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“What is his name?”

“Julian.”

“And does Julian know that you think he’s surprisingly kind, some of the time?”

“No.” I shoot back almost instantly, which makes her laugh out loud.

It’s a real, rich sound that crinkles the corner of her eyes and fills the quiet space of the shop. A sound I haven’t heard in what feels like a lifetime. Between the crushing anxiety of the shop’s debt, the piles of overdue invoices stacking up in Dad’s old desk drawer, and the suffocating threat of losing this place entirely, laughter has become a luxury we can’t afford.

For months, her voice has been weighted down by polite smiles. To hear her laugh like this—light and unguarded, makes a sudden knot appear in my throat and my eyes well up before I can blink the tears away.

“Good,” she says. “Keep him guessing.”

“Mom.” I feel my cheeks burning with genuine mortification. “It’s not like that… at all.”

She gives me a look that tells me she knows exactly what it is like.

“Keep him guessing, Ellise.” She stops displaying the books entirely, turning her full attention to me. “Your dad didn’t know for at least six months that I thought he was surprisingly kind.” She pauses, with a deeply private smile touching her lips. “Well, he didn’t know for quite a long time, and he was utterly relentless about it when he finally found out.”

“We are not—it is not like you and Dad—” I stumble over the words, completely lost.

I don’t know how to describe Julian to her in a way that is both honest and doesn’t open up a conversation that I am nowhere near ready to have.

“It is only a duet, Mom. We’re playing a single piece together for the Spring Showcase. That’s it.”

She looks at me with an expression that communicates, with absolute certainty, that she does not believe a single word coming out of my mouth. But she lets me keep my lie anyway.

“Okay, honey.”

I look back at the wrapped book in my hands, my mind drifting straight to Julian. I think about what I actually want out of this chaotic situation, realising that I don’t have a proper answer to any of it.

When I finally look up, I realise Mom has silently been watching me, her eyes tracking the strained posture of my shoulders.

“How are your joints?” she asks, her tone shifting from playful to deeply protective.

“Manageable.” I lie automatically, a reflex I’ve honed for years. “Though the cold weather really hasn’t been helping the last couple of months.”

“Are you sleeping?”

“Enough.”

“Ellise.”

“Some nights more than others.”

She nods. Mom knows what ‘some nights’ means. She has been there through the years of endless heat pads, specialised physical therapy, and medication. She’s watched me try to manage the chronic pain and sheer exhaustion of a body that naturally works against itself and one that can never truly relax. But she has never once suggested I stop playing, nor has she ever demanded I keep going at the cost of everything else.

“Can I ask you something, El?” she murmurs, stepping closer to the counter.

“You’re going to anyway.”

“Do you still love it?” She asks the question so simply, entirely free of judgement. “The violin. Belrose. The music.” She hesitates. “All of it.”

I open my mouth to say yes immediately. It’s an instinctive reaction, the only answer I have ever given to every single person who has ever asked. I have worked on this every day since I was five years old. It is my identity. It is all I know. I have bled for this craft, and the answer has always been an unquestionable, yes.

But as I look around the bookstore, surrounded by paper and quiet memories, I find myself unable to say that one simple word.

“I don’t know,” I whisper. It is easily the most terrifying and honest thing I have said out loud in a very long time.