Steam swirls in a thin cloud from the mug of tea sitting in front of Wes. Engraved in the ceramic is the Brews and Views logo. He eyes it suspiciously. It smells good, an earthy bold flavor. Oolong, possibly. And Wes is ninety-nine percent certain it’s poisoned.
Across from him, Leo stares, one eyebrow raised, his mouth twitching impatiently.
“There’s cyanide in here, right?” Wes gestures toward the mug. It was sitting at the table waiting for Wes before he arrived.
“No.”
“Odorless horse tranquilizers? Arsenic? Heroin?” Tentatively, Wes sniffs, then sips the tea. He’s not experiencing any instant numbness. He’s not lightheaded. There could be delayed symptoms, but for now, the tea’s… incredible.
“It’s regular, boring, overpriced oolong,” Leo confirms, sipping his own extra dry cappuccino. It’s decaf and made with almond milk, not because Leo’s lactose intolerant, but because he’s just a complicated, pretentious dick.
Slurping his tea, Wes studies Leo. The first two buttons of his starched white shirt are undone; his sleeves are bunched at his elbows. He hasn’t shaved. His tie’s loose. Honestly, he looks a mess.
“Sup with you?”
“Interning, studying for the LSAT, and trying to ensure your fiancée doesn’t have an aneurysm over your ideal wedding venue being booked two years in advance is detrimental to my health.” Leo wipes at his foam moustache. “At least the coffee’s good.”
“Sorry,” Wes says, sounding anything but that.
“You haven’t answered any of my texts.” Leo folds his arms on the table.
“Been busy. Planning a funeral for your childhood fantasies is a lot of work.”
“Wes,” Leo tries.
“Is that why you invited me here?” Wes asks, voice hard. “You need me to return to my wedding duties?”
“Leeann misses you,” Leo says softly. “And you haven’t answered any of her calls either. That’s not like you.”
Wes rolls his eyes. Leeann’s a narc. She’s sold Wes out to his own demonic kin.
“So, what? You’re here to play nice?” Wes hisses, almost burning his tongue as he gulps tea. “This pretend, ‘I care so much’ version of Leo? You can keep it. I’m good.”
“No,” Leo says, low and defeated. They’re seated in a far corner, close to the large storefront windows. Sunlight pours over them. The rain’s finally left. In its wake, a milder August warmth has emerged. Leo squints at the people passing by outside. “I don’t really know how to be the brother I should be to you.”
“What?”
Leo drags a finger around the rim of his mug. “We’re so different,” he says. “When we were growing up, I felt like I had to protect you. We liked different stuff. Different things set us off.”
He clears his throat, eyes on the table. “The kids my age would make fun of you.”
Wes flops back in his chair. “Okay.”
Behind the bar, Kyra’s not-so-secretly watching over them. Beyoncé plays on the speakers, and she’s singing along. But her eyes never leave Wes’s face. She’s waiting for any indication to jump in. Wes loves her for that, but he needs to hear Leo out.
“I tried to make you less… you,” Leo says, voice dropping in shame. “I tried to make you like different things. Act a certain way. I was hard on you, hoping you’d get the hint that I didn’t want to give anyone a reason to pick on you.”
“Ha.” Wes’s forehead wrinkles. “How’d that work out for you?”
Leo exhales. “They still made fun of you. So, I thought if I pushed you far enough away, they wouldn’t be able to talk shit about you. You wouldn’t be around. They’d find a new target.”
“And?”
“They did.” Leo’s eyes finally lift, soft and glassy. “But by then, the distance between us was so big, I didn’t know how to bring you back.”
Poisoned or not, Wes sips his tea. It burns in the way he needs. He tries not to remember what it was like to have Leo shout at him or slam his bedroom door in Wes’s face. It doesn’t work. He can recall every time Leo wouldn’t let Wes follow him and his “friends” to the beach, every moment Wes wanted to share a new comic with Leo, but he wasn’t there.
“I wasn’t a good brother back then,” Leo admits. “Or now. There are times when I don’t know the right things to say.”
“Yeah, well.” The heat from the tea barely dissolves the lump in Wes’s throat.
“But you’re still my brother.” Leo frowns. “I give a shit about you.”
Wes snorts. But the honesty in Leo’s guilt-stricken eyes is unavoidable. Wes blinks until that sheen dampening his eyelashes passes. “I know,” he says tightly.
A quiet filled by Beyoncé’s voice settles over their table. Wes refuses to cry. But that eight-year-old version of himself crawls out of the shadows Leo put him in, warming Wes’s chest, making him wish they’d said any of this to each other sooner.
