The Melody of You and Me (Lillac Town Series Book 1)

by Maria Hollis

  The Melody of You and Me

  M. Hollis

  © 2016 M. Hollis

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright laws.

  For every lonely girl out there in the world.

  May you find yourself in the pages of a book.

  Chapter 1

  A loud knock on Chris’s door interrupts her heavy sleep.

  She turns over in her bed. Tegan and Sara are singing loudly inside her head, and she couldn’t care less about anything else, apart from the rapidly fading image of a fantasy girl moving behind her eyelids.

  The knock comes again.

  Chris turns one more time, and the movement causes one of her ear buds to fall from her ear. She hears her roommate’s voice from the other side of the door.

  “Chris! Did you sleep with your earphones in again?” Mayte asks. “Your alarm won’t stop ringing!”

  Chris opens her eyes with a groan.

  “Sorry!” she says, reaching for her clock on the bedside table.

  The numbers on the screen accuse her of being ten minutes late for work, again.

  Her clothes are strewn all over the floor, and it takes her longer than usual to find her favorite old pair of jeans before she goes to the bathroom to wash her face.

  When she finally gets to the kitchen, Mayte is already finishing her breakfast.

  “You need to stop with this habit,” her sweet voice reprimands as she smiles behind her coffee mug. One of her dark fingers has a small smudge of yellow paint. Chris never understood how she could wake up so early to paint something just for a hobby.

  “I can’t sleep without music, you know that,” she explains.

  With a teasing smile, she steals one of Mayte’s pancakes and moonwalks awkwardly through the living room.

  Mayte rolls her brown eyes with amusement and gets up to start cleaning the dishes.

  “You need to eat a full meal one of these days. And don’t come to me with I had a whole pizza last week. You are going to make yourself sick.”

  Chris ignores Mayte’s usual rambling. She throws her backpack on her shoulders lazily and grabs her keys from the counter.

  “Have a good day!” she yells before closing the door as she leaves.

  ***

  The walk between Chris’s apartment and her job usually doesn’t take more than five minutes. She likes to spend her time under the sun, feeling the end-of-spring warmth bathing her skin. Her mother would have complained if she were here. She would berate Chris about how her skin is just too delicate for such heat and that she needs to take precautions against all the extra freckles that would appear on her face.

  Chris stops, feeling her phone ringing in her pockets.

  She frowns at the name on the screen. Speaking of the devil.

  Her fingers hesitate around the phone buttons, wondering if she should accept the call or ignore it again.

  Chris shakes the thought away with a sigh.

  She doesn’t like to think about her mother; it sours her mood. The last time they had a full conversation it just turned into a big mess. Since then, Chris had been ignoring all of her calls and messages.

  “I’m at work! Will call you later.” She types before resuming her walk.

  Chris has enough trouble on her mind without having to worry about her parents’ opinions on the decisions she makes in her life.

  ***

  When she reaches the entrance of Johnson’s Bookstore, the open sign is already on the door.

  Through the windows, she can see Lily running around organizing the books. She is muttering to herself as she frowns in deep thought. Chris watches her with a fond smile. Lily must be pissed that she is late once more and ready to throw a fit. Sometimes, Chris forgets that Lily is only nineteen; she often acts like an old lady. Lily tends to organize the books always with a complaint about how the customers make a mess, cursing at the walls, and staring angrily at the trash people leave around the bookstore. Always the same worry that she won’t have time enough to finish everything she needs to do. Lily goes through life as if the world is going to end at any second and she needs to catch up on everything before it’s over.

  Chris enters the store, closing her eyes blissfully when she feels the cold air that greets her inside. When she opens them a minute later, Lily is staring at her with her hands on her broad hips.

  “You’re late. Again,” Lily says as she throws her pink hair behind her shoulders.

  “I know, sorry,” Chris apologizes.

  She fixes a book that is about to fall from the Bestsellers table and feels Lily’s gaze burning on her skin.

  “Did the girlfriend keep you up all night?” the girl mocks.

  That was a fast change of mood, even for Lily.

  Chris pouts, trying to walk faster to get to the storage room. Before she can get to the back door, Lily is in front of her blocking the way with her arms crossed.

  “We broke up two months ago,” Chris sighs.

  Lily uncrosses her arms, and her honey eyes widen. Slowly, she takes a step closer to inspect Chris’s expression better. God, Chris hates this. This is precisely why she hadn’t told Lily about it yet.

  In a split-second, she is being embraced in a tight hug.

  “Why didn’t you tell me before?” Lily says, her voice muffled against Chris’s shoulder.

  “I needed time to figure stuff out. But I’m over it, really,” Chris says as an excuse.

  After what feels like an eternity, the girl finally lets her go.

  “Do you need me to shake her up a bit?”

  Chris laughs.

  “No, I know you can’t even hurt a fly. But thanks for the metaphorical support, I guess.”

