The day I nearly talked to Grace was the hottest day of my life. Even in the bookstore, which was air-conditioned, the heat crept in around the door and came in through the big picture windows in waves. Behind the counter, I slouched on my stool in the sun and sucked in the summer as if I could hold every drop of it inside of me. As the hours crept by, the afternoon sunlight bleached all the books on the shelves to pale, gilded versions of themselves and warmed the paper and ink inside the covers so that the smell of unread words hung in the air.
This was what I loved, when I was human.
I was reading when the door opened with a little ding, admitting a stifling rush of hot air and a group of girls. They were laughing too loudly to need my help, so I kept reading and let them jostle along the walls and talk about everything except books.
I don’t think I would’ve given the girls a second thought, except that at the edge of my vision I saw one of them sweep up her dark blonde hair and twist it into a long ponytail. The action itself was insignificant, but the movement sent a gasp of scent into the air. I recognized that smell. I knew
immediately.
It was her. It had to be.
I jerked my book up toward my face and risked a glimpse in the girls’ direction. The other two were still talking and gesturing at a paper bird I’d hung from the ceiling above the children’s book section. She wasn’t talking, though; she hung back, her eyes on the books all around her. I saw her face then, and I recognized something of myself in her expression. Her eyes flicked over the shelves, seeking possibilities for escape.
I had planned a thousand different versions of this scene in my head, but now that the moment had come, I didn’t know what to do.
She was so real here. It was different when she was in her backyard, just reading a book or scribbling homework in a notebook. There, the distance between us was an impossible void; I felt all the reasons to stay away. Here,
in the bookstore, with me, she seemed breathtakingly close in a way she hadn’t before. There was nothing to stop me from talking to her.
Her gaze headed in my direction, and I looked away hurriedly, down at my book. She wouldn’t recognize my face but she would recognize my eyes.
I had to believe she would recognize my eyes.
I prayed for her to leave so I could breathe again.
I prayed for her to buy a book so I would have to talk to her.
One of the girls called, “Grace, come over here and look at this. Making the Grade: Getting into the College of Your Dreams — that sounds good, right?”
I sucked in a slow breath and watched her long sunlit back as she crouched and looked at the SAT prep books with the other girls. There was a certain tilt to her shoulders that seemed to indicate only polite interest; she nodded as they pointed to other books, but she seemed distracted. I watched the way the sunlight streamed through the windows, catching the individual flyaway hairs in her ponytail and turning each one into a shimmering gold strand. Her head moved almost imperceptibly back and forth with the rhythm
of the music playing overhead.
“Hey.”
I jerked back as a face appeared before me. Not Grace. One of the other girls, dark-haired and tanned. She had a huge camera slung over her shoulder and she was looking right into my eyes. She didn’t say anything, but I knew what she was thinking. Reactions to my eye color ranged from furtive glances to out-and-out staring; at least she was being honest about it.
“Do you mind if I take your photo?” she asked.
I cast around for an excuse. “Some native people think if you take their photo, you take their soul. It sounds like a very logical argument to me, so sorry, no pictures.” I shrugged apologetically. “You can take photos of the store if you like.”
The third girl pushed up against the camera girl: bushy light brown hair, tremendously freckled and radiating so much energy that she exhausted me.
“Flirting, Olivia? We don’t have time for that. Here, dude, we’ll take this one.”
I took Making the Grade from her, sparing a quick glance around for Grace.
“Nineteen dollars and ninety-nine cents,” I said.
My heart was pounding.
“For a paperback?” remarked the freckle girl, but she handed me a twenty. “Keep the penny.” We didn’t have a penny jar, but I put it on the counter next to the register. I bagged the book and receipt slowly, thinking Grace might come over to see what was taking so long.
But she stayed in the biography section, head tipped to the side as she read the spines. The freckle girl took the bag and grinned at me and Olivia.
Then they went to Grace and herded her toward the door.
Turn around, Grace. Look at me, I’m standing right here. If she turned right now, she’d see my eyes, and she’d have to know me.
Freckle girl opened the door — ding — and made an impatient sound to the rest of the herd: time to move along. Olivia turned briefly, and her eyes found me again behind the counter. I knew I was staring at them — at Grace — but I couldn’t stop.
Olivia frowned and ducked out of the store. Freckle girl said, “Grace, come on.”
My chest ached, my body speaking a language my head didn’t quite
understand.
I waited.
But Grace, the only person in the world I wanted to know me, just ran a wanting finger over the cover of one of the new hardcovers and walked out of the store without ever realizing I was there, right within reach.
