“The ladies that run the library?” I laughed. “I don’t need to. They had them already.”
“What’s your author name? I wanna read your stuff.”
My cheeks heated. Mitch read my works and that was miserable enough. There was no one else who knew me who read them. “Danielle Pepper. They’re uh ... spicy.”
“Really? Now Ihaveto read them. I’ll report back.”
“Just don’t tell me if you hate them.”
“What am I, a dick? I would never. I’m sure I’ll love them. Do you mind if I tell the other girls too?”
“Do you mean Wren and her other friends?”
“Yeah. Mollie, Grace, and Jade. Mollie’s daughter ran into you when you uh ... Yeah, that.”
I winced. “Oh, God. I need to apologize to her.”
“Mollie was embarrassed.” Kelsey shook her head. “She wants to apologize to you, actually. They’re all really nice. I usually keep my distance, but they’re slowly sucking me in. And they keep secrets. If you wanted to ever tell them about Theo, you could.”
“T-Theo? Nothing’s going on with Theo and me.”
“Yeah, yeah. The way he cares about you? Comeon.”
I blinked. “You’d say he cares about me?”
She laughed as she put away the milk. “I would, which is more than any other woman in town could say.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Theo doesn’t date. Ever, as far as I know.”
“Oh.” That brought me back down to Earth. “You know, that might be for the best. I’m sure you’ve noticed, but I have a thing with touching. That makes it hard to date.”
“And yet you want it, huh?”
“Yeah. It’s pretty miserable, but I’m working on it.”
“With Theo?” Kelsey asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Theo’s been nice, but I highly doubt he’d want to deal with all of this. And I don’t even know if I’d let him. I want to, but that doesn’t mean it’ll happen.”
She hummed. “Weirder things have happened. You know,when I left for college, I never thought Strawberry Springs would have a library again. Much less a coffee shop and a thriving economy. Jade has always said there was something magical here, and maybe she’s right.”
“I think I need a lot more than magic to help me.”
“True, but the idea of it can help.” She gave me a smile before she looked at the pile of empty plastic bags. “We did it by the way. One massive store run. Done.”
I blinked, following her line of sight. True to Kelsey’s word, everything was put away and I had all the basics to survive.
I was okay.
Not perfect. I still felt jittery from being out of the house and letting someone into my space.
But it was better. I’d just started my medicine and it wasbetter.
Hope sprouted in my chest. If I’d done this, what else could I eventually do?
My thoughts went to Theo. It felt like something was there. Maybe I was too hopeful and maybe I wanted more than he could give.
