“Right, no, I understand you’ve never heard of us before,” I said into the phone, waving to some customers as they strolled in. “We are…well, were, famous for a long time and I’m working to…right. No, I understand and I sure will,” I said, sighing as I hung up the phone.
I took out my red pen and crossed another name off the list.
“No luck?” Gabe asked, staring at my computer screen. He’d been coming by to help me set up some financial systems for the bookstore. Turned out, Big Sur had a lot of experts, and when your best friend had been running a business for his entire life—you should start there.
“Nope,” I said, shrugging. “But the list is long and I’m only 10% through it. They’ll come,” I said, with a confidence I didn’t really feel.
Gabe and I had taken a second look at my grandfather’s finances and, as I suspected, the bread-and-butter of his business—when it was good—had been readings and lectures.
Getting them started up again was another question entirely.
“Your sales are up 3%,” Gabe said, clicking through a report and printing it for me. “Not too shabby.”
I looked, impressed as the small line on the bar chart moved up. Slow, but steady.
“That’s good news,” I exclaimed, so loudly a few of the customers glanced my way. I smiled at them nervously. I still lacked a lot of my grandfather’s gregariousness, but I was getting better.
“It is,” Gabe said slowly, slapping a hand on my back. “But your expenses are still outpacing your revenue significantly. Almost shockingly so.”
“Fuck.”
“I’m still letting you drink for free,” he said with a wry grin.
I winced a little—for every ounce of good financial news, it didn’t seem to be able to chip away at the massive amount of debt.
“Much appreciated,” I said grimly, turning back to my list.
After I’d let down the investors—who had a few choice words for me—I called my parents. They thought it was a terrible idea and told me so. A few friends agreed. My boss didn’t seem to care—they hired the intern, like they promised—but he did express a fair amount of disbelief over my decision.
The first month was exhausting—between getting rid of my apartment, moving my things, running the store, and starting marketing classes at the community college—I barely had a moment to myself. And when I did, I spent it drinking with Gabe.
Hard, just like my grandfather had said. Some days it felt like I was pushing a mountain from one end of the earth to the other.
Others were sublime—a run along the beach, whales in the distance. A great book catching me by surprise. Seeing a bear, with two cubs, walking along the path leading to the cabins. A quiet contentment had settled in my bones.
And I knew what I was doing: distracting myself. Pushing myself so hard I didn’t have time to think of Lucia, yearn for Lucia, ache for Lucia. Every so often—watching the sunrise over the cliffs, or reading a line of poetry I knew she’d love—it would hit. Swift and sure, breaking my heart anew. Shattering that quiet contentment. I hadn’t heard from her, but I also hadn’t reached out. One night, during a fit of insomnia, I’d looked at her Instagram account.
She looked happy in Paris.
For the next two days, I felt like I was drowning, unable to fully catch my breath. It was the photos of her laughing, the curve of her lips. The interesting way she captioned things—I noticed, now, the poetic style of her writing.
The two poems she’d written for me were shoved into my grandfather’s copy of On the Road.
I couldn’t bring myself to read them.
I dialed the number of the next author, looking over Gabe’s shoulder as he did something I couldn’t begin to parse.
“You’re an accounting genius,” I whispered, sound of the phone ringing in my ear.
“That, or I’m stealing from you,” he said, waving up a customer.
I watched as he listened to them gush about the books here, handing them an index card. I’d decided to re-start the tradition. According to our new Yelp page (all five-star reviews…we just weren’t making enough money) customers raved about it. Loved its quirky charm.
A woman picked up on the other line—Noel Hartford, a local poet that the Big Sur Channel was raving about. Surely, she’d be interested?
“At The Mad Ones?” she semi-squealed and I grinned, appreciating the response. “I thought it closed down.”
“Nope,” I said. “It is alive and well and we’d very much like to start up the writers programming my grandfather used to run.”
“I used to go to those,” she gushed. “I was little, and didn’t always understand what was going on, but I begged my parents to take me.”
My heart beat painfully, thinking of Lucia, begging her parents to take her to a bookstore. The way she’d denied those things to herself now, in pursuit of a career it was so obvious she was ready to leave. I hoped, wherever she was in Paris, she was reading. Or writing.
“Well, would you like to be the inaugural author?” I asked, crossing my fingers under the desk.
My grandparents stared out at me from their wedding photo, hanging above the register. You can do it, they seemed to say. Because really, I could.
“I’d love to.”
And just like that: hope.
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