didn’t want to wait to find out the details of her date. She grinned and slid her finger across the screen.

  “I’m on to you!” Chi Lo said, again not bothering with a hello. “Tell me the truth. You didn’t even set foot into the bookstore, did you?”

  “What the hell are you talking about? Of course I was there. They had to kick us out when they were closing.”

  “Us?”

  “Yeah, me and Jen.”

  “The Jen who just called Sarah to apologize for standing you up?”

  “What? Now who is drunk?”

  Chi Lo sucked in an audible breath and released it slowly. “Do you swear by…by your shiny awards and everything else you writer types hold sacred that you met with a woman in the bookstore?”

  “Of course I did. You were the one who set us up, remember?”

  “What did Jenny look like? Is she tall, thin, blonde, and blue-eyed?”

  Tricia closed her eyes as she imagined Jen’s face and body. “Nah. Her hair is so dark that it’s almost black. She’s got curves in all the right places, and her eyes make me think of the richest chocolate.”

  “Check your e-mail,” Chi Lo said. “I just sent you a photo of Jenny.”

  Tricia moved the phone away from her ear to open her e-mail app. Some blonde grinned at her from a photo that had clearly been taken in Sarah’s living room. What the…? “That’s not Jen.”

  “That’s Jenny, the woman you were supposed to meet at the bookstore.”

  Her knees turned into paper-mache. Tricia plopped down onto the couch. “Then who did I spend the evening with?”

  Chi Lo chuckled. “Some unsuspecting stranger with a fondness for Karin Kallmaker novels.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Tricia lay in bed and stared at the dark ceiling. In front of her mind’s eye, every second of her date…or what she had thought was a date…replayed in slow motion. God, now she understood why Jen had looked so confused when she had asked her to have coffee with her and when she had joked about their third date.

  She rubbed her face with both hands, then suddenly had to smile. Their first meeting made for an amazing story. What were the chances of another woman named Jennifer browsing the LGBT section at the exact time Tricia was supposed to meet with her blind date? If she focused, she could already hear Jen’s laughter when she told that incredible tale.

  But to do that, she had to find her first.

  Determined, she swung her legs out of bed and hurried to her laptop. It couldn’t be so hard to find a hypnotherapist named Jennifer, could it?

  Two hours later, she had an answer to that question.

  There was no hypnotherapist by the name of Jennifer, Jenny, or Jen in the entire city, at least not one that she could find. Had Jen lied about her job too?

  She shook her head. No. Jen had seemed so genuine.

  Maybe she had only recently set up her practice and didn’t have a website or any other information online yet.

  She had called Sarah earlier, but her friend didn’t know anyone working as a hypnotherapist. The Sarah Jen was friends with clearly wasn’t the one Tricia knew.

  Damn, this is all so unbelievable. If I tried to use it in a story, my editor would tell me my plot wasn’t realistic.

  The screen blurred before her eyes. She clicked the laptop shut and trudged back to bed, trying not to think about how Jen would feel when days, then weeks went by without a call from her.

  No. Don’t give up. Her characters always fought for their happy ending, and so would she
. Think. What would the characters in her novels do?

  An idea popped into her mind. That’s it!

  In her second novel, a romantic suspense, her fictional detective had solved a murder case because the suspect had paid for duct tape with his credit card, enabling her to find out his name and address—and if she wasn’t mistaken, Jen had paid for her books and their first round of hot chocolates with her credit card too.

  First thing tomorrow morning, she would head to The Booklover’s Lair and beg the clerk or the barista to give her Jen’s full name.

  ~ ~ ~

  The bookstore clerk at the register stared at her as if she had just demanded he hand over all the money instead of merely a customer’s last name.

  “I swear I’m not a stalker.” Tricia leaned closer to make sure no one could overhear her. “Look, this woman and I…we went on a date right here in the store, and I’d love to see her again, but I, um, I’ve got the wrong number, and I can’t find her without her last name. Do you really want to stand in the way of true love?”

