There’s a bird in the store. A bird.
I’ve called Astrid three times since discovering it on top of the Self-Help shelf, but as usual, my aunt either doesn’t hear her phone ringing, has misplaced it, or is too busy cross-stitching some new, aggressively positive quote onto a throw pillow, as one does.
My brother’s shift starts in about five minutes, but he texted earlier to say he’d be stopping at Neato Burrito for lunch and I allowed him to be late if he brought me a Cowboy Crunch, but now I’ve decided that my growling stomach is not as important as getting this bird out of our bookstore.
But he doesn’t pick up his phone either.
“Here, birdy-birdy.” I start doing that sprinkle-finger thing people do to attract cats and it shoots me an unimpressed look. “Come on, I have books to put out. It’s release day. Follow suit. Be free.” I gesture to the front of the store, where the closed door starts to open.
The bird flies at the sound of the door chime and I lose sight of its gray feathers. I stumble over a warped floorboard—a gift given to us by two weeks of rain a few months back—when I try to track its movements farther into the store.
“Hello?” a voice calls from the front.
“Sorry! I’m back here. One second.” I sweep the shelves one last time before I deem this bird a master of camouflage and abandon my search and rescue mission in exchange for making money. I grab a stack of new releases from the storage room and head to the front to rectify the embarrassingly empty New Arrivals table.
Every week, there’s just one thing on the Tuesday-morning checklist, and that’s to get the table up to par before a customer comes in and assumes that the New Arrivals table being empty means we don’t have any new arrivals, which just about defeats the purpose of having a New Arrivals table, but who am I to judge someone for thinking that when we’re a bookstore that can’t even put out new books on time?
That entire hypothetical situation depends on a customer actually coming in, but that’s been happening less and less since Prologue opened across the street.
But, naturally, someone would actually come in when there aren’t books out and there’s a chance of getting shit on by a scared bird. Why did I insist on switching shifts with Ravi today?
Oh yeah. Because Ravi never remembers to put out the new books on Tuesday mornings. The irony.
I guess the adrenaline was pumping too loudly in my body for me to recognize the voice, but once I make it to the front of the store and see the customer waiting, I freeze. Jasper Hamada stands in the doorway, as artfully put together as every other day I’ve seen him, always here in Books & Moore, as if he doesn’t exist outside these four walls—he was here three Mondays ago, two Thursdays ago, and last Saturday. Today, there’s not a wrinkle within four miles of his powder-blue collared shirt with stitched white daisies, and his signature black jeans are as tight as ever. He finishes off the outfit with a pair of all-black Converses that look to have been freshly lint-rolled. He pushes away a few pieces of intentionally messy hair when they threaten to block his dark brown eyes.
“We have to stop meeting like this,” he says, mock-serious. “It’s like you’re stalking me or something.”
I’d usually play along—if there can be a “usually” in a semi-flirtatious acquaintanceship that’s
only half a second old—but: “There’s a bird in here.” I can’t stop imagining the thing swooping toward his beautiful hair, mistaking it for a luxury bird nest.
He stills. “Is that—what does that mean?”
“Just a warning.” I set the stack of books on the table. “And by the way, I hope we have what you’re looking for. Our new releases flew off the shelf, so to speak—because it’s a table.” Nailed it. I guess my deadbeat mom isn’t the only mediocre actress in this family.
He smiles, a faint scar next to his mouth disappearing when a dimple shows, and steps closer. “Any recommendations?”
I hold up what I’ve been calling The Book That Shall Not Be Named by The Author Who Shall Not Be Named. I’ve been mentally preparing for this book’s release for a few months now—it’s a total white male savior narrative and that’s just the beginning of the problems. I don’t even want to put this flaming piece of garbage on a shelf, but Astrid says I have to and, because I want her to hand this store over to me after four unnecessary years of college, I will.
Behind the other new books. With its cover facing the wrong direction.
“Not this one,” I say.
“Interesting sales tactic. Is this reverse psychology?”
