Between the Pages

The bookshop smelled of ink, old paper, and the faintest hint of vanilla from the café in the corner. It was the kind of place that felt like stepping out of time — soft jazz humming through the speakers, dim lighting casting warm pools of gold over rows of well-loved books, and a steady hush of pages turning and espresso machines hissing.

Nancy had been coming here for years. It was a ritual, a safe haven from the noise of the city. Every Saturday, she claimed the same table by the window, tucked away in the corner where she could read without interruption. The barista knew her order — an oat milk cappuccino with cinnamon, no sugar. She never spoke more than necessary, never lingered by the register. People were complications, and Nancy liked her life simple.

Then, one Saturday, someone took her table.

At first, she thought it was a mistake. Maybe the person had just sat down for a moment, maybe they would leave. But no. There he was, long legs stretched out under the table, absorbed in a battered paperback.

Nancy hesitated, standing in the middle of the café, clutching her book to her chest. She wasn’t confrontational, but that was her table. It had been her table for years.

The man looked up.

“Oh,” he said, blinking like he’d just woken up. “Did I — am I in your spot?”

Nancy shifted on her feet. He had a deep, bookish voice, the kind that belonged to someone who read out loud when they thought no one was listening.

“I—” she hesitated. The words yes, please move were right there, but something about him made her pause. He wasn’t imposing exactly, but he was large — broad shoulders, unruly dark hair, a sweater that looked impossibly soft. But his eyes were kind, sharp in that way people got when they truly listened.

“I always sit there,” she admitted finally.

He glanced at the empty tables nearby.

“Would you like to sit with me?”

Nancy instinct was to say no. She never sat with strangers. But there was something different about him, something disarming. Maybe it was the book in his hands — Frankenstein, the same edition she had on her own shelf at home.

She sat.

“Nancy,” she said after a long silence.

The man smiled, and it was the kind of smile that made her stomach twist in an unfamiliar way.

“Dave.”

Over the weeks, they built a rhythm.

Every Saturday, Nancy arrived at the bookshop, and Dave was already at the table. He had a coffee waiting for her — correct down to the cinnamon sprinkle. She never asked how he knew. Maybe he had asked the barista. Maybe he just noticed.

They didn’t talk much, not at first. They read in silence, only occasionally breaking it to share a line from their books. But as the weeks turned into months, the silences became softer.

Dave spoke in tangents, in unfinished thoughts that made Nancy want to pull the thread and follow him into whatever strange corners of the world his mind wandered. He read classic horror novels but wrote poetry in the margins. He had a habit of drumming his fingers against the table when he was thinking, always in an absent rhythm like the heartbeat of a song only he could hear.

Nancy listened. She found herself wanting to know more.

One day, she found a note tucked inside her book — just a single line scrawled in Dave's messy handwriting-

What’s the last book that made you cry?

She smiled.

She wrote back- The Ocean at the End of the Lane.

The next week, Dave had a copy of it.

It was the kind of thing that sneaks up on you, the way the cold does when you step outside without realizing the season has changed.

One afternoon, the café was too crowded, so they wandered through the bookshop instead. Dave stopped in the poetry section, running his fingers along the spines like he was looking for something familiar.

“Here,” he said suddenly, pulling out a slim collection and handing it to her.

Nancy took it, frowning at the title.

Pablo Neruda. Love Sonnets.

She raised an eyebrow. “Are you trying to tell me something?”

Dave grinned, but there was a flicker of something else in his expression. He had a dimple in his left cheek. Nancy had never noticed it before.

“Just read the one on page fifty-eight,” he said.

She flipped it open, found the poem, and read-

"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.

I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;

so I love you because I know no other way—"

She swallowed.

Dave was watching her, his hands in his pockets, the faintest hint of pink at the tips of his ears.

“I—” Nancy started, but she didn’t know what to say.

Dave just nodded, like he understood anyway.

They left the bookshop in silence, but something between them had changed.

Winter came, and with it, a new rhythm. Nancy found herself texting him in the middle of the night, sending him passages from books she couldn’t stop thinking about. Dave sent back voice notes, his sleepy voice reciting poetry.

It was easy. Too easy.

And that terrified her.

One Saturday, she didn’t go to the bookshop.

She told herself she was just tired. That she needed a day to herself, to clear her head. But when the next Saturday arrived, she hesitated at her front door, fingers curled around the handle, and didn’t leave.

A week stretched into two.

She ignored Dave’s messages at first — not because she wanted to, but because she didn’t know what to say. She could picture him at their table, waiting, his coffee growing cold. She told herself it didn’t matter. That things like this — things that felt this easy — never lasted.

Then, one evening, she found a book on her doorstep.

A worn paperback, familiar in her hands. The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Her own words, written weeks ago in the margins of a note.

What’s the last book that made you cry?

Her throat tightened. She flipped it open and found another note tucked inside, scribbled in Dave’s messy handwriting.

“I don’t know if you need space. Or if you’re just afraid. But I’m still here.”

Nancy pressed the book to her chest. She sat on the floor of her apartment for a long time, staring at it, heart pounding.

And the next Saturday, she went back.

Dave was there, as if nothing had changed, a cappuccino waiting for her. But there was a moment — just a flicker — when he looked up and saw her, and something in his face shifted. Relief. A softness that made her stomach turn over.

She sat down. Took a breath.

“I—” she hesitated.

Dave didn’t push. He never did.

“I got your note,” she said finally.

A slow smile. That same quiet patience. “Yeah?”

She nodded, fingers tightening around the book in her lap. “Yeah.”

They didn’t talk about it after that. They didn’t need to.

But later, when Dave handed her a poetry book without a word, Nancy flipped straight to the margins, half-expecting to find another note.

She wasn’t disappointed.

The bookshop remained theirs, a world within a world, the kind of place where time folded in on itself and nothing else mattered.

Dave started leaving her notes in books he thought she’d like. Nancy started stealing his pen and doodling in the margins of his poetry.

They built something between the pages, between cups of coffee and silent afternoons where words weren’t necessary.

It was the easiest thing Nancy had ever done.

And, for once, she wasn’t afraid.