JACK DARCY

“Please help me.”

“Sure!” A bright-eyed woman smiles gently at me. “What are you looking for today?”

“Romance,” I tell her. “I need to romance a woman.”

“Fantastic. We have everything you can think of under the sun.” She waves her hand, and sure enough, I’m reminded of the stacks on stacks on stacks of books lining every shelf of the two-floor facility. “Do you like witches? Erotica? Contemporary? Lawyers? Garbage men?”

“Um, how about normal guys?” I shrug my shoulders. “I’m looking for advice.”

She laughs. “We have normal guys. Any sort of story appealing to you? Enemies to lovers? Single dad? Friends?”

“Friends. Books with very specific examples. I’m talking paint-by-numbers, here.”

After leaving my mother’s, I cruised through town, headed straight toward the only place that could help me now—the place where this all began. If I learned one thing from fairytales, it’s that every fairytale starts with the words once upon a time. They end with happily ever after. I just need some help getting from A to B, and I have a feeling this magical place can point me in the right direction.

“Specific examples of what?”

“Actually.” I lean on the counter and let my idea fully form. “You probably read a lot of books since you own this place, huh?”

Another laugh from her. “That I do.”

“So, if I needed some help, or...I don’t know, the SparkNotes version of these books, you’d be the right person to talk to?”

“I suppose.”

“What if I proposed a deal? Let’s say I buy...” I hesitate, then glance toward a table covered with brand new paperbacks. “Twenty of those.”

“Which ones?”

“The ones with, I dunno, the girl in the dress.”

“They all have girls in pretty dresses. That’s our historical section.”

“Let me finish my proposal. I need a little help with romance,” I tell her, turning back to the counter where a line has started to form behind me. “I was in here a few days ago. You probably don’t remember me.”

“No, I do. You bought the doctor romance.”

“Wow, your memory is good.”

“I just thought it was great to see a man in here with his girlfriend, checking out our gay romance section.”

“Gay romance?”

She blinks. “There are two men on the front cover. What did you think you were buying?”

“Doesn’t matter,” I say quickly. “What matters is that the woman in here wasn’t my girlfriend. She still isn’t, but I want her to be.”

“You need help winning her over?”

“I was going to read all the books you suggested to get advice, but I will run out of time.” I’m practically pleading with her. “I’m desperate. I’ll buy every book you give me the SparkNotes version of if you help me out.”

“That’s not good enough.”

“Money? I’ll donate to the store.”

“You have to read the books.”

“What?”

“I don’t just want your money,” she says with a cheeky sort of grin. “I want you to read them all. It doesn’t matter how long it takes you, but you have to give them a fair shot.”

“Fine. I’ll spend the next twenty years of my life catching up on them if you help me now.”

“Deal.” She extends her hand, and we shake on it, a look of mutual satisfaction passing between us. “Now, I say we begin over here...”

Two hours later, I’ve purchased exactly one hundred and ninety-three dollars’ worth of books and have a lifetime of reading cut out for me. I didn’t exactly plan on how to carry them home on my motorcycle, so I ended up purchasing a forty-five-dollar backpack that says Smart Girls Read Romance. But don’t worry, the ladies at the store told me. It’s “super-cute.”

I do feel fabulous strapping on my “super-cute” backpack that feels as if it’s stuffed full of bricks. Several friends of the store walk me to the door, wishing me luck as I turn to say good-bye.

As I puzzle through all of the advice, I’m still not a hundred percent sure what my actual next steps need to be. I mean, I have a list of about a hundred of them, but they’re all so un-Jack it’s making me uneasy.

“Are you sure I can’t just...” I hesitate. “I don’t know, throw rocks at her window? Romeo and Juliet style?”

“Have you ever read Romeo and Juliet?”

“No,” I admit.

“Don’t throw rocks at her window,” one of the ladies says. “Just text her and say you’re coming over. It’s the twenty-first century.”

“But—”

“You’re not going to listen to our advice, are you?”

I take a deep breath. “Yes, I am. Thank you—for everything.”

“She’s a lucky lady,” one of the women says. “Don’t worry so much.”

I offer one last smile of thanks, climbing onto the bike with my “super-cute” backpack strapped tight. “So... no rocks?”

“No rocks.”