Page 6 of The Cupid Chronicles

She doesn’t know that I’m determined to break my cycleof picking the wrong guys. Of trying to talk someone into feeling a certain way about me. My new friends here don’t need to know that I’m trying to beless. . . me. Less open. Less all-in. Less dramatic. Just . . . less.

You’re a lot, Iris.

“Zero interest in who?” Liz Ridgeway pops in the lounge from the hallway but stops short and glares at the yogurt in Brooke’s hand. “It’syou.” Her tone accuses.

“What’s me?” Brooke’s face is all innocence.

“You’ve been stealing my yogurt!” Liz shakes her head. “I thought it was Joyce.”

Brooke slowly holds out the half-eaten cup to her, but Liz rolls her eyes. “Forget it. You owe me two Boston cream pies, one strawberry, and one of whatever that is.” She takes a K-cup and moves toward the Keurig, then looks at me. “Did your building finally come through and find your soulmate?” Her eyes brighten.

“Oh, goodgrief,” I groan. “Not you, too.” I expected this reaction from Brooke, but I thought Liz was more level-headed.

“Look, Iris.” Liz sets a cup under the spout of the machine and turns it on. It whirrs to life as she and Brooke exchange a glance. “If you were mysteriously brought together with someone, you should pay attention. That place is magic. Everyone says so.”

I’d heard rumblings of magic in the building, but those are just silly superstitions, right? Despite Liz and Brooke’s earnest expressions, I have to stick with logic. I’m trying to be more practical, which is why I need to save the magic for the movies. Would it beso coolif a mother and daughter really could switch places to gain a new perspective on each other’s lives and struggles? Of course. But my life is not a Lindsay Lohan movie.

I’m not sure if I’m happy or sad about that.

“I don’t believe in magic.” I toss my stir stick in the trash. “It’s not real! And if it were, it would be the kind of thing that happens to other people.” I take a sip of my coffee, hearing the patheticnothing cool ever happens to mein my own voice.

No. I do not need amagic manright now. Or any man. I promised myself I wouldn’t make the same mistakes I’ve made a hundred times before. That’s why I moved. That’s why I’m here.

Mostly.

It’s not like I left town because I ran through all the men there and needed a new hunting ground. But I did need the chance to figure out how to let logic—and not emotion—be the thing that drives my choices. “Emotion” would have me believing that I’ve magically stumbled upon a unicorn of a guy, the one person on the planet who might actually stick around. “Logic” knows better.

Logic knows that people leave. Or—maybe more to the point—people don’t stay. Those might seem like the same thing, but they absolutely are not.

Which is why I cannot buy into the “magic” or “romance” of a building—a building? Really?—because if itweretrue—which it obviously isn’t—I would hope it would try to match me with someone nicer.

I turn and add a little more creamer to my cup.

“Why do you even bother with the coffee?” Brooke stares at the near-white liquid in my mug. “You might as well just pour some sugar in a cup, stir in some cream, and drink it like a shot.”

“Ooh, good idea,” I say, faux-happy. “I’ll do that tomorrow.”

“Don’t disregard The Serendipity, Iris,” Liz says, stuck on this. “You can look it up. Whole articles have been written about it.” She points at me. “Magic.”

I lean against the counter as Brooke shoots the emptyyogurt cup at the garbage can, missing and hitting the wall. “And the thing about magic is . . .” She walks over and picks up the cup, steps a few feet back, shoots . . . and misses again. “You don’t have to believe in it for it to be real.”

I frown. “Oh, my gosh. You’reactuallyserious.”

Up until now, I thought this was awink, winkkind of suggestion, but I realize I was wrong.

Brooke picks up the cup one more time and, this time, does a little move and tosses it into the garbage can. She whips around and points double pointer fingers at me.

“First try,” she says in a funny voice.

I roll my eyes, but I smile and shake my head.

Liz holds up a hand. “I know you’re not from here?—”

“I’m not from Zimbabwe, I’m from like an hour away,” I interject.

“—but,” she continues, leaning on her tone, “there is plenty of evidence to back up the claim. My uncle met his wife because of that building.”

I give her a look. “Because of abuilding?”

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