I place the book facedown on the table. “No, unless that works on you?” I gesture around the store. “Don’t buy any of these books. Definitely don’t buy all the books.”
“Actually, do you have the Discontent series?” he asks, and with that he wins my heart once and for all. Maybe today will be the day I finally work up the nerve to ask for his number. I like to tell myself that I was going to do it the last time he was in, but I was recovering from a summer cold and there’s nothing cute about a sniffling, leaky girl begging for your attention. If I had asked, he probably would have never returned, and right now we desperately need the customers.
“I don’t think I could in good conscience call this a bookstore without that staple of young adult literature somewhere inside.”
I wind around the maze of shelves, stopping under my hand-painted sign marked Young Adult—Current Events, aka dystopian and postapocalyptic.
Jasper follows, nearly bumping into my back when I stop. It’s a cooler day today, eighty-three degrees as opposed to the typical ninety or higher, but I can still feel the heat rolling off his body. Not a drop of sweat on his crisp shirt, though. Definitely no sweatstache, like the one I can feel pooling above my own lip.
The Discontent series by Isla Warbeck is my favorite. It’s campy in the best way, like if Guardians of the Galaxy had taken place in a desert hell instead of space. The characters use funny phrases that fans have adopted to annoying levels—like, are you even an OG fan of the series if you’re not eye-rolling at the people saying, “I feel half-past death”? The series is finally getting the recognition it deserves in the form of a film adaption of the first book, The
Magnificent Lies of Lasers, out at the end of summer, and movie tie-in covers—though I think the old ones are better.
I pluck the first two books from the shelf and hand them to Jasper, our fingers grazing with an imaginary shock that buzzes through my limbs. He pulls his hand back fast, grip not tight enough on the books, and they fall.
And that’s when the bird shows up again.
The flutter of wings causes me to duck, but by the way Jasper flails his arms around his head, the bird might have brushed him in its escape.
“There’s a bird in here,” he says with wide eyes. “I thought you were joking.”
“Pidgey isn’t a joke.” I gather Jasper’s fallen books and straighten, trying to see where the bird landed this time.
“You named the bird after a Pokémon?”
“I don’t see you offering any names.”
“Pidgey,” he laughs. “I guess she’s the ‘more’ in Books and Moore.”
“No, that would be me.” I cringe at my own comment. Back in middle school, a few boys liked to poke fun at my last name and the extra pounds I’m perpetually packing. “Madeline Moore.”
I search around where the third book should be, but it’s not there. Either misplaced or we sold it when I wasn’t here. Disappointing, but I try to keep them in stock, so the next time—if he returns after the bird incident—he can pick it up.
“We’re temporarily out of the third book, but it’s on order.”
“I’m a slow reader, so I’m sure you’ll get it in before I even make a dent in the first.”
We head toward the front of the store, my neck craning this way and that way to find the unwelcome visitor. To dodge any attacks it might be planning. A gentle little twitter echoes around the quiet store, but I can’t tell from where. This bastard is taunting me.
I lay his books on the checkout counter.
“So,” he starts, “this is a family-owned store, right? Like Prologue—or whatever it’s called—across the street?”
“Not quite like the assholes across the street. We’re an indie and they’re just a franchise, like the shitty Subway a few blocks over that has watery soda and wilted lettuce.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Wow, tell me how you really feel.”
I smile brightly in my soon-to-be-manager way. “I feel grateful that you choose to shop at Books and Moore instead. Your business is appreciated.”
I’ve avoided looking at it as much as possible, but the cold and corporate-y vibes pull me in this time. It looks close enough to a Barnes & Noble to make people double take, kind of like the third Hemsworth brother—yes, there’s a third Hemsworth brother—but enough like an indie to reel in the hipsters. Prologues are starter bookstores made for people who don’t really like books, but want to seem like they do. This Prologue and the one about half an hour away are run by a local Japanese family. Their first location apparently did well enough to warrant this month-old one—as if we even needed the first,
what with everything being available online, and, I don’t know, the fact that B&M has been selling books here for, like, twenty years, thankyouverymuch. This Prologue is an unnecessary sequel following up a completely rude debut.
