Cheyenne moans. “This is so embarrassing.”
“No it’s not,” I say. “It’s great! Let’s go say hi!”
“We are not—”
But I’m already tugging Cheyenne’s arm and walking around the side to the front of the line. “Mr. Herman! Mr. Herman!” I call out, waving my free hand. Mr. Herman, as Santa, looks over in a panic, and I realize I’ve almost blown his cover. “I mean, Santa! Look! I have your favorite elf here!”
Mr. Herman catches on quickly. “Ho, ho, ho! My favorite two elves here for a visit. Come over and—”
“Nope!” Cheyenne shouts, spinning around and dashing away from the North Pole. I chase after her, almost knocking into a trio of preteen boys on skateboards in the sardine-packed mall, as Cheyenne continues to say, “Shoshanna, it’s my dad. Dressed as Santa. Saying ‘ho, ho, ho.’ Oh my god. What if Anna sees him? This is too embarrassing. I can’t—”
I feel the tiniest twinge of annoyance as she speaks. Mr. Herman was so happy to see his daughter. He wanted Cheyenne to spend time with him. My moms were ecstatic when I got my job at Once Upon. They showed up at the end of my first shift with a tray of rainbow-frosting cupcakes to share with the entire staff. It was too dang nice to be embarrassing. After that, they’d drop in on random occasions to browse, buy gifts, or treat me to lunch at the food court. All these little things I loved but never thought about much. Now, it would feel surreal to see Mama bringing me an Auntie Anne’s pretzel or to find Mom trailing her finger along the spines of the mystery section.
But it’s not right to be annoyed at Cheyenne when I haven’t told her what’s going on at home. And, to be fair, I’ve never witnessed my moms in elf costumes. That might be a sight I couldn’t recover from.
As we head back toward our respective stores, Cheyenne pulls out her phone and calls someone. A few seconds later she breathlessly says, “Mom? Yeah, hi.” Her eyes are wide and wild with panic. “There’s an emergency.”
Chapter Five
For the next few hours, I lose myself to bookselling, racking up sale after sale, peddling five copies of the first Time Stands Still book alone, not to mention plenty of memoirs, romances, and adorable picture books. My own to-be-read pile has grown to Jack-and-the-Beanstalk heights, and I can’t wait for these holiday double shifts to be over so I have more time to actually read.
After helping another customer, I look around the store and sigh in contentment. I freaking love my job. People enter Once Upon hesitant, hopeful, eyes flitting across the shelves in search of something special, and I get to help them. I get to comb the shelves and come up with the right title to brighten their entire week or even year. There’s nothing quite like the perfect book—nothing else in the world that can shine a light on something deep down inside of you, that can burrow into your heart and make you feel seen and heard. Holiday bonus or not, finding that perfect book for someone is a greater burst of adrenaline than even my most legendary sugar rush (Halloween, 2016).
I notice Daniel is finishing up with a customer as well, pointing them over to the registers with a pleasant smile. I size him up with sudden suspicion. Daniel, reader of all the books, speaker of countless recommendations, wearer of Spider-Man socks. He’s one of the few employees in the store more well-read than me and just as personable. If I have competition for the bonus, he’s it. And just because we’re nerdy BFFs who once came up with 101 alternate titles for the Harry Potter books together (including Harry Potter and the Goblet of Teenage Angst and Harry Potter and the Deathly Angst), it doesn’t mean I’ll go easy on him.
Daniel notices my gaze and laughs as he approaches me, running a hand over his hair. “You should see the look in your eyes. If I didn’t know better, I’d be scared of you, Shoshanna Greenberg.”
“So…,” I say. “Planning to win the bonus?”
He winks. “Subtle. But don’t worry. I’m not working enough shifts to win. Family is in town early for Christmas, so I won’t be pulling doubles like you.”
“Oh, good,” I say, feeling quick relief.
Daniel laughs again as his phone chimes. He checks it and says, “Ah, Lola is here. I’m heading out.” He salutes me. “See you later, Greenberg.”
I salute back. “Until tomorrow, Rhodes.”
