“I’m not good at it.”
“I realize that too.”
She’s standing close enough now that I could reach for her, but I don’t.
“My ex-husband made me feel like every opinion I had was wrong,” she says quietly. “Like loving books and wanting a bookstore and believing in romance made me foolish, naive. Less than.”
“Your ex-husband was a jerk.”
“He was. But I believed him for ten years.” She meets my eyes. “That’s a long time to believe someone who’s wrong about you. It leaves marks.”
“Something I know about.”
“I know you do.” She takes a breath. “I’m not ready to forgive you, Scott. Not yet. There’s too much to untangle.”
“I’m not asking for forgiveness.”
“What are you asking for?”
I think about it. WhatamI asking for? What do I actually want?
“A chance,” I finally say. “To be the person Vera saw in me, the one you saw in my letters. Who I’ve been trying to become since you told me I’d lost my way.” I hold her gaze. “I’m not asking you to trust me. I’m asking you to let me earn it.”
Jessica doesn’t answer. Not with words.
But she doesn’t leave either.
She looks back at the framed review on my wall. At the bookshelves full of love stories, the evidence of a life I’ve hidden from everyone except her.
“Take me home,” she says finally.
My heart drops. “Okay.”
“And Scott?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you. For showing me.”
I nod. It’s not forgiveness or a promise, but it’s not nothing either.
It’s a door, cracked open.
And I’ll take it.
The drive back is quiet, but different than before.
Jessica stares out the window again, but she’s not guarding herself the way she was on the drive out. Something has loosened like a knot that’s been worked at but not yet untied.
When I pull up to her building, she doesn’t immediately reach for the door.
“I started writing,” she says.
“What?”
“A few nights ago. I opened my laptop and just...started. I ended up with three pages, terrible pages, but mine.” She finally looks at me. “You asked me once, in a letter, what was stopping me from writing my own stories. I didn’t have an answer. I think maybe I’m finding one.”
“That’s—Jessica, that’s wonderful.”
