‘Volume is fine.’ The narrator was going through the opening credits.
Margot laughed. ‘You’re shouting.’
Bonnie removed an earbud. ‘What?’
‘Just put them in, go sit in the armchair and give it twenty minutes.’
‘Very well.’ Bonnie was pretty sure she shouted that too given Faye’s look across the room from the window where she was probably looking out for the locksmith.
Bonnie did give it twenty minutes. In fact, before she knew it, almost an hour had passed. Midas sat by her side. She fussed over him, and she got absorbed in the story as he went to sleep. The book was riveting. It wasn’t long before she was fully immersed; the locksmith could’ve come and gone without her even realising.
She was about to take her headphones out and stop so she could go to the toilet, but she realised she didn’t need to. She could keep listening.
She used the toilet out the back and when she went back into the bookshop both girls were sitting just like Howard would have done, each with a book in their laps, looking up briefly and then straight back down at the page. There was something comforting about doing this among friends. Reading was a solitary activity, but there was companionship and a connection. And even though she might never appreciate books in the same way as Howard did, with darkness surrounding the shop and the time creeping towards the midnight hour, on an adventure herself, it struck her why he’d loved the Midnight Book Club so much. It was a shared love of something and the bonds of friendship that did it.
She settled back down to listen to more of the story and when she eventually noticed Faye moving about, her watch told her that it was almost midnight.
‘It’s good, isn’t it,’ said Margot when Bonnie took out the earbuds and went over to where she was sitting.
‘I’m hooked.’ The book was quirky, sometimes sad, but filled with hope. ‘I need to know what’ll happen next.’ And she’d quite forgotten how uncomfortable she’d felt first stepping inside the bookshop.
‘You can get the audiobook on your iPad at home. I’ll help you sort it out.’
‘Thank you.’ Howard would be delighted she was even interested and to have found the joy of listening to a story right here in his bookshop felt like a sign that maybe everything was going to be okay.
‘Whereisthe locksmith?’ Bonnie asked when she remembered the real reason they were here hadn’t been to eat or to enjoy the books. She’d been quite distracted, hadn’t she? ‘And whatever is Faye doing?’
‘It’s Wednesday,’ Faye called out from the story corner. She’d set up a laptop on the low table that usually had kids’ books spread out on it. ‘I’ll put everything back as it was afterwards, don’t worry.’
She caught her breath. ‘You’re holding the Midnight Book Club here, tonight?’
‘Any second now,’ said Faye.
She was about to ask more questions, suggest she got out of the way, when suddenly a voice came from the laptop.
Bonnie peeked tentatively around the side of the screen. There was a woman there, then someone else popped up in another rectangle.
‘Hello, Sarah. Hello, Joel,’ said Faye.
‘How many tonight?’ the woman who must be Sarah asked.
‘Six of us,’ said Faye.
‘You can sit here.’ Margot ushered Bonnie to one of the three chairs they’d sat in earlier to eat.
‘We have Bonnie with us tonight,’ said Faye to the other attendees.
‘Hello, Bonnie!’ came Sarah’s greeting followed by another, the man this time, and then the next person who popped up, someone called Winston. Each name was beside the person on camera.
‘Hello.’ Bonnie didn’t want to be rude, but this was so odd, so unlike anything she’d done before.
Faye smiled brightly. ‘Bonnie, tonight is a very special Midnight Book Club, because we decided that rather than focusing on a book, tonight’s session is especially for you.’
It was clear from the faces on the laptop screen and Margot’s expression that everyone else knew this already.
‘It’s wonderful to see you all!’ said Faye, taking the heat off Bonnie but not for long. She rested a hand on Bonnie’s shoulder. ‘As you know Bonnie was the love of Howard’s life.’
‘Apart from books and his beloved bookshop!’ Winston announced and it had a few people open-mouthed but Bonnie started to laugh.