“I need a best man.”
Wes sits up, shoulders drawn like a boss. “Are you asking or telling me?”
“I’m trying,” Leo says, incredulous.
“It’s a weak effort.”
Leo gags; his body shifts as if he’s two seconds from reaching across the table and duffing Wes on the shoulder. But he doesn’t. “Well?”
“Am I allowed to quote Green Day during the reception toast?” Wes wonders.
“Hell no.”
“You’re a dick,” Wes mumbles.
“Thanks. I’d hate to disappoint you.”
A laugh floods Wes’s mouth. Who is this alien?
“Are you gonna ask Nico to be your date?” Leo leans back, his expression relaxed.
Wes’s the one choking this time.
“Don’t act, bro,” says Leo. He takes a quick sip of his drink. “You know you want to.”
Wes face-palms, groaning. Of course Leo knows. Of course, the universe has let everyone in on Wes’s secret except the one person who should know.
“I have no clue what to do,” he mumbles into his hands.
“Wes,” Leo says, “If the worst thing you do in this lifetime is fall in love with your best friend, then I’d say you’re doing pretty damn good.”
* * *
On his lunch break, Wes sneaks into the alley behind Paseo Del Mar. He squats, spine pressed to the pastel pink wall, while scrolling through his contacts. He inhales deeply for courage before pressing the FaceTime button. It takes two rings before the video comes in fuzzy, then crisp.
“Wesley?”
And there he is, Calvin Hudson, droopy eyes deep brown with green flecks around the outermost parts of his irises. His hair’s cut close; the shadow of a beard and mustache outline his mouth. There’s a touch of gray in the black. His voice’s groggy, but so warm.
“Hey, Daddy.”
Damn, how long has it been since he called Calvin that? How long since he’s felt this vulnerable, a man-sized shell of a body containing a five-year-old desperate to crawl into his father’s lap for tea and cartoons.
“Are you okay?” Calvin looks down, probably to check the time. “Are you at work?”
“Ye-Yeah,” Wes stutters, smiling with all the muscles that’ll cooperate.
“Mrs. Rossi good?”
Wes doesn’t know. She’s taken another unplanned day off. Technically, he’s in charge, but he has the slightest faith Ella and Cooper won’t burn the store down in the next ten minutes.
“Yeah, she’s fine.”
Calvin hums; the camera shifts until Wes gets an up-close-and-weird view of him. He’s always been strange about FaceTime. He doesn’t understand the concept of keeping the phone still or what to do when the picture freezes and always holds the lens too close, as if it’ll make the moment more personal rather than awkward.
“How’s the restaurant?” Wes asks, killing time until he can corral courage.
“Good, good. But I can’t wait to get back home. They’ll be fine without me here.”
Wes loves the confidence in Calvin’s voice. It’s taken him years to get to the point where he trusts anyone else to manage one of his projects.
“Did you get my texts?”
This is the point Wes’s been avoiding. For weeks, he’s kept Calvin on hold. Or he’s skirted the subject of school. But after talking to Leo, he knows this is what he needs to do. Thankfully, Leo’s got his back. He even offered to call their parents for Wes.
But Wes needs to own this.
“About that.” Wes scratches his cheek.
Calvin hums again. The camera pans back as he lifts a cup to his mouth, slurping.
“Is that tea?”
“Yup,” says Calvin, holding the cup higher, almost dropping his phone. The joy in his voice collapses the light-years of distance between them, as if Calvin’s right here in Santa Monica with Wes, both of them stretched lazily across the green sofa with twin cups. “Thai ginger. Do you remember drinking this?”
Wes nods, eyes wet. A sleeping, curled memory stretches in his chest. Its blissful light overtakes Wes’s cells. Calvin’s drinking herbal tea. He’s thinking of Wes.
I can do this.
“So, uh.” Wes clears his throat. “Can we talk about college?”
* * *
On Thursday morning, before the ivory imprint of the moon disappears, Wes jogs down the stairwell to Colorado Avenue. From the sidewalk, he can view the unlit blue-white arch welcoming tourists to Santa Monica Yacht Harbor. The air’s slightly damp and cool. Eugene’s already inside Brews and Views, setting up the espresso machines for the seven a.m. crowd. A soundtrack of birds and rolling waves from the beach whispers into the streets.
It’s like every other morning Wes has been here, in front of Once Upon a Page, before the bookstore opens.
But today it’s different. There’s a weight on his shoulders he’s ready to remove. There’s a hollowness in his chest that needs to be filled.
