Page 67 of A Novel Love Story

“I would. It’d be payback for all thetheir/they’re/theres they’ll mix up in their essays that I’ll have to suffer through.”

She gave it a thought. “Fair.”

After the sleepy bookstore employee finally drove up and opened the store, we got our preorders—and another few books, because neither of us could step into a bookstore without buying more—and left to go spend the day lost in Eloraton. But on the way home, I asked Pru, while driving, “Do you really mean it? I wouldn’t make a good professor?”

She said, “I was just joking.”

I gave her a look, because I knew better.

She caved. “I mean … I think youliketeaching. I think you’regoodat it. I don’t think it’s something like you’ll wake up in ten years and realize you made the biggest mistake of your life getting tenure, but I guess … I dunno. I feel like if your classics professor in undergrad hadn’t pushed you to go to grad school, you’d be doing something way different.”

“She said I’d do good in grad school,” I pointed out, “and I did.”

“Yeah but …” Then she shrugged. “What do I know? I’ve had five different jobs in two years.”

Which was true, and I did love teaching, so I pushed it to the back of my mind. Besides, Liam was between projects again, and my paycheck was steady. That night, we ordered in Chinese and got lost in Eloraton with Gemma and a nerdy astrophysicist who came to town to study the comet that was passing through,and the book was quiet, with low stakes, and lovely. There were so many readers who hated this third book, because it was such a bold departure from the first two in the series. It was softer, like a waltz through Eloraton. In the first book, Junie had come to town in a whirlwind, and in the second book, Ruby rattled everyone with her songs.

Gemma was different. She had nothing to escape from, and no one to prove herself to. She justexisted, with her daughter, Lily, and floated through the pages like time well spent on a lazy river.

When I first readHoney and the Heartbreak, I also didn’t really like it. It was too slow, too quiet, too soft. I couldn’t relate to Gemma at all, hung up over a heartbreak but not the man himself.

But then three years later, during the worst year of my life, I reread the series. I was fresh off my own heartbreak, drowning myself in happily ever afters so I wouldn’t have to think about the failure of my own. I rarely left my apartment, except for teaching or getting takeout when Uber Eats didn’t sound appealing. By this time, Rachel Flowers had died, too, and because everyone secretly loved a tragedy, her books shot onto bestseller lists and stayed there.

Rachel was divisive with her romances. She kept her readers on their toes, always a little more unconventional than most. Readers still didn’t likeHoney and the Heartbreak, but I finally understood it, and like the honey Gemma Shah’s bees made, the story coated my soul and kept me warm. Not all love happens at first glance—sometimes, it takes a reread at the exact right (or wrong) time in your life. And sometimes, it takes a little help from your friends.

“What are you doing the second week of June?” Pru asked one evening in April, when I was right there with Gemma, falling head over heels for sweet and timid Thomas.

“I’ll probably offer to teach summer classes.”

“Well, don’t.”

I looked up from my book. “Why?”

We were curled on the couch,The Bachelorettemurmuring in the background, a woman giving roses to charming men who hoped they could be her one. “Because we’re taking a road trip up to the Hudson Valley.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re going to meet our book club.”

“We can just Skype in,” I replied dismissively. “It’s a long drive.”

“Elsy …”

I leveled a look at her. “Prudence …”

“Come on,” she begged.

I whined, “I don’t want togoanywhere.”

“Not even to see our friends?”

No, I wanted to say, because I didn’t want to leave the apartment at all. I hadn’t, really, not since … well, not since Liam ended things. I hadn’t even wanted to go grocery shopping, because what if I ran into him? Or his work friends? I didn’t think I had the energy to act like everything was all right. Not yet, anyway.

Prudence began to hum that god-awful song.

“Please,” I pled. “Stop.”

But she just hummed it louder, and began to shimmy her shoulders to the song. “Come on, Eileen …” she said, taunting. And she knew it would work every time, because I always caved if it was something she wanted to do. I could put my wants and needs on the back burner and I’d grin and bear it and go off on adventures with her. It felt better, anyway, than thinking about my own life. If I could just live in her glow, bask in it forever, I thought that would be enough.

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