He walks away, sliding his phone into his pocket and high-fiving Myra on the way out, and a little sigh escapes me. Not to be all cliché or whatever, but it’d be nice to have someone during the holidays. Daniel has Lola, and it’s totally understandable why Cheyenne is all lustful after her ex, Anna. Who doesn’t want to cozy up with someone during the cold weather? Of course it’s at the exact moment of that thought that I look up and find Jake standing in the adult fantasy section. He’s talking with a customer, laughing and running a hand through his luscious head of curls. I bite my lip as my eyes flicker from his jaw to his flannel all the way down to his brown boots, and I wonder for just a moment…
But then the laughing stops. And Jake looks awkward, and the customer gives a This guy is no help sigh. So in a burst of holiday goodwill, and definitely for no other lustful reasons, I decide to lend a hand.
I walk over and keep my voice bright as I ask, “Can I help you find something?”
“I’ve got it, thanks,” Jake answers.
I step up to him close enough to whisper, “Just let me help.” When he looks at me, I almost wobble backward. His dark brown eyes are intense, “swoonworthy,” some might say, and up close they make my head light, my thoughts slow yet heady, like I just downed two glasses of wine at a seder. I manage, barely, to keep my voice level as I tell him, “You can keep the sale.”
Those swoonworthy eyes narrow as he scratches his neck with two fingers. I find myself staring at the soft patch of skin a second too long. “Really?”
I clear my throat and flick my eyes back to a safe area—also known as a piece of lint on my cardigan sleeve. “Really,” I promise. “I kicked bookselling butt this afternoon. It’s not like an extra sale will bring you anywhere close to beating me.”
“Fine,” he relents, and I swear I sense a small grin tugging at his lips. “Okay, then.”
My pulse ticks faster than usual. I really did step up close to Jake, close enough I can feel the warmth of him through my cardigan and his flannel. My cheeks heat as I turn to the woman standing in front of us and focus my attention on her instead of Jake and Jake’s warmth. She’s holding a stack of three books, but her frown tells me she’s unhappy with the choices.
I stick out my hand. “Hi! I’m Shoshanna. Can I help you find something?”
She shifts the books and shakes my hand. “I’m looking for a gift for my dad. He likes fantasy, and I want to get him something recent, written by a woman, if possible.”
“Oh!” I say. “He has to read Time Stands Still. It’s the best series to—”
She shakes her head. “No, I want something recent.”
“It’s recent!”
She gives me a weird look. “Didn’t that series end, like, a decade ago?”
Well, in the history of literature, I’d still call that pretty dang recent, but the customer is always right, especially when I’m showing Jake the definition of exemplary customer service, and I’m still very aware of Jake at my side. “Right! Okay, so we have a display table of new fantasy. Let’s see if any of those are the right fit!”
I try to lead her off to the display, but she stays put. “Anything you’d specifically recommend?”
“Every single one is a staff recommendation!” I assure her, finally ushering her over to the table. Jake trails behind us, and we all pick through the titles together. Now that I’m looking at the display, I realize I haven’t read any of these. I love fantasy. It’s basically my favorite genre, but I guess I’m a little behind, which can happen when you reread your favorite series approximately eight times in a row and also read assorted fanfiction for that series. I feel the woman’s hesitancy and hate the discomfort of not having an immediate solution. I rack my brain, but every title tha
t comes to mind was released at least a few years ago.
“So something like Time Stands Still but recent?” Jake asks.
“Exactly!” the woman replies.
“It’s a great series,” Jake says.
Oh, come on. He hasn’t read it.
“One second…” Jake pulls out his phone, and after a minute of typing and tapping, he says, “How about Elyse Greene’s Willow Warrior series?”
“Have you read it?” she asks.
“Not yet,” he responds, “but I’m planning to soon. It’s on a list of recently released reads for fans of Time Stands Still.”
She claps her hands together. “Oh, that’s perfect!”
