My phone lights up from where I’ve left it on the coffee table, my older sister, Vick, calling me.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey! You’re alive! I’m so happy!” She screeches in my ear, and I have to put her on speaker to deal with her at that decibel level. “So…how was it? Was it amazing?”

  “It was…good.”

  “Good? Just good?” Vick asks, concern lacing her words.

  “Yeah, I’m just…feeling a little out of it right now. I was so nervous and scared that I’m crashing down from it, and I just want to be a zombie in front of the TV. It’s Sunday, and tomorrow’s my first day on my own running the bookstore. It was totally a bad idea to do this today, but I needed to.”

  “Okay, okay. I get that you want to be alone. And because we both know you choose the same movies over and over, watch some of Brooklyn Nine-Nine so you can laugh it out. Plus, I know you’re going to do great on your own at the store. I know so.”

  I nod dumbly and give no one but myself a tired smile. “Yeah, okay, that sounds like a good idea. I want to show Mrs. Bristol that I can do it on my own.”

  That’s the one-year plan left on my five-year plan, anyway. That I can afford to take over the lease and run the store for the rest of my life, living the dream.

  That’s all I want. And if it makes me boring, then whatever.

  I just skydived, so why aren’t I exhilarated?

  Where are all the happy chemicals for my brain? Where?

  “Evie?” Vick calls when I’m quiet for a little bit. “Should I come over?”

  I snort, but it sounds like a weak attempt at reassuring her, even to my own ears. “No, I’ll be okay. I’ll see you tomorrow, right? We’re going dress shopping.”

  “You hate dress shopping. But you don’t have to wear a dress. I want you to be comfortable,” Vick says, always giving me a way out when I shouldn’t need one.

  “No, no. I want to wear something unexpected for once,” I say, my voice hard. “I want to pull off something different.”

  “Then that’s what you’ll get. I’m coming to get you around ten tomorrow morning. I’ll bring coffee and donuts. Love you, you know?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  Vick snorts. “Gotta go, Michael’s here. Message me if you change your mind about me coming over, okay?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I say, give my last goodbye, and end the call.

  I sit in my empty apartment, waiting to feel better.

  I still feel like a boring person, bogged down in responsibilities. I’ve never taken a chance on anything in my life except for the one thing that mattered—the store.

  And I’m going it alone tomorrow.

  Somebody help me.

  TWO

  Middle of January…

  “Live a little, would ya?” Izzy says, smacking our iced coffees together in their plastic cups, nearly sloshing mine all over the place.

  “It’s freezing outside, and you want me to ingest a freezing cold drink? Yeah, that’s going to be a no from me.”

  Izzy rolls her eyes at me. I know that she only has a couple of hours before her shift at L’Arsenale starts tonight, one of the city’s coolest dinner-club and lounge bars (they have the entire bar made out of Lego pieces).

  She’s wearing her customary fishnets under her distressed jeans, a pair of boots that have seen better days on her feet that are more for comfort than for being stylish. Her dark hair’s piled on top of her head, blue eyes rimmed with brown eyeliner that’s been smoked out at an angle to give her face a more feline look.

  If I were to see her on the street I’d take a glance at her, make that customary first impression about her—that she would be an interesting person to get to know.

  I know that I pale in comparison—at least in looks.

  I don’t wear edgy clothes, my jeans don’t have rips in them (because I’m cold most of the time, and exposed skin seems like a bad idea).

  I’m okay at doing my eyeliner sharp enough to cause first blood, and I find myself touching my face more often than not now that I’m not wearing my glasses anymore.

  I blink at my cousin, my eyes dry and gritty, and honestly, contacts are the worst. I’m going to have to start carrying around saline for my eyeballs in my purse, stashing it in secret hideouts like Vick does.

  “How many shots of espresso are in here?” I ask, and Izzy winks at me while sipping from her straw.

  “Guess.”

  I lick my lips, giving her a death stare. I slurp up my drink, noting that there’s at least three espresso shots in it, and I’m probably not going to be able to sleep tonight if I keep going.

  Evie 1.0 probably wouldn’t keep drinking; Evie 1.0 needs her sleep, needs her rest now that she’s sailing this ship completely solo.

  Evie 2.0 wouldn’t give a shit.

  Evie 1.5 is caught somewhere in the middle.

  “Jesus, it’s just a coffee. Stop staring it at like that; you’re going to give it anxiety.”

  I snort, stand up to my full height (a full couple of inches taller than Izzy), and take another long drag on my drink, the caffeine already starting to ramp me up.

  Izzy smirks and shakes her head from side to side, about to say something embarrassing when a customer walks in, and I say hello in the standard French-English greeting, and then let them be.

  I’ve been on my own running the shop for six weeks now, bringing us to the end of January, and the store has taken up so much of my energy that I haven’t even tried to tackle my resolutions other than dyeing my hair this icy blond that’s more upkeep than it’s worth.

  Well, you’re still saving up, and putting those final touches on the business plan you’ve been writing for what feels like forever, so there’s that.

  The only resolution I really care about is to sit down with Mrs. Bristol and get all of this sorted out and the papers signed.

