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By people, I mean females. Even the ones old enough to be his gran.
And they all make eyes at him.
I understand that, because it’s an easy thing to do.
Maybe he’s not great at his job because his mind is elsewhere, like on his gran. I keep going back to the conversation during the storm, the night he stood so close and made my stomach perform slow, sweeping loop the loops, when he touched my hair and looked at me with a softness, and the way he wouldn’t look at me, like he held something in.
Not about me. I’m not that girl, even though every so often I catch him looking at me, like there’s another layer, like there’s something… maybe something he wants to say, but doesn’t.
I make a hot chocolate, a secret vice and add extra marshmallows, even though it isn’t the hot chocolate season. I sip it as I fuss around the cozy but no-fuss apartment above the store.
Another reason I don’t want to sell.
Memories live and breathe in here. My family, my grandparents, and everyone who breathed life into this place and helped form it to what it is today.
Home.
A piece of old New York.
After the hot chocolate’s gone and everything is locked and done for the evening, I set out the recipes I’ll make first thing. I found an old bakery book in the last haul. I’m reading that tonight, and I’ll find something in there. It’s from the turn of last century and those recipes are always fun to play with and tweak.
I pull back the covers and slide into bed, holding the book. Tomorrow is the block meeting at O’Reilly’s, so I have a lot going on. With a yawn, I flick through the book, but my eyes are heavy and I’m reaching for the light when my phone buzzes.
“Suzanne,” I say after checking my caller ID. “What’s up?”
“I have a party to go to tomorrow, if you want to come along. You know, if you’re not all up in your silly store’s business.”
A tick of annoyance pings in me. Honestly, sometimes I wonder if we hadn’t met at college if we’d be friends. She comes from money, has a sweet duplex in the West Village, and a sweeter job at her father’s company doing… something.
But she’s got a good heart under all the snobbery. I sigh. “I found someone to work part time, so I’m training him.”
“Him? Do tell.” She practically purrs the words. “Unless he’s been hit with the ugly, then don’t.”
I roll my eyes up to the shadowed ceiling as traffic squeals outside and shouts of an altercation ring out in the air. “He’s cute, if you like that sort of thing. But you know, he works for me.”
“So? It’s time we took back the work space.”
“I don’t think so.”
“The party, you should come.”
I hate those kind of things. Besides, my job and saving my building takes up most of my time.
But Suzanne is sometimes easiest to handle by noncommittal vagaries. “Where is it?”
“Grab a pen!”
I jot it down faithfully, along with her instructions on what to wear. Then the sighs. “I am busy tomorrow, Suze, but I’ll try.”
“Saving the condemned? That’s not a thing, that’s torture, now, listen to this. I met this guy…”
And closing my eyes, I settle back for the story.
All the prices are wrong.
I don’t know how that happened, because I marked all the boxes and my instructions were clear. But when Magnus comes in, it’s like he’s got a sixth sense because even though I swear I’m my usual easy, breezy self, he suddenly straightens, like he’s the one in charge, zeroing in on a problem he needs to handle.
“What happened, Zoey?”