  A customer enters the store, and Chris runs to the door on her right, taking advantage of the fact that Lily will be distracted by work.

  She throws her backpack between two boxes in a corner as she enters the tiny room. Chris checks her reflection in a broken mirror on the wall and frowns at how messy her blonde hair looks after just a short walk. After straightening her orange shirt and fixing her locks in place, she knocks on the manager’s door.

  “Hey! It’s Chris.” The door opens against her fist and she takes a step back.

  “Oh, perfect. I was waiting for you.” Susan smiles and moves to the side to let an unknown girl come closer.

  Chris does a double take. One of her hands automatically runs to her head, as if she hadn’t just checked her hair a minute ago.

  “This is Josalie. She is starting with us today,” Susan explains.

  It takes a few seconds before Chris can have any reaction. She just stares at the girl for a while. Dark brown hair falls into soft locks, framing Josalie’s tanned and round face. Full lips open in a gentle smile. She seems energetic, changing her weight from one leg to the other as if she can’t wait to start working. Everything about her exudes excitement.

  Chris smiles back at her. She can’t remember the last time she felt so lightheaded and silly close to a girl. It was certainly long before she even started dating Tabitha all those years ago.

  “Hi, I’m Chris,” she squeaks and blushes.

  Oh God, what’s happening?

  “You can call me Josie,” the new girl says, her smile growing bigger.

  The way her smile expands forms two adorable dimples in he
r cheeks, completely distracting Chris. So much so, that it takes her a moment to realize that Susan has spoken again.

  “…I thought it would be good for her to have you show the way around on her first day. Is that alright?”

  Chris nods quickly.

  She would love to show her around, for sure.

  Chris frowns and shakes her head. This isn’t the usual reaction she has to meeting new people. Especially a new coworker.

  Be professional, she chides herself.

  “Great. I’m going to finish yesterday’s accounting,” Susan says. “Chris is great. She can help if you need any assistance. But even so, I’m always here if you have further questions.”

  “Noted,” Josie says. “And thanks for being so kind to me.”

  “My pleasure, we’re happy to have you here.”

  Susan waves them off and goes back to her room, closing the door behind her.

  Josie turns to Chris and bites her lips nervously. Her eyes go up and down Chris’s body briefly, and Chris wonders if the girl is checking her out too.

  No way.

  That’s just wishful thinking.

  She’s probably straight anyway.

  Right?

  ***

  “Here in the first table, we have the Bestsellers. And on the second table, you can find the international editions,” Chris explains as she walks around the store.

  Josie always by her side.

  “Then we have all the romance bookshelves that take most of our space,” she adds.

  “With good reason,” Josie says around a laugh. “Who doesn’t love to get lost inside unrealistic ideals of romantic love?”

  Chris snorts. She stops for a second to stare at the amused look on Josie’s face. This new girl is endearing. Josie stares back at her, a hint of curiosity behind her eyes. Chris shakes her head and points to the distant bookshelves ahead of them.

  “Here, let me show you the thrillers and biographies.”

  They spend most of the day like this. Chris explains how something works, and Josie answers back with a joke. Sometimes, when a friendly customer comes in, Chris lets Josie help them. The girl attends everyone with a sweet smile and a lot of patience.

  Susan chose the right person.

  “It’s good to have an extra pair of hands here at this time of the year,” Chris says when they stop for a few minutes.

  “Oh. Because of summer starting?” Josie asks.

  “Yeah. Soon the classes will be over, and the students will come running to find a place to shelter themselves from the burning heat. There aren’t that many stores in the area that have air conditioning, so Susan had made sure to get a unit installed during the last summer to boost sales. It had worked like a charm.”

  “That does make sense.”

  A flash of pink hair passes between them.

  “Everything okay there?” Lily asks as she runs back to the counter.

  “Yes, perfectly okay!” Josie says.

  Chris and Josie watch as Susan leaves the counter and changes places with Lily.

  “It’s usually Lily and Susan who stay on the register, but it can get tedious so we like to move around sometimes,” Chris explains. “But don’t worry about that yet. Today, you will be a seller.”

  Josie nods attentively.

  A book falls from the table behind Chris, and she kneels down to retrieve it. She smiles at the cover where two girls hold hands behind their backs. When she turns around, Josie gasps.

  “Oh my God! I’ve been looking for this book for months,” she says pointing to the cover.

  The new girl likes lesbian literature?

  Chris’ eyes widen at this new information, and she stops in her tracks.

  “Really? That’s our last copy. It’s one of my favorites,” she says.

  Chris hands the book to Josie and watches as she touches the cover. Josie’s fingers linger along the pages with careful attention, as if it’s a precious thing. There’s a small smile on the corner of her lips when she reads a passage that seems to amuse her.

  Josie seems to realize that she is being watched, and her eyes rise to meet Chris’s stare. The sun coming through the windows reflects on her face and makes her brown eyes shine even brighter, revealing golden flecks around her iris.

