She closed her eyes, the cold settling over her face as her thoughts returned to the young man who’d been digging in the forest. If only Max could have seen her with her hair properly curled, dressed in the pale-pink summer frock she’d sewn for his return, instead of lumped up inside Vati’s ragged coat.
Her gaze wandered back over her shoulder to the light on the ground floor of the castle, to the library where Max enjoyed reading one of the many books that trimmed its shelves. Was he looking out at the lake like her? Or perhaps he was missing whatever he’d buried.
The thought of buried bones made her stomach roll, but these animals were important to Max, so they were important to her—just as important as keeping his secrets.
A breeze rustled through the branches, stirring up the depths of this lake before her and the longings in her heart. And her mind wandered back to Max’s hands on her shoulders, his lips pressed against her hand.
No one else could steal her heart because it had already been stolen. And nothing could ever change her love for Max Dornbach.
Nothing at all.
CHAPTER 2
CALLIE
MOUNT VERNON, OHIO
PRESENT DAY
People tuck the strangest things into the pages of their books. Dried flowers. Birth certificates. Twenty-dollar bills. One time I found a baby’s tooth crammed down the spine ofGinger Pye. I’m not entirely certain what type of person stores a tooth in a children’s book—perhaps a boy or girl saving it for the tooth fairy.
The owner of a book, I’ve discovered, can be as intriguing as the author. And owners often lose more than someone else’s story when they give away their books. Sometimes they give away a part of their story as well.
My story is the same as any other in that no one owns it except me. And it’s filled with threads of achievements and regrets,seemingly random bits of plot that meander across the pages of my everyday even as I sell other people’s stories, the sort neatly sandwiched between two covers with a spine that’s either stiff or slightly worn, smelling of musty leather and ancient ink.
Below my bedroom—a bedroom where, at this very moment, I’m supposed to be asleep—is the bookstore owned by my sister and me. Some nights, like this one, sleep is fleeting as my mind tumbles the unpolished pieces of my story over and over, trying to smooth out the edges.
When I realize there’ll be no respite from the tumbling, I decide to seek the company of friends and their secrets. A mug of chamomile tea in hand, I slip down the back steps of my loft apartment.
More than fifty years ago, Charlotte Trent opened Magic Balloon Bookshop on the ground floor of this colonial brick building, next to her husband’s ice cream and soda shop so kids could enjoy a treat along with a new or used book. The Trents were never able to birth children, so they welcomed an entire village into this store as their own, including my sister and me.
When I was younger, I’d spend hours here after school, reading books that took me to the faraway places I longed to see. Now, as a bona fide adult, I can go down and read whenever I like, including these late-night hours while everyone else in our small town is asleep.
While some might proclaim the death of the print book, every day dozens of kids still tuck themselves away with a book on beanbags or in the hidden spaces of the two-story castle that my sister’s carpenter husband, Ethan, built for us. The kids of Mount Vernon and the surrounding county now know me as Story Girl, a role I’ve embraced since my fifteenth birthday, when Charlotte gave me a pair of red-striped socks and a copy of L.M. Montgomery’snovel about a girl who entertains a group of children with the most fascinating tales, some true, some not.
Charlotte’s gift changed my life in more ways than one. InThe Story Girl, the children find a picture of God portrayed as a fierce, cruel man and take this picture to a minister, crying as they ask if that is what God truly looks like—a face of hatred instead of love.
The minister’s reply is simple, but his words affected me in a profound way.
“God is infinitely more beautiful and loving and tender and kind than anything we can imagine of Him.”
In my own tears, a new picture of God began to form, a smile on His face instead of an angry scowl. Montgomery’s words, the truth ingrained in them, stitched themselves into my teenage mind. God wasn’t cruel like my own father had been. He loved me, Calisandra Anne Randall, a girl who craved beauty and kindness and, more than anything, a family who cared about me.
After readingThe Story Girl, I realized that I wanted to spend the rest of my life working with books, helping change and expand the perspective of others through the power of a great story.
A few years later, Charlotte gave my sister, Brianna, and me another present. After she retired, Charlotte gifted us with the keys to her bookstore and then she moved out of the apartment over the shop, into a condo east of town. I still have my striped socks. And a decade after Charlotte handed over the keys, Brie and I still own this shop.
A cramped office in the back of the store hosts Charlotte’s antique desk—a giant walnut piece with carved braiding around the edges, fancy Queen Anne legs, and iron pulls on the eight drawers. The desktop is covered with papers, a computer cord, and paper clips, along with two pictures of my sister with Ethanand their four-year-old twins, Owen and Oscar. Two boys who I’m pretty sure worked together to hang the moon with their dad’s hammer and nails.
Books line shelves above the desk and spill over the edges of cardboard boxes on the carpeted floor, filling in all the spaces of this room. The bottom desk drawer holds the thick album that Brie and I have been compiling since we took over the store, the forgotten items left in the stacks of used books sold here.
With one swoop, I push aside the clutter on the desktop and open the album to see if Brie has added anything new to our collection. Stored inside the fifty or so vinyl sleeves are letters, theater tickets, and all sorts of pictures—formal ones dating back a hundred years alongside Polaroid prints and more contemporary pictures of birthday parties, beach trips, and one of a family visiting a medieval church somewhere in Europe. But there’s nothing new inside.
Brie is two years younger than me, and she’s the chief book collector and manager of our little shop. I’m part-time sales clerk, website manager, blogger, and Story Girl, though my name should probably be Story Lady since I’m fast approaching my thirtieth birthday. The income for all the above is miserly, but my apartment comes with the job, and I have a bicycle and two good legs to pedal wherever I need to go in this town. And if I want anything else—I lower the voice of my mind as if I might offend these walls—I can buy it online.
I’m the curious one of the Randall girls—Curious Callie is what Brie used to call me after our favorite little monkey, though my curiosity is fueled by purpose these days. I research and post articles about children’s authors and then spend my free time updating the expansive Lost & Found section on our Magic Balloon Bookshop website.
When Brie and I first took over the bookshop, I tried to find the previous owners of the bits and pieces we discovered in our collection of used books by contacting whoever sold us the book. Now when we find something, I post the item online instead.