When Wes opens the door, he inhales the scent of new books and old carpet. In a few hours, the bookstore will smell like sand and ocean. In a month, the bookstore will probably reek of new paint and retail commercialism. Anna forgot to turn off the neon BOOKS sign in the window last night. The pink letters aren’t the only lights glowing in Wes’s vision.
In the back corner, the office shines like a beacon.
Wes’s fingers drag along the shelves as he navigates the aisles. What happens to the books when a bookstore closes? Are they donated to charity? Given to schools? Put in a storage locker, where their stories grow old and lifeless in the dark?
The void in Wes’s chest expands, but he carries on.
Mrs. Rossi is hunched at her desk. Her hair’s more gray than pink now. Sitting on a messy stack of papers is a used copy of The Heart of the Lone Wolf. Mrs. Rossi’s mumbling to herself; her left hand trembles as she attempts to hold a pen. “Heaven help me!”
Wes frowns, then clears his throat. “Hey?”
“Good morning,” Mrs. Rossi croaks, lifting her head. She’s pale; her face is clean of any makeup. It amplifies the sadness in her brown eyes, the wrinkles at her mouth. Her right hand crosses over to grip the left. After a moment, the shakes subside. “It’s fine.”
Wes nods. They both know she’s lying.
The office chair squeaks loudly as she reclines. “You’re here early.”
“I wanted to—” His voice breaks. “I wanted to talk to you.”
“I was wondering when you were going to finally ask.”
“Ask?” Wes’s eyebrows shoot up.
“Mmhmm.” She brushes hair off her forehead, her hand shaking again. “I’ve known you for a lifetime, Wes. I knew it’d take you ages to come to me about what’s happening with this place. I’m sure it’s been eating you alive.”
“You knew I knew?”
Mrs. Rossi tuts. “Of course I did.” Her eyes close; her inhalations are long, and she exhales noisily. “You’re all a hot mess. You’ve been running around here, having events after hours and shuffling my store around, and doing everything under the sun to save it.”
“You knew?” Wes can’t control the volume in his voice.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t notice? I’m old, but I’m not naïve.” She snorts. “Hell, half the time, you forgot to rearrange the bookshelves to the right places.”
A tactical error. Wes shouldn’t have trusted Cooper and Zay with those tasks. But his eyes narrow, and he hisses, “Why didn’t you say anything? Why did you just let us—” He sucks in a loud breath. “You let us fight for this place while you just disappeared. What the hell?”
“I let you try to save this bookstore for many reasons,” Mrs. Rossi says firmly.
Wes allows the silence to surround them. Then, voice shaky, he says, “Why?”
She shuts her eyes again. “I should’ve told you. I should’ve told all of you, but,” she pauses, her throat bobbing. Wes waits. Nose wrinkled, she says, “Part of me wanted to believe that you could do it. Bring back the customers. Keep this place afloat just a little longer.”
Her hands grip the chair’s armrests. White knuckles. Blue veins. Age and wear and unsteadiness.
“That’s not fair of me. To expect so much of everyone else.” She blinks her eyes open. They’re shiny brown moons. “To expect so much of you.”
Wes leans against the doorframe. He tries to control his expression. He failed the bookstore. He failed her. But Mrs. Rossi failed him too. And that’s the hardest part to digest. Ella’s right—she’s the closest thing to a second mom for all of them.
“I also didn’t say anything because I know you. This is your home,” she squeaks. The tremble in her voice is almost too much for him. “It’s my home too. Decades, Wes. I’ve given this place decades, but I can’t keep it going. I can’t keep going.”
Wes crosses his arms. His expression hardens. “But someone else could’ve.”
Mrs. Rossi shakes her head.
It’s selfish. If she’s too tired to keep going, then retire. Give the reins to someone like Anna. Or one of the local bookstore managers that have been ousted by online retailers destroying the lifeline of independent bookstores.
Maybe… him. Wes doesn’t know all the ways Once Upon a Page operates, but he knows enough.
“You’re just giving up on something that means a lot to this community,” he snaps. “You can retire. But you can’t just let this place go.”
“I can,” she bites back. “It’s mine.”
“No, it’s the property of some bullshit, commercialized coffeehouse now.”
“You don’t understand.”
Those three words strike the flame over the kerosene in his chest. “How am I supposed to? I’m eighteen. Everyone expects me to just wake up and have my shit together. I’m supposed to have a plan.” His chest heaves, his brain on fire. “But everything I come up with isn’t good enough. I’m adult enough for expectations, but not adult enough to know what I want.”
“Wes, sweetheart, it’s not—”
“You gave me my first and only job at sixteen.” Wes hates how pathetic his voice sounds. It’s whiny. It’s filled with ache. “You were the one person that believed in me. But even you didn’t believe I was adult enough to handle any of this.”