I shake the mouse on the ancient computer Astrid won’t upgrade to check our Excel spreadsheet where she keeps inventory of the books. She’s been like this for as long as I can remember—stuck in her ways with no real motivation to change. My aunt could be a visual inspiration for a Kate McKinnon sketch. She’d be stuffed to the point of exploding with paperbacks, have multiple reading glasses on her person that she could never seem to find, and she’d unintentionally whack everyone with her big bag . . . where she carries more paperbacks.
I guess I have to give her half credit for what she’s done with the store because, when she took it over from my grandmother, she at least took it from a paper inventory to a computer.
“Where’d you buy your signs at?” He lifts his chin to the sign above me that says Gateway to: with a list of fictional getaways and an arrow pointing toward the register. He’s always asking questions like this when he comes in, and they give me little heart palpitations. “I made them,” I say.
He delivers a toothy smile, one of his canines sharper than the other. “They’re cool. I like the ‘You should be reading’ one. I needed that above my desk when I should have been doing homework in high school.”
“What were you doing instead? Disturbing internet searches? Would your history make the FBI agent assigned to you blush?”
He folds himself against the counter, which takes some effort because he’s tall. I can rest my elbows comfortably on it without stooping too low.
“It wouldn’t be appropriate to discuss in public,” he says in a hushed voice, even though we’re alone in the store.
“Curiosity is natural in young men.”
He snorts, straightening. “What’s my total?”
I glance at the register even though I know the price off the top of my head. “Seventeen dollars, please.”
“For both?”
I point toward the sign in the display window. “Paperback sale. Fair pricing. Engaging conversations. Unlike Barnes and Un-Noble across the street.”
“To be fair, I’m pretty sure you haven’t actually gone over there to see how well they converse.” He inserts his credit card in the reader and waits for it to beep. “You might be surprised.”
“Bet they don’t have a bird dive-bombing you, though.” I bag his books and set them on the counter. “Speaking of. I need to find some bread to lure out Pidgeotto.”
“I thought it was just a Pidgey?”
“Well, if I don’t do something to capture it soon, it’s going to evolve into a Pidgeot and become too strong for me to handle.” And that’s the extent of my Pokémon knowledge.
He grabs for his bag, and time seems to slow. I have to do it. I can’t let him leave without shooting my shot. Not this time. Clamminess be damned, I set my hand atop his to stall him.
“Um.” I choke back fear vomit and wet my lips—and then start laughing nervously, withdrawing my hand. “Have a good day.”
“Thanks.” He pauses for a moment, half-turned toward the door. He spins back around and bites his lip. “Actually. Can I get your number?”
I stand there, staring, for a moment. Just trying to figure out when I lost track of reality and slipped into my daydreams. “My phone number?”
“Yes.”
The word slips out of my mouth and I wish I could swallow it back in. “Why?”
“To . . . text you?”
“About what?” This can’t be a casual thing, right? He wants something out of this. There’s no way he just asked for the thing I was too scared to ask for.
“I don’t know.” He shifts from one foot to the other. “Updates on the bird?”
I shake myself more alert. “No, sorry, you can have it. This just feels like—” I can’t say it feels like a fantasy because if I haven’t scared him away yet, it’s possible that will do it. “It feels like a mistake?”
I could smack myself with a paperback. “Just you getting my number. Not me getting yours. Me getting yours is like—” Finger guns. I do fucking finger guns. If the warped floorboards could please suck me in, that would be great.
He laughs, his scar melting into a smile line. “I’m sure me getting your number is—” He imitates my very terrible, hopefully soon-to-be-forgotten finger guns. “Unless all of this was a clever ploy to distract me so you didn’t have to give me your number, in which case you could have told me honestly and I’ll accept defeat—”
“No! You can have my number. I don’t want it anyway.” I gesture vaguely around the store. “I will provide you with photos of the bird’s short life like a new mom on Facebook.”