Anxiety pulses through me. Can Jake really sell books that way? With lying and a smartphone? What if it’s a good strategy? What if he wins the bonus, and I don’t have enough money to fix Barbra, and my moms will keep fighting about it, and—
Before I can stop myself, I’m saying, “Oh, I know exactly where that one is! Follow me!” I spin on my heel and lead the woman back to the fantasy shelves. I find the book and pass it over, along with my own QR code. “Just hand this in up front, thanks so much. Happy holidays!”
After the woman heads to the register, Jake walks up to me, jaw tense, swoonworthy eyes now alight with annoyance. “Seriously? You said that was my sale.”
His words hit harder than expected, and my shoulders tighten. I did say that was his sale. I just got anxious and panicky about losing the bonus. “You’re right,” I admit. “I’m sorry. But you also basically stole my sale this morning with Ryan the Jimmy Carter fan. So. We’re kind of even.”
“Oh.” Jake’s expression flickers. He leans closer to me, and I inhale all his sugar-and-cinnamon scent like he’s a life-size bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. “Yeah, well, I guess you’re right. I’m sorry too.”
The moment stretches too long, and my skin buzzes, all electric and hypersensitive, like I can feel Jake even though we’re not touching. My eyes flick to the curve of his lips, and the electricity grows, and I worry if one of us doesn’t speak soon, I’ll do something extremely regrettable. So I clear my throat and say, “It’s not like it matters. You’re not going to win the bonus.”
“You really think I can’t win?” Jake leans back and stretches, pulling one arm tight across his chest. He seems more amused than annoyed now. “Because I found that woman a book just now—not you.”
“It was a fluke,” I tell him and myself. “You can’t google up a perfect recommendation every time. People want a personal touch. They want you to vouch for a book.”
“Which is something you couldn’t do. Besides, people like search-engine-optimized results. They want to be led to exactly the right choice.” Jake’s expression shifts then, and he gets this evil smirk that makes my hairs raise.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing.”
“Jake…,” I warn.
His smirk intensifies. “You know what? I’m going to straighten the shelves. The next customer is all yours. I’m sure you’re right. It’d be the upset of the century if I win the bonus.”
As he walks away, I call after him in a panic, “Why were you smiling when you said that? Jake!”
He doesn’t answer.
Darn it.
Why was he smiling when he said that?
* * *
I bite my nail as the Starbucks’ line inches forward. I’m overreacting. I know I’m overreacting. Jake can’t win the bonus. He’s messing with me, that’s all. And I’m being sensitive. I’ve always been a little sensitive. I once cried at a commercial for a carpet cleaner because the family was just so happy to have that new puppy, muddy paws and all. And the tension at home and Barbra’s impending breakdown is making me more on edge than usual, and why am I about to waste money at Starbucks when I didn’t even want to buy a smoothie, like what’s the point of a pick-me-up when there’s so much stress attached to it, and I just feel like one more tiny thing could topple me over, and—
I exhale a giant, shaky sigh.
“Whoa, what’s up with you?” a voice asks.
I spin around, muscles tense, but then relax when I see who it is. “Elliot!”
“I need caffeine,” he says. “This day has been way too long.”
“Agreed.” I smile. “The crowds at Make You Up looked intense.”
“So intense. It’s all hands on deck for the holidays, and I want to be seen as helpful since I’m trying to get a raise from Kim. Seriously, I sell twice as much product as anyone in that store, but she won’t give me a raise because I have a problem ‘listening to authority,’ or whatever. And yet she seems to have no qualms about having me close down the store tonight, and—”
“Wait!” I interrupt, an idea sparking. “You’re closing the store tonight?”
Elliot sighs as he runs his fingers through his perfectly tousled hair. His silver rings glint under the mall lights. “Yeah. Kim has to leave early for some hot yoga acupuncture meditation cult thing. I don’t know.”
“Hmm,” I say.
An entirely empty store full of makeup…
“You have something brewing in there.” Elliot taps my forehead. “Tell me!”
“Well… if you’re closing down the store, you know, the store with all the makeup, what if we film Geraldine’s first video there using the samples? Oh my god!” I jump. “I can even borrow a backdrop from an old event at Once Upon, so no one will recognize where we are. It’s totally seriously perfect!”
