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“She’s here again!” Hannah giggled.
Darcy’s head shot up, her glasses nowhere to be found. “What?”
“You know who!”
Darcy probably resembled a tomato, but she tried to act as cool as she could in the situation and play dumb. It worked as well as expected.
Still, she glared one last time at her coworker, fixed her glasses (and her clothes, and her hair) and proceeded to wear her best smile.
No sweat.
Darcy Lewis had been working at Germans and His Ducklings, a small bookstore that she had no idea how could afford to stay open in Manhattan during the era of Amazon and corporate businesses, since she’d come to New York.
Life was expensive and SHIELD had offered very limited funding to Janey, so while their immediate needs were met, spare change for anything wasn’t something Sitwell was willing to consider.
At least for her. Jane had a stipend and all, even if it all went into her research of Pop Tarts. The joys of unpaid internships.
The job at the bookstore was also a nice way to spend her time whenever the Scientists became all too much. Part-time didn’t pay as much as she’d like, but while it wouldn’t give her a nice nest egg, it would still give her some spare change (and maybe stop her student loans from bleeding all over her credit, which was a thing).
She liked it. There weren’t many clients, and more often than not she dealt with books that weren’t mainstream enough to give the store a steady income, but they made do.
Also, she’d never read so much in her life.
The store provided some kind of reader service, where the clerks offered some insight over any book in the store. Apparently, the store had prided itself of being the only one with such a thing, which Darcy doubted. And, of course, Wikipedia pages and Amazon reviews weren’t enough for the store owner, who insisted she and her coworker read every book, just in case a client needed one detailed opinion, something that had to have never happened ever in the history of any time.
For this very reason, she and Hannah had put the books in different languages in the farthest shelf, just in case old man Germans remembered about any of the Arabic tomes he still kept. Yeah, no.
“Just in case,” had giggled Hannah. According to her, nobody ever went that way.
And it wasn’t like they were selling any of those anytime soon.
The redhead had started coming to the store almost three weeks ago.
It had been an accident, surely, because when she’d stepped in she’d looked quite confused, as if her GPS had betrayed her and she was expecting something entirely different. Like a drug bust. Or a war.
Well, Darcy was no expert and she’d admit quite freely that the woman’s attire had not been her main focus at all, since her eyes had found something much better to look at (her eyes, her face, her hands…), but she wasn’t born an idiot, and she had noticed the overly alert stare and the gun under the overly large sweater.
What the fuck.
However, the woman had recovered and started to browse the shelves like a true pro, so much so that Darcy had completely forgotten about her for about fifteen minutes, when the woman had come at the counter with a book. And another two.
“Could I have them gift-wrapped, please?” the woman had smiled, then, showing off a line of perfectly white teeth and dimples.
“Uh. Oh, yeah. I mean, sure. Of course- Just-” The woman’s smile widened as Darcy took the books from her without even looking at the titles. Or their price.
Yep, Darcy was screwed from moment one.
The second time she’d come, the next day, she had come without the gun and with a more relaxed attitude. Unfortunately for Darcy, she’d made a beeline for the Foreign Languages section.
She’d come back with the integral copy of War and Peace, in Russian.
“I’m begging you,” Darcy whispered behind the counter, before the woman opened her mouth. “Don’t ask me questions about this because I haven’t read it all and I can’t read Russian. I hope you know it’s in Russian and not in English, but I’m also hoping you didn’t notice and you don’t want to talk about it at all.”
The woman had blinked, then chuckled and giggled and for about five seconds Darcy had felt the most important woman of the universe. “No, I don’t have any question, and yes, I know. I’m Russian, I know how to read it.”
“Oh, thank God!” Darcy had sighed, and then had blushed in front of the client get it together, girl! “I mean, great, that’ll be 12$, do you need it gift-wrapped, too?”
From then on, the woman had spent probably half of her salary in books by coming to the store every three days.
Sometimes it was history books, more often than not it was literature. Once or twice Darcy had caught her pawing at the paperback romances, only to move to another section when she noticed she was being watched.
Indeed, the one or two times Darcy had been caught staring, the woman would smile and then come to the counter with outrageous questions Darcy couldn’t possibly answer and watched her flounder, grinning all the while.
Unfortunately for her, Hannah had picked up on it. “Ooooh, you like her!”
“It’s not like that! She’s a very good client!”
“Of course, Darcy, of course. You know Kindle is a thing, right?”
Damn it.
“So, what will it be today?” This woman’s smile was really contagious.
She had already handed her the book, but was waiting expectantly and watching her every move.
Keep it professional, Darce! she shouted mentally, but the attention she was getting was really distracting.
“Only this one,” the woman said.
“Got it,” Darcy smiled. “Seriously though, you bought so many books I’m almost feeling sorry. Like, it’d be probably easier on your wallet if you just went digital.”
The woman shrugged. “I like paper. And I just moved in town, so I need to fill up my shelves. I grow bored very easily.”
“I… see.” Darcy blinked. “Anyway, that’s your book. Come again.”
The woman took the book, but her eyes lingered a bit more on Darcy before she made to leave.
Oh. Ooooh. “So, hey.” The woman stopped in her tracks and turned. This was either going to be great or a disaster. “It has come to my attention that I never introduced myself.” “Has it, now?” the woman had raised one perfect eyebrow at her, a hint of a smile peeking on her lips. “Uh-uh. So, like, I’m Darcy.” “Natasha.”
Unfortunately, as much as the bookstore tried to keep up, it failed and old man Germans had to close shop on a dreary November day.
“I’m sad to see it go, really,” said Darcy, twisting the teaspoon in the cup.
“Frankly, I’m not,” answered her girlfriend, stealing her spoon and licking the foam. “My wallet will never recover. The sacrifices I made for you.”
“Natasha, nobody forced you to buy thirty-five books in a month, that was all you.”
“Mh.” Natasha passed the spoon back and handed Darcy her toast. “Next time, do find a job at a library. Or something cheap. A coffee shop will do, as well.”