“No, that doesn’t mean I only need forty-five. I would like fifty matching folding chairs delivered by Thursday afternoon at the absolute latest,” Drew says, a heart-shaped stress ball deformed inside his fist despite his voice being morning-dew calm. “Yes, noon would be excellent. Thank you. All right. Have a good day.”
When Drew sets the phone down, he slips off his glasses and massages his temples. I set down the pen I’ve been gnawing on and go to him. “May I approach the bench?” I ask, gesturing to the heftyantique checkout counter where bookmarks, stickers, and postcards are displayed for purchase.
“Proceed.”
I extend a hand toward him, and he takes it without hesitation. “Everything okay?”
He nods. “I’m really banking on this author event being a success. The grand unveiling of the author’s identity. It’s going to get a lot of media coverage and could bring an influx of shoppers to the store. Everything needs to be perfect.”
That need for perfection leads him to drop my hand and scurry over to a disorganized stack. Instantly, he’s rearranging the titles, making sure they’re displayed properly even if no one has been in here since I arrived.
“Sounds like you’re doing everything right,” I say.
“Except getting people to attend,” he says, forlornly looking around. It’s true his store isn’t a super-popular business, but he’s got his book club, his regulars, and some curious tourists. Enough cash flow to keep the lights on. “I have to pull in numbers.”
I whip out my phone and click open the first social media app I see. “How does two point six million sound as a number?”
He laughs. “I don’t think the fire marshal would be happy about that.”
“I mean, what if I posted about the event?” I hand him my phone. “I’ve got the platform. I might as well use it.”
Drew bobs his head, shoulders joining in. “I don’t know. Not sure the audiences really overlap.” I know it shouldn’t sting, but it does a little. “Not in a negative way. I’m just saying that it’s not like it’s an event for you, or an event you’ll be at.”
“It is most definitely an event I’ll be at,” I tell him. “Where else would I be? I’m obviously coming to support you.” It stings more that he’d assume I’d skip out on an important event of his. Myskipping-out days are behind me. Chaos ensues when I do. I have categorically learned my lesson.
“Even still,” he begins, swapping out one of the books in the new window display promoting the event, “it’s not for or about you. Your fans would only come if it was.”
An idea pops into my head when I realize he’s not going to be able to focus on the crystal hunt with this humungous responsibility hanging over his head. “What if it was about me? Indirectly, anyway.”
“Clue me in.”
My heart pirouettes when his old words hit my ears. It’s phrases like this that let me know the twenty-three-year-old Drew is still jammed underneath the button-downs and facial hair.
“I could moderate the talk,” I offer. “Think about it. I’m already reading the book. It’s excellent. Freakishly reminding me too much of CeeCee’s old workplace, but still good.” A panopticon reception desk. A secret hallway. Aguru.
On the way back to New York, while playing footsie, we both dove into the book club pick. Drew was about four chapters ahead of me, given my ADHD makes focusing—especially in a highly stimulatory environment like a train—difficult, so his slight gasps and chuckles made me pause and whisper, “Spoiler alert.”
“Reading,” Drew said with an air of knowingness, “is entirely subjective. My gasp may be your groan.” And, I had to cross my legs at that because suddenly my mind was overrun with all the acts we could do to each other that would elicit a different type of groan.
To ward off the reminder of those stirring feelings, I resume my argument. “I could come up with plenty of questions to ask, or you could draft some and I could memorize them. You know that’s my number one skill.” I hold up my notebook chock-full of material as concrete proof.
“You’re not a bookseller, though.”
“So what? That doesn’t mean I’m incapable,” I counter. “I know how to engage a crowd. I can throw in a few jokes. It’ll be a riot.”
He’s a veritable bobblehead of indecision. “I don’t want to draw any attention away from the author.”
“Oh, and your bright hair and dashingly handsome face aren’t going to drawanyattention?” I ask, putting on the charm but meaning every word of it. His blush is my absolute favorite sight. His cheeks are shiny red apples I want to take bites out of. In a sexy way. “Come on, let me do this small favor for you. You’ve helped me so much already with the crystal hunt.”
“Where are we at with that, by the way?”
“You’re changing the subject,” I protest, not wanting to battle with myself over what going back means and what I’ll be leaving behind—or is it ahead?—when I do. “But we’re five-sevenths of the way there. I’m pretty sure I slotted in the fifth crystal from Stephanie’s stash.”
Stephanie offered me a helpful cheat sheet to be able to identify them, which led me to several minutes of internet-searching stone names before remembering Drew left behind the mystical blue light glasses made by Doop.
Colors blurred by on the screen until I was looking at a listing for citrine: a light-orange stone with golden flecks and tumbled rounded edges. It was a bit before I found a match, but when I held the sixth stone from the bag up to the image, I knew I had it.
“Citrine is a sunny stone known for optimism and opening your mind,” I tell Drew, but refrain from adding that I’ve opened my mind to the possibility of being stuck in this timeline. While not ideal, it’s becoming less appalling as the days go by.