  We’re inside my favorite place in the whole entire world—Librairie de Ville, the bookstore that I run for a now pseudo-retired and traveling Mrs. Bristol who I’ve worked for forever. I’ve been working here since I was sixteen, and it’s my second home.

  It’s a place that embraces Evie 1.0, and all her boring book nerd tendencies.

  Reading all day long when I have the time? Check.

  Introducing customers to some of my favorite series and then having them come back asking for more? Triple check.

  Getting to work in a place I love every single day despite the stresses of running the business in the city? Priceless.

  Izzy knocks the store all the time, the way I kind of live here now, working on purchasing and procurement, all while adding books to my already insurmountable TBR list while chatting with customers about what they’re looking for.

  While the rest of the world has started buying ebooks on their tablets and phones, the independent librairie has struggled to survive among the bigger chain stores, and I’m taking it as a personal failure.

  I’ve pitched ideas to Mrs. Bristol about getting an online catalog going so that we can start catering to those people that want our books, the kind that are signed by local authors, or trying to figure out ways to sell our used books for some kind of profit.

  I haven’t figured it all out yet, not all by myself, and while I struggle to get the numbers to work, to show me a different result than the one I keep getting, I can’t just let it go, even if Mrs. Bristol doesn’t seem worried.

  “Listen here, duckie. I’ve gone through wars, two terrible marriages, and a single good one that had its own trials and tribulations. I’ve dealt with three sets of in-laws who were determined to tell me what to do when I made the conscious decision, back then, that I was not suited to parenting. Can you imagine the ruckus?” Mrs. Bristol laughed when we had our daily video call today, her internet winking on and off, the pixels morphing her face so she was unrecognizable, although her voice came through cheery and strong.

  Happy.

  “Yes, Mrs. Bristol. I can imagine.”

  “Well, this is nothing compared to that. Don’t worry so much about the store. You’re so young, what’s the point of worrying for the future that when it finally gets here you realized you haven’t enjoyed a single second of it?”

  “Are you quoting Ferris Bueller to me?” I said, and thankfully the call dropped, and I was spared having to give an answer.

  Now Izzy’s poking at my cheek because she’s a little shit and the youngest of the Prewitt clan, which means she can get away with murder.

  Case in point: she still works as a bartender and spends her money faster than she can make it. There’s also been a rift between her older sister, Max, and her that I can tell is already starting to fester with all the dirty looks Izzy gives me whenever Max’s name is even mentioned.

  “Come on, entertain me before I have to go to work,” she says, biting at her straw.

  “Me? Entertain you? I’m working, Izzy. I’m working.” Izzy blinks at me.

  “See these spreadsheets? My eyes are going to start bleeding any second now if I have to look at them any longer to make sure I didn’t make any kind of mistake. And this coffee is going to keep me up all night, and I’ve got a big order coming in tomorrow morning and have to get in early. God, what was I thinking?” I frown down at the offensive drink as if it were the one that forced me to swallow some of it down.

  Izzy leans over the front counter to get a look at our old computer monitor (that’s going to be replaced as there’s only so many times that I can decline the software updates and the whole system crashes right in front of my very eyes). She frowns at the numbers, the ones highlighted in red obviously catching her attention, then her gaze swings back to me, mouth spread in a wide smile.

  “Glad it’s you and not me.”

  “Thanks…just, thanks for that,” I sigh, exasperated, tired, trying to wrack my brain and come up with a solution that’ll keep the store from going under in the next couple of years.

  What am I going to do outside of this place? I’ve been here forever. Who am I without this place?

  “Why don’t you hire someone?”

  I glare at her. “I can’t do that just now. Besides, I’d have to pass it by Mrs. Bristol first. We’re not due the usual round of university students coming around to find jobs at least until July or August, and the two kids I have now just finished up their two weeks’ notice, and I’ve been doing everything by myself to compensate.” My heart beats hard and fast in my chest just thinking about all the work there is to do, how much more is left to do, and how little time I have to accomplish it all.

  “Woah, Evie, calm down. Have some more coffee,” Izzy says, shaking my drink at me and trying to get the straw into my mouth like I’m some sort of baby.

  “Caffeine isn’t going to solve the problem.”

  “Sure it will. It’ll keep you up so you can figure out the problem. See? I’m not a total idiot,” she says, pointing at her forehead with her long nails, nails long enough to destroy a person’s face or an eyeball.

  I shiver just thinking about it.

  “Nobody said you’re an idiot. Did you hear that come out of my mouth?” I snap.

  It’s an old conversation, one that we keep coming back to, over and over again, circling like sharks around a wounded seal, homing in on it while there are other things to be worried about.

  “I can go back to school,” Izzy says, notching her chin up. “I could if I wanted. I’ve been wanting to sign up for the spring semester. I could get a late start. In fact, I’ve already signed up but haven’t stepped foot in class for a couple of weeks.”

  I nod back. “You could if you wanted. You could go. I could help you find the right books if you needed.”

  Izzy leans back and straightens up. She shakes her coffee drink so the ice rattles against the sides of the cup, making a beat out of the clattering music. She gives me a short and tight smile before twisting the whisps of hair she deliberately left out of the messy bun perched on her head in an artful fall that frames her face.