I relay my number to Jasper and then my phone vibrates in the back pocket of my overalls. Relief crashes over me like a wave. I wish Tristan Donahue, who misinterpreted my “come here often?” on our last day of AP English, could see how much my flirting has improved.
“Prove it was your number,” Jasper says.
“But then you’d see my phone background and I don’t want to scare you away.” Don’t underestimate me, Jasper; I could do it.
“Is it a picture of me?”
“Presumptuous,” I say heavily, though I’m feeling lighter and lighter with each passing moment. Joking is easy. “Yet not incorrect. I snuck a photo of you when you were swatting at Books and Moore’s new mascot.”
He backs away from the counter, twinkles in the corners of his dark eyes. “I’ll see you around, Madeline.”
My name sounds like a beautiful language on his tongue, and I want to be fluent. Is there a Rosetta Stone course for Jasper just saying my name? I’d listen to it every night before bed.
He opens the door, holding it for—Benny! Benny with my burrito that I can’t eat because my stomach is too full of butterflies. He wipes sweat from his brown skin and nods at Jasper in that way that dudes do, for whatever reason.
And then this damn bird dives toward Benny and Jasper, narrowly making it outside in the most spectacular and graceful move I’ve ever seen.
“Holy shit!” My brother swipes at his buzzed head, eyes wide.
“I want to make it known that that was all me. You’re welcome.” Jasper waves and lets the door close behind him.
“What the fuck? There was a bird in here?” Benny asks shakily. “You know I hate birds. The world is bad enough without giving little raccoons the ability to fly.”
“They’re more like rats.”
“Not helping their case.” Benny drops my burrito on the counter, and I notice Jasper left his bag. I dart around, swiping it up in a fluid motion, and hightail it out of the store before my brother can finish saying, “That guy was pretty cute.”
“Jasper?” I squint in the midday sun, searching for him among the cars parked along the one-way street, the sidewalks full of people on their lunch breaks, but I don’t see him.
Then a figure moves across the street. Tall, blue, handsome.
“Jasper!” I call as a car goes flying down the road, pushing hot air in my direction. I cut between parked cars, look left, right—despite the one-way limitation firmly in place—and left again. I dart across the street and see him duck into Prologue.
Wait. What the actual fuck?
Going in after him seems like a bad idea. Not only do I have a bag from another store, but it’s a competitor. And going in could look bad for B&M. But my curiosity has gotten the better of me and Jasper paid for these books, so it’s only right that I barge the hell in there and see what he’s buying that B&M didn’t offer.
About three times the size of B&M, this Prologue has an all-glass front with sliding doors, and a vestibule that bombards visitors with a steady blast of cool air. All my sweat chills on my body and the little bit of hips visible on the open sides of my overalls pebble with goose bumps. There are at least seven people shopping in here, but Jasper isn’t one of them.
I take a spin to see if I missed him somewhere around the neatly arranged shelves at the front, but—there. He has his back toward me as he leans against the counter, talking to an older Asian man with chubby cheeks. I approach slowly, my shoes not making much noise against the compacted carpet, and tap Jasper on the shoulder.
He spins and I’m face-to-chest with him, the perfect height to read the name tag he’s now pinned on his shirt, which reads:
Jasper Hamada
Supervisor
He has the audacity to smile stiffly and ask, “May I help you find something, miss?”
It takes a second to answer, the rage boiling inside me. My face heats, my head swims, and I want to shove him. I push the books into his hands instead. I want to do it ten times, once for every digit I stupidly provided him with, thinking he’d ever text me.
“You can help me find my shit because I just lost it.” I stomp out without another word. What game did that asshole make me an unwilling pawn in? And why did he get my phone number when we are very clearly sworn enemies?
Jasper Hamada, welcome to my shit list.
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