"Sophie," Joe starts, using his 'concerned parent' voice that usually precedes something I won't like. "We need to discuss your bookstore."
Unexpected at a wedding reception! My spine stiffens. "What about it?"
"Your entire building's been sold!"
"WHAT??" I shout.
"They're going to convert it to low income housing."
The tossed bridal bouquet hits me squarely in the face!
A missed thorn gets me. It scatters rose petals down my dress, confirming that this day is, indeed, trying to kill me!
Who am I? I'm just Sophia Quinn, proprietor of a bookstore in the stunning, northern California, town of Inverness. We're up Highway 1 from San Francisco. Just south of Bodega Bay, famous for that Alfred Hitchcock horror film, "The Birds." Population about 1,400, depending on how you count us.
I'm happy in my situation, well, a bit brokenhearted over first losing my boyfriend Cole to the stunning Victoria, and then to the Navy. I'd heard he'd become a S.E.A.L., but he had ghosted me. Never wrote me a single letter.
The grump!
I guess I'm our little town's favorite bachelorette, and I like it being single, despite the constant meddling of the formidable Mrs. Gilbert, who actually makes spreadsheets on romance! And amazing snickerdoodles with triple the vanilla.
At least my Uncle Joe protects me from her matchmaking. Joe thinks everyone is beneath me.
Good old amazing, tinkerer, genius, Joe. I'm thankful for Joe.
Anyhow, I thought I'd successfully dodged the traditional bouquet toss, hiding slightly behind a potted palm with my emergency chocolate stash, but my cousin Hazel, the determined bride herself, had other plans. She lobbed it at me with the precision of an Olympic javelin thrower while screaming "You're next, Sophie!"
I am not next! I am never, next. Never.
I am, have been, perfectly content running my bookstore in our sleepy Northern California town, where the redwoods touch the sky and everyone knows exactly how I take my coffee (triple shot oat milk latte with a sprinkle of cinnamon, because some things are worth being high-maintenance about).
"Did you see that catch?" Aunt Mabel emerges beside me, clutching her ever-present iPad loaded with profiles of 'eligible bachelors.'
"It's a sign from the universe!" she says.
"Pluto, maybe, or the underworld! The universe needs to mind its own business," I mutter, picking two petals out of my hair. "And so do you,
Aunt Mabel."
She waves her iPad at me. "But I found the perfect ..."
"No."
"He's a dentist."
"Still no."
"With a yacht."
"Absolutely not."
"And a San Francisco high rise penthouse."
'I ignore her. She teases. She's terrible.
Uncle Joe, my legal guardian since my parents passed fifteen years ago, is at my side. Between him and Aunt Mabel, I feel like a sandwich made of pure familial interference.
The remaining rose petals flutter from my nerveless fingers. "What? I ask joe again."
"Some hotshot developer bought the whole block. But before you panic, there's more."
Too late. I'm already mentally calculating how many boxes I'll need to pack up ten thousand books.
"He's willing to meet with all the current tenants about their leases. Tomorrow morning."
"Tomorrow? But that's Sunday!"
Uncle Joe shrugs. "Afternoon. He's only in town for a week. Something about community development projects."
A week. One week to convince some corporate shark not to turn my beloved bookstore into another soulless chain coffee shop. Or an unpainted plywood, low income, apartment. Perfect!
"Who is he?" I ask, already planning my strategy. I can pull a presentation together, gather community support letters, maybe stage a small protest.
"Cole Harrison."
The name hits me like a bucket of iced soda hits a football coach. Memories flash through my mind: stolen kisses behind the high school bleachers, promises whispered under starlight, the crushing disappointment when he left for the Navy without a backward glance at me, nor at Victoria, who he was also seeing at the time.
Now he's back. And he owns my building.
The universe isn't just meddling. It's pointing a finger and laughing.