  It would take me two hours to get that kind of look right, two whole hours.

  My own hair’s down today, stick-straight and boring (except for the color) long enough now that it keeps getting stuck in the zipper of my hoodie when I pull it on. I’m dressed for comfort for being here throughout the long day, from nine in the morning when we open to nine o’clock at night because there’s no one else.

  And that’s the problem.

  “I know what the problem is. I have to somehow clone myself as is, a complete and utter replication instead of growing a person from a fetus so I can get her to help me.”

  “You’re terrible at delegating,” Izzy says, sipping some more of her coffee, finishing it off with slurps and sucking on nothing but air. She eyes my own iced coffee, and I hand it to her without thinking twice. “Thanks.”

  I nod. “I could be terrible at delegating, but no one will do it like I can, and that’s the problem.”

  Izzy rolls her eyes toward the ceiling, making her body sway a little, looking like she’s going to lose her balance. That must’ve been some eye roll. God, she’s so annoying.

  “So put out an ad somewhere, asking for people in whatever positions you need them to be in. Once you clear it with the Princess of Dowager.”

  I shake my head, horrified. “That’s not a thing, Izzy. That’s not a valid title. And while Mrs. Bristol is a widow, that’s rude.” I jab a finger at the air between our bodies, then curl my hand into a fist, stuffing both of them into the pockets of my jeans.

  “Easy, easy there,” Izzy says, chewing at her straw, which we both know is terrible for her teeth, but we don’t say anything to each other because it’s not worth the energy or the effort to do so. “I said what I said. Call Mrs. Bristol up tomorrow, or wait for her to call you, I guess, since she’s the one traveling and you practically live here—”

  I snort and then sigh, because it’s true. I do practically live here. My apartment is a twenty-minute walk away, which I’m really grateful for.

  I also hate the walk in the winter because it feels like taking my life into my own hands when I have to negotiate the icy sidewalks and question if there’s black ice hanging around or not (most often there is black ice, and I’ve survived this long without falling and cracking my head open like an egg).

  “And get it figured out. I don’t know why it’s so hard for you, but you’re allowed to ask for help, to get that help for yourself. You know that, right?”

  I glance away, moving my hands to the keyboard of the computer, minimizing the spreadsheets with a keystroke and leaving nothing but the Hubble image of the Pillars of Creation as the desktop background.

  “Come on, Evie. Wasn’t this part of your 2.0 list?”

  I nod, then shake my head from left to right. “I was very vague on that list, and that’s the first step toward failure—I know this. You need to be specific and realistic and –”

  “Sorry, can I get these rung up?”

  My cheeks burn as I ring up the customer, apologizing for the delay, even as the guy gives me a side-eye look that promises retribution if I don’t move quickly enough.

  Which I do.

  “All right, all right,” Izzy says, tossing the two empty iced coffees into my trash can by a jump shot that almost misses. “Sweet. Well, I’ve got to get moving. Make sure you message me when you leave here, all right?”

  It’s my turn to roll my eyes, but I give her a nod anyway. It’s nice that she checks in, more often than my own sister. It’s nice to be on someone’s mind like that.

  Really nice.

  “Take care of yourself, okay? And try not to stress too much about all this,” Izzy says, waving her hand at the computer, as if it’ll erase away the cold, hard truth of the numbers. Numbers don’t lie—humans do.

  And if things keep going as they’re going—

  Stop thinking about it right now. You have an idea for Mrs. Bristol, and you can try and figure out how to save this place. You have time until she gets back. Even if it were better that you handle everything yourself, you just…can’t.

  It’s past supper time now, and people are already snuggled up at home, trying to keep warm from the harsh winter outside. I’m cozied up in the store, unable to leave yet, the smell of paper and books wafting up my nose, some of the shelves covered in flameless candles to give the place more ambiance.

  I found more customers tend to come in when the store looks more inviting.

  The Librairie isn’t the biggest book shop in the world, but it is one of the oldest independently run ones in the city, the first female-owned business of its kind (as Mrs. Bristol likes to tell me whenever she can). It’s seen a lot of history, seen the city change from the late fifties until now.

  And I can’t bear to let it go sinking under my poor guidance.

  I have to keep this place running, I just have to.

  It doesn’t help that I fell in love with reading here, that this place holds so many special memories for me.

  Yeah, no way am I going to let this place get ruined by me. No way.

  I take out my own personal laptop that’s been connected to the systems of the store so that I can work remotely (as if I ever leave my place, or come straight here, living that hermit life). I open up the gigantic spreadsheet that has my seemingly never-ending to-do list, prioritized by tasks that are the most time sensitive (even though it feels like they’re all time sensitive).

  Just looking at all of the tasks has my heart skipping in my chest, my throat tightening up at how very much there is to do, and that is yet to be done.

  And because I’m somewhat masochistic, I’ve come to learn, I start moving around the store an hour before closing with my clipboard and pen in hand, double checking inventory, noting what’s selling faster than others, and what I’m going to have to return to the publisher after its 180-day rotation.

  I let myself drift through the task, counting and taking notes, watching the door in case anyone decides to come in and ask any questions.