The Hot Mess and the Heartthrob(3)

There are seven and a half billion people on this earth.

There’s no way this woman is her.

I’m a dreamer. A songwriter. A performer. A lover.

I’m not logic. I’m not math. I’m not statistics.

But even I know the odds are basically zero that this woman is the woman my entire being wants to believe she is.

Which doesn’t change my conviction that it’s her.

Dreamer, right?

“I need a present,” I blurt.

I can’t tear my eyes away from the woman squatting opposite me, and I can’t decide if they’re playing tricks on me or not.

They have to be playing tricks on me.

Doesn’t matter how many times I play that night over in my head, logically, I know time and experience have altered my memory. It’s been so long, I can’t even remember the last time I consciously thought about it.

How long has it been? Six years? Eight?

I don’t know, but it’s her.

I feel it in my bones.

This is the woman I haven’t been able to forget.

She licks her lips, and blood surges somewhere it shouldn’t. Not while I’m in public.

“Okay. What kind of present?”

The kind money can’t buy, and I think I just found it. I look around wildly, trying to find an excuse to stay here.

I need answers to a million questions swirling in my head.

“Yodeling pickle.” Words are half my life, and a display of yodeling pickles on the checkout counter is the first thing I see that I can identify with words.

The woman winces and once again stops herself as her hands start to move.

Giselle clears her throat. “Lunch…”

Lunch. Right. I’m supposed to be meeting my buddy Beck for a steak lunch. If anyone could eat their way through a kitchen, it’s him. If we don’t leave soon, I won’t get lunch.

Not at my favorite steak place.

But I don’t actually care.

I stick my hand out. “Hi. I’m Levi.”

“Oh my god, you are,” the woman whispers.

“I need a yodeling pickle.” Jesus. What the fuck is wrong with me?

“Do you have a website?” Giselle asks.

I shoot her a look. Do I have a website? Did she hit her head?

“Yes,” the woman says. “Yes. Website. We ship anywhere.”

I’m still sitting here with my hand out like a dumbass, thinking Giselle is talking about my website when she’s trying to help me get out of here but still support a small local bookstore.

“I can get you a card,” the woman adds. “Just…hold tight.”

She bolts to her feet, and yeah, I watch her hips swing in her jeans as she goes. She has a streak of dirt across one round cheek, and there’s something blue on the back of her thigh.

“Levi. We need to go,” Giselle says quietly. “What’s going on?”

I rise, getting a little head rush from all the squatting, but I’m still watching the bookstore lady. “Inspiration.”

“So make an after-hours appointment to come back. Storytime’s breaking up. We need to go.”

I peer around the shop. The shelves are a few inches shorter than me, so I can see they go another four rows deep. Wooden signs hang from the ceiling, all of them hand-written and decorated with charming little accents, identifying an Escapism Fiction section, an Oh, the Places You Should Go section, a For the Adorable Anklebiters section, a Cozy Reading Accessories section, and a Honey, These Ladies Have Been There Too section.

There’s also an Elixir of Life section, but the arrow pointing up on the back wall suggests it’s upstairs.

The coffee. There’s coffee.

This isn’t just a bookstore. It’s more.

No wonder it’s inspiring.

Funny thing about inspiration—it used to be with me all the time. But the more I travel, the more I explore, the more people I meet and stories I hear, the more everything looks the same.

Nothing’s new anymore. I’ve seen the world. Met all the people. Written all the songs.

So this place? This woman?

I’m supposed to be here. There’s something waiting for me here. It’s new.

It’s what I’ve been looking for.

“Hi.” A small boy—I’d guess roughly my nephew’s age—grins at me from around the edge of the bookshelf. His light hair is buzzed so tight I can see a birthmark shaped like a pear near his crown, his eyes are bright hazel, and his smile is full of a familiar mischief that matches his That’s Trouble with a Capital T sweatshirt. “Can I help you?”

“Levi.” Giselle’s voice has a familiar edge that says if I wanted to get lost and dawdle, I should’ve brought a three-person-deep security crew with me. “It’s time to go.”

Sounds like elephants are tromping down the stairs, and the distant voices in the shop are getting closer.

Storytime was upstairs.

The woman getting a card is bent behind the checkout counter, and I can’t see her. It’s like she was a ghost, and when she stands up, she won’t be who I think she is.

“My nose glows in the dark.” The little boy lifts his face and points at his nose, and— “Oh, shi—shoot, little dude. Where’s your mom?” I drop to a knee. Been here before. At least, on the periphery. “Can you blow out your nose?”