“I’m intrigued. But sounds risky.” We step up to the cashier, and Elliot orders. “Two grande peppermint mochas, please!”
“That’ll be eleven seventy-four,” the cashier says.
I freeze. I should split the cost, but he’s the one who ordered us something expensive when I was already feeling guilty about my plan to order a kid’s hot chocolate. Before I have a chance to react, Elliot inserts his card, and the cashier hands him a receipt.
“I’ll get us next time!” I say. “Promise.”
“Sounds good,” Elliot replies, totally unconcerned. I chew the inside of my cheek as we step to the side to wait for our drinks. “So, a video…”
“Yeah. What do you think? No pressure, though. I don’t want to get you in trouble!”
“I think…” Elliot trails off into a long pause before smiling at me. “I think it’s a fantastic idea, and I’m very much in!”
I squeal. “Really?”
“Really, really.”
And just like that, a giant weight lifts from my tiny shoulders. Helping Geraldine will be the perfect way to make her YouTuber dream come true, and as a bonus, distract me from any future stress spirals.
When our drinks are ready, I grab mine and take a sip. Pepperminty, chocolatey perfection. “I should head back to work,” I tell Elliot.
“Text coordinate details?” he asks.
“For sure!”
He gives me a quick, one-armed hug before we part ways. The shoppers quickly disappear him into the crowd. As I sip my drink, I pull out my phone and text Geraldine about tonight. She immediately sends back a slew of texts, mostly excitement with a medium dose of nerves. She says she’s not ready to post content online but that she’d love to do a practice video. Happiness floods through me as I sip my peppermint mocha and head back to Once Upon. I’m bolstered by sugar and friends and ready to sell a lot of freaking books.
Chapter Six
Jake leaves halfway through my double shift, so the rest of the day goes by without incident. Well, there are customer incidents. Like the customer who insists on only boy book recommendations for her son and scoffs, literally scoffs, when I hand her a book with a girl protagonist. And then there’s the ten-minute-long, painstaking conversation I have with a customer who said he preordered a book for pickup on Wednesday and why isn’t it here yet, and I said yes, well, it’s only Monday, and he said, yes, but I ordered for pickup Wednesday, and I barely resisted the urge to scream, That isn’t how time works, sir!
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But, you know, that’s just retail life.
And then my period started, and I didn’t have a tampon on me, so I borrowed one from Tanya, a mother of two who carries everything from tampons to graham crackers to Tide to Go pens on her at all times. She’s such a good person she’ll probably even carry around an emergency tampon for other people once she’s post-menopause. I make a mental note to bring her some packets of chamomile tea since it’s her favorite, the break room is always out of it, and it seems to be the one thing she can’t fit into her Mary Poppins bag.
The afternoon wasn’t all bad, though. I sold an obscene amount of books, and even better, Ms. Serrano and I had a thirty-minute chat about a new romance series she loves, and then she gifted the books to me because she said they’re going to put her on that Hoarders show if she doesn’t start purging her personal library. And now it’s finally the end of my shift, and after two days of double shifts in a row, I’m bone tired, which is an expression my grandpa uses that I never understood until this moment.
But—I need to reenergize because we have a YouTube video to film!
As I approach the Make You Up doors, I text Elliot the code words: peppermint mocha. We invited Cheyenne to the filming as well, but she sent her regrets. She has a date with her mom to binge the most recent season of The Bachelorette. I felt the same tiny tug of annoyance as earlier—no, not annoyance—jealousy. I can’t remember the last time we had an HGTV Greenberg family marathon, sprawled out with blankets and candy and mercilessly judging people for their design preferences. I always predict “flip,” and my moms always predict “flop,” and it’s a whole cute thing.
Elliot cracks open the store door, pulling me out of my thoughts. He peers both ways like we’re in a heist movie and not a suburban mall that hasn’t had a proper facelift since the early aughts. Then he nods and lets me in, whispering, “All clear.”
“Copy,” Geraldine’s voice responds.
Elliot’s phone sticks out of his pocket, functioning as a walkie-talkie on speakerphone. I lean over and speak into it. “The peppermint mocha has landed. Over.”
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