There’s a thick pause. A few pieces of gray-pink hair fall over Mrs. Rossi’s forehead. She inhales, but it looks as though it takes so much effort. Then she says, “Wes, I’m sick,” in a voice that he swears comes from somewhere else.
“What?”
“I’m sick,” she repeats. Before he can ask, she tells him, “Brain tumor,” and follows with “I found out earlier this year,” and finally “They think I have a fighting chance, but the statistics say otherwise. I’ve tried avoiding added stress. Taking more time to relax. I gave it my all but, if I hold on to this place, I’ll be living the time I have left worried I did the wrong thing by not letting it go.”
Wes isn’t sure he’s breathing or standing.
She’s sick. Doctors say Mrs. Rossi’s dying. Wes blinks repeatedly. Tiny black holes form throughout his body, devouring every nerve. He’s numb.
“There’s too much debt, sweetheart,” she says weakly. “Do you honestly think I could afford to keep all of you on staff with no customers? I did it because I know how much all of you, even Ella, love this place. But I can’t put that burden on someone else.”
Words try to climb into his mouth, but they keep slipping on the bile coating his throat.
“I want what time I have left spent not stressing over what could be,” she says, eyes wet. “I want to spend it with my husband. I want all of us to move on. And I’m sorry I didn’t convey that in the right way.”
Wes finally inhales.
“They promised me they’d keep a corner of the coffeehouse dedicated to books.” She taps the spine of Savannah Kirk’s novel. “I spent decades trying to make sure people found the stories they needed to go on. To live. To heal and to love. To fight. The least I could do is make sure there’s still a piece of me in this damn space.”
Tears latch onto Wes’s eyelashes.
“It’s just a place,” she says, waving a trembling hand around her head. “It’s just a bookstore. A thing.”
“It’s not,” he tries to argue.
“It is. Just a possession.” Her grin is an unshakable force. “It’s filled with amazing memories, but we don’t get to take our possessions with us everywhere. We leave those behind. But the memories—damn it, Wes, we get to take the memories with us to wherever our next road may lead.”
There’s a coffee mug at the edge of her desk. She reaches for it, but her hand shudders too much to grab. Wes steps into the office. He passes it to her, hands cupped around hers.
“I tried so hard,” he says, choked. “I wanted to fix this for you.”
Now he’s the selfish one. Poor Wes Hudson, incapable of adulting.
“I tried,” he repeats. “I’m not an adult. I can’t make an impact.”
Mrs. Rossi takes a long, slow sip of coffee. Then she says, “Excuse me, but are you smoking? Are you high?”
Wes lurches back, stunned. Then he cracks up.
“An impact? Have you not seen the change in Lucas?” she asks.
He’s noticed the small things—Lucas’s giant smile every time they walk through the door. The way they’re more talkative. Their change in clothes. But that’s not because of him, right?
“Lucas’s always loved it here. But since they’ve started hanging out with you, they’re more themselves than I’ve ever seen.” Mrs. Rossi proudly lifts her chin. “Their mom called the other day to thank me. I assured her it was all you. Lucas might not ever have it easy, but every teen should have the right to be their true selves. We should give that to them. Always.”
Wes bites the inside of his cheek, waiting for her to finish.
“I always knew you were great. After all, no average kid hangs around a bookstore.”
Wes chuckles. “It was the comics.”
“Whatever.” Mrs. Rossi tuts again. “Stop trying to make an impact, Wes. Be the impact. For teens like Lucas. But also, for yourself.”
Their silence is filled with inevitable sniffling. “We’re holding onto old, broken things, sweetheart.” Her warm hands grab his. Her eyes are soft, but Wes can still see the doubt edging her pupils. “I don’t know what’ll happen in six months. Or tomorrow. But I can’t change the past. Neither can you. And we can’t stay here hoping the world will make things happen for us. It’s time to let go. Move on.”
Wes nods slowly.
That’s the thing. Some people are chained to their pasts. Some only have tunnel vision for the present. And some are so terrified by their future that they won’t just let it happen. It’s all real. It’s all suffocating.
Mrs. Rossi is right. At some point, everyone has to move forward.
So, Wes does. He presses his store key to her desk. Then he eases his arms around her for a hug. It lasts too long. But that’s okay. Sometimes, it’s appropriate to hold on longer than necessary.
Neither one of them mentions how wet Mrs. Rossi’s shoulder is when he pulls away. They don’t comment on their damp cheeks, or the way they keep sniffling.
They just… move on.