Rude.
And yet, I didn’t stop myself from thinking about him. His height. His face. His Spanish. His hand around mine. The way he had looked at me like I was competent—and like that was special.
His number in my pocket.
Not his name.
I groaned at myself. “Great. Anonymous Adonis with a very specific rare book request. I am thriving.” This was why I didn’t engage with strangers.
A knock sounded at my door. I opened it to find Eloise standing there, holding a baking tray.
“Good evening, Artemis,” she said. “I made your favorite: Luteal Phase Chocolate Explosion.”
I stared at her. “Why would you name it that?”
“It’s accurate,” she said.
“And unsettling.”
“I track patterns,” she replied.
“You track my cycles?”
“It’s only fair, since you track everything else.”
I had never once felt judged by her. That alone made this conversation possible. I stepped aside and let her in. Eloise moved into my kitchen with the confidence of someone who had co-signed the lease.
She hadn’t, but she had earned squatter’s rights emotionally.
She placed the muffins on the counter and made tea without asking me.
Eloise Kane had been my next-door neighbor for three months and the closest thing to a chosen aunt I had ever acquired. She was in her early seventies with close-cropped, snow-white hair, and a sharp gaze that missed nothing. Retired screenwriter. Former best-selling novelist. A woman who had opinions but never weaponized them. There was a lifetime of wisdom packed into a body that barely reached my shoulder.
She had taken one look at me on move-in day, handed me a muffin, and decided I was hers.
She didn’t ask what I did wrong, why my parents weren’t involved in my life, or why I didn’t have any friends or a partner. She simply stayed. She brought comfort, safety, and a kind of steady presence I never expected to find as an adult.
I picked up a muffin and took a bite as she handed me a mug. The chocolate centered me for exactly three seconds before I moved to grab a book, forgetting I had a mug in my hand. The tea sloshed over the rim and spilled directly onto one of my favorite throw pillows on the couch.
I froze in horror.
“Oh no, no, no, no,” I muttered, quickly putting down the mug and muffin. I grabbed a few napkins off the coffee table and blotted the pillow. “This is fine. This is manageable. People handle spills every day. Entire civilizations have endured worse disasters. The Spanish archivist of 1394 mislabeled an entire vault of manuscripts and caused trade disputes across three kingdoms. I can handle a stained pillow.”
Behind me, Eloise let out a delighted sound. “There it is. The academic meltdown Iwas waiting for.”
I kept blotting the pillow even though the damp patch was growing wider.
Excellent problem solving, Fartie. “I shouldn’t be allowed near liquids.”
“You should not be allowed near your own brain,” she said. “It gets louder every time you panic.”
“I am not panicking,” I tried.
She raised one eyebrow. “You just invoked a medieval archivist to cope with a tea stain.”
I stopped patting. “I did.”
Eloise nodded. “You’re coping through excessive knowledge again. I was worried you might have stored your anxiety in a box like a normal person.”