  Okay, that was maybe a bit over the top, but she was getting desperate. She had been begging and pleading with him for ten minutes, and she hadn’t been any more successful with the barista. Clearly, finding a person via their credit card purchases was easier if you could flash a badge or a court order, like her fictional detective.

  The clerk gave her a blank look. “We can’t give out private customer data, ma’am.”

  Unromantic bastard. “What if I—?”

  “Is there a problem?” someone asked from behind her.

  She turned and came face-to-face with the store’s manager. Damn. “Oh, hi, Mr. Ashby.”

  “This lady wants us to—”

  Tricia interrupted the clerk with a glare. “Thanks. I’ll ask him myself.” If she wanted the bookstore to keep carrying her books, she needed to act like a professional, not make the manager think she was a lunatic who bothered his customers.

  She tugged Mr. Ashby out of earshot. “Um, I don’t know if you remember me. My name is Trish Hoffman. I’m a local author.”

  “Oh yeah. I remember. My wife loves your books.”

  His wife read lesbian fiction? She stared at him.

  “So, what is it you wanted to ask me?”

  Tricia’s mind raced as she tried to come up with something. “I, uh, was wondering…um…”

  An understanding smile spread over his face. “You want me to set up an author reading for you.”

  Shit. She hated reading in front of audiences. But it was the only way out. “Um, yes. Yes. That’s it. A reading. Of course, I’ll understand if it’s just not possible at the moment. After all, my genre won’t draw a big crowd, and you need to keep an eye on the bottom line.”

  “I do, but I’m always happy to support local authors, so let’s give it a try. How does the first of July sound?”

  Tricia gave him what she hoped could pass as a grateful smile. “Um, sounds great. Thank you.” Damn. Now she’d have to do a reading, and she still wasn’t any closer to finding Jen.

  ~ ~ ~

  For the rest of June, Tricia set up her office in the store’s coffee shop section, going there to write every day. Not that she got much writing done. Most of the time, she was keeping an eye out for Jen, hoping she would return to the LGBT section to get more reading material. If she didn’t get her act together soon, she would miss her deadline.

  Well, at least her publisher was happy that she had finally agreed to do a reading.

  A reading that will start in about twenty minutes, so you’d better focus. She took another look at the scene she had picked to read. By now, she nearly knew it by heart, but that didn’t ease her nervousness. Reading in front of an audience always did that to her.

  She got up and paced through the store’s break room, where the manager had ushered her to get ready. Quietly, she opened the door and peeked out.

  Mr. Ashby and one of his clerks were setting up three rows of chairs in front of the table where she would read. A stack of her novels was already waiting for her to sign, and at the front of the store, a poster announced the author reading and signing. Every time she walked past her publicity photo, she winced. Even after ten novels, she still wasn’t used to being in the limelight like that.

  Finally, it was time for her to take her place behind the table. With a death grip on her novel, she followed Mr. Ashby. She kept her gaze on the book while he introduced her. If she looked up into the expectant faces of her fans, she knew she would choke.

  Calm down. It’ll be over in a few minutes. Just remember not to read too fast, and you’ll be fine.

  She had picked the scene in which her main characters met for the first time, each thinking the other one was a burglar. Laughter drifted over from the audience as she described her characters threatening each other with a frying pan and a laptop bag.

  Her nervousness eased a little, and she began to have fun just as the scene and the reading ended.

  In a daze, she started signing books that readers handed her.

  Finally, the short line that had formed in front of her table dwindled, and there was only one customer left.

  A copy of her latest book was slid in front of her, already opened to the title page.

  “Who am I making it—?” She lifted her gaze from the novel and froze as she looked into Jen’s chocolate-colored eyes.

  “Jen,” she said softly.

  She wasn’t wearing a hoodie today. Her knee-length skirt and a blouse indicated that she had come straight from work and made her look even more like a sexy librarian.

  Tricia jumped up. “God, I’m so glad you found me. I’ve been looking for you all over for the last three weeks.”