  She is stunning.

  Chris feels her heart skip a beat, and her cheeks heat up.

  Josie tilts her head to the side and purses her lips as if in deep thought.

  “Are you gay?” she asks shyly.

  Oh.

  “No, actually, I’m pansexual,” Chris answers.

  Josie takes a second longer to respond, and Chris cringes internally, waiting for the reaction she frequently gets when people doubt her sexuality. Or the times when she needs to explain why she just feels more comfortable using pansexual than bisexual. But she sees only understanding in Josie’s eyes.

  “Awesome!” Josie takes a step closer. Her expression is filled with genuine happiness now. But there is still some reservation when she says the next words. “I don’t know a lot of LGBT people, so this is exciting for me. I’m a lesbian, by the way.”

  For a moment there, Chris thinks Josie sounds uncertain about that. Chris wonders if maybe it is a sensitive subject for Josie.

  “You don’t need to worry about it. Lily is… not into labels, shall we say. And Susan doesn’t mind about our personal stuff unless it’s interfering with our work,” Chris reassures her.

  “That’s great to hear,” Josie says with relief.

  ***

  At the end of the day, Chris sits in one of the orange couches that are scattered around the store. She stares at the ceiling in boredom while she waits for Susan and Lily to close out the cash register.

  “So what did you think of her?” Lily whispers in her direction, taking advantage of the fact that Josie didn’t leave the storage room yet.

  Chris rolls her eyes at her indiscretion before lowering her head to look at Lily.

  “She’s nice,” she says with a shrug.

  “Nice? She is perfect for this job,” Lily rants excitedly. “You should have seen her in the interview. I think she spent half an hour telling Susan how it was one of her dreams to work in a bookstore.”

  “Well, not a surprise,” Susan interjects. “In her resume, it says she worked in five mall stores and two cafés. Honestly, they must have been making her work absurd hours all these years. You know how messy shifts can be in this kind of place.”

  Chris agrees silently. She spent long months as a cashier in a supermarket before landing the job at the bookstore. Fitting it in around her awful college classes had been one of the most stressful things she ever had to do. She is lucky that Susan is such an understanding boss.

  The back door opens, and Chris readjusts herself immediately, smoothing her wrinkled clothes and fixing her hair before Josie comes into view. Lily sends her a weird look.

  “What?” Chris mouths at her, and Lily frowns back.

  Across from her, Josie stops in front of one of the tables and studies the books on it.

  “You two can go. We’ll be fine closing tonight,” Lily says and waves for them to leave without looking up.

  Odd. She never treated closing out the cash so lightly before.

  Chris and Josie say their goodbyes and leave the bookstore together.

  ***

  Outside, the sun is already starting to disappear behind the tall buildings. There is a gentle breeze in the air that makes it more bearable to walk in the streets now that the night is falling. Some of the workers from other stores are also closing their doors and cleaning the sidewalk, ready to end another day of work.

  The two girls reach the corner of the street and take a step into different directions.

  “I’m taking a bus back to Lillac U,” Josie explains.

  She is a student, of course. Chris hopes she doesn’t know anyone that might know her; she still gets nervous just thinking about her years in college. Not that she knew tha
t many people from Lillac.

  “I live just a few streets back here,” Chris explains awkwardly as she points to the direction her apartment is in. “See you tomorrow then.”

  She is already turning around when Josie speaks again in a low tone.

  “Don’t miss me tonight.”

  When Chris’ eyes widen in surprise, Josie laughs and winks at her before walking to the other side. She looks behind a few times, checking if Chris is still watching. Chris can’t move; she feels as if something is pulling her closer to this girl, making it impossible for her to stop staring.

  It’s not until Josie disappears between two buildings that Chris finally starts walking home. She feels a little lightheaded. It’s only the first day with the new coworker, and she’s already shaken by this girl.

  Summer is starting to look promising.

  Chapter 2

  Less than a year ago, Chris had dropped out of Lillac University, leaving her Computer Science major and plans for a stable career behind. Her coworkers at the time and her roommate were the only ones to fully support her decision. She didn’t actually have anything concrete planned for her life at that point. After graduating high school, she just went straight to college and never stopped to think about the future.

  Why do they never let young people stop to think?

  Why is it unacceptable to take a little time to figure out what she wants to do for the rest of her life?

  It’s not as if anything is set in stone.

  But it seems that most people just consider her to be a twenty-one-year-old girl without a major, a partner, or any life plans. People keep trying to force this idea on her that if she doesn’t get her life together before her thirties, she will be useless to the world.

  Her parents and Tabitha seemed to agree on this subject. It came to a point where the three of them tried to have some kind of intervention to make her stay in school. Chris felt shocked and disappointed, but not surprised in the end. They just didn’t get it. They never gave her any chance to explain how suffocating she was feeling going to classes. How she just knew this wasn’t what she wanted to do for the rest of her life.