Page 101 of Power Play

Ryan dropped into the chair beside mine and opened the book. “If I thought you were dumb, I wouldn’t waste my afternoon teaching you. I value my time.”

I pressed the book against my chest. “That was almost romantic.”

“Don’t tell anybody.”

“Your reputation would never recover.”

“Exactly.”

He pulled a thick Spanish-English dictionary from the bag next. The corners were worn soft, several pages bent, and his name had been written inside the cover years ago in handwriting less controlled than it was now.

“That one was mine,” he said. “You can keep it.”

My fingers paused against the cover. “You want me to keep it?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t use it?”

“I haven’t needed it in years.”

I opened the front carefully. The pages smelled like old paper, faint dust, and something that made me think of his apartment. His hands had moved through this book, and maybe his mother’s had too.

The thought made the gift feel heavier.

“This is yours.”

“I’m aware.”

“What if I ruin it?”

“Then I’ll make you replace it.”

“With another thirty-year-old dictionary?”

“Preferably one that survived several foster homes and one very questionable backpack.”

I looked at him. “You carried this through foster care?”

“For part of it.”

“And you’re giving it to me?”

Ryan’s expression barely changed. “It’s a dictionary, Charm.”

“It’s your dictionary.”

“That distinction feels emotionally dangerous.”

“You started this.”

“I handed you a book.”

I ran my thumb over the worn edge. He had given me pieces of himself before through stories about his mother, Spanish words, and books he trusted me to touch. This felt different because he was telling me the dictionary belonged with me now.

Keeping something of Ryan’s shouldn’t have made my throat tighten. Lately, the idea of keeping anything connected to him had become complicated.

Ryan reached into the bag before I could say more and pulled out a black composition notebook. CHARM had been written across the front in his slanted handwriting.