  “Were you?” Disbelief colored Jen’s tone. “Then why didn’t you call?”

  “I wanted to, but I didn’t have your number.”

  “You said you did.”

  “That’s what I thought too, but…” Tricia looked around. The manager was watching them curiously. “Um, can we talk somewhere else?”

  Jen hesitated. “All right. I think the coffee shop here is about to close, but the one next door is still open.”

  With both of them gripping their respective novel, they left the store. Tricia ordered hot chocolate for them, and they settled down at a table in the corner.

  “You might not believe what I’m about to tell you, but I swear it’s the truth.” She looked into Jen’s eyes, hoping she would see the sincerity in her gaze. “On the day we met, my best friend set up a blind date for me. I was supposed to meet a woman named Jenny in the bookstore’s LGBT section. I thought you were her, but then she called to apologize for standing me up—and I’m kind of glad she did because I had a wonderful time with you.”

  Jen stared at her. Her hot chocolate sat untouched in front of her.

  “I know it sounds crazy. Let me call my friend. She can confirm it.” Tricia reached for her cell phone, but Jen reached out and stopped her with a quick touch. Her fingers were cool, even in July, and Tricia instantly wanted to cover them with her own to warm her.

  “That’s not necessary.” A tiny smile eased onto Jen’s face. “I can read minds, remember?”

  “Then you believe me?”

  “I think I do. After all, not even a writer could come up with such a crazy story.”

  Tricia nearly knocked over her mug as she reached for Jen’s hand and gave it a quick squeeze. “Thank you for believing me. I really was trying to find you, but there wasn’t a hypnotherapist named Jennifer in all of Chicago.”

  “I go by my middle name in everyday life, but my practice is under my first name.”

  “Which is?”

  Jen shook her head. The corners of her eyes crinkled. “That’s something I never reveal before the third date either.”

  They both chuckled, and Tricia wondered if they would ever make it to a third date after their messy beginning.

  After a few seconds, Jen sobered. “I tried to find you too.”<
br />
  “You did?”

  “Yeah. At first, I thought you weren’t interested in seeing me again, and that’s why you didn’t call.”

  Tricia’s stomach twisted itself into a knot as she imagined how Jen must have felt as the days went by without a call from her. She gave in to the urge to reach across the table again and cover Jen’s hand with her own.

  To her relief, Jen didn’t withdraw.

  “Then I started wondering…” Jen continued. “What if Sarah had given you a wrong number or something? But when I called her, she said she didn’t know anyone named Tricia.”

  Tricia smiled ruefully. “I’m pretty sure our Sarahs aren’t the same person.”

  “I really didn’t know what to make of the entire situation. I was a little pissed, to tell you the truth.” Jen hesitated, then added, “Pissed and disappointed. And then, a few days ago, I walked past the bookstore and saw the poster announcing Trish Hoffman’s reading…with your picture next to it. Suddenly, I realized why you seemed so familiar.” Jen tapped the book, which had Tricia’s author photo on the backcover. “You could have told me, you know?”

  Tricia ducked her head and, with some reluctance, lifted her hand away from Jen’s. “I know. I just didn’t want you to feel self-conscious after commenting on how unrealistic my characters are.”

  A cute blush rose to Jen’s cheeks. “Sorry about that. Please don’t think I don’t like your writing. That scene you read from today had me in stitches.”

  “Thanks. But you were right. I’m thinking about making my next main character a hypnotherapist. Someone relatable, who wears hoodies and drinks hot chocolate.”

  “Really?”

  Tricia nodded, stirred her hot chocolate, and peeked over at her. “Of course, that would require lots of research.”

  “I can imagine,” Jen said.

  Her poker face was so much better than Tricia’s, and her tone was neutral, not revealing if she had understood Tricia’s hint.

  “May I?” Tricia pointed to the book on Jen’s side of the table. When Jen nodded, she slid it over, took out a pen, and inscribed the title page. She signed it with Tricia, not Trish, because that was who she wanted to be to Jen.