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When Tommy got out of the Army, he could have moved anywhere in the United States and probably qualified for a wide assortment of jobs. Aircraft mechanic, car mechanic, supply manager, truck driver, and heavy equipment operator for various construction equipment. Tommy never got around to being certified on cranes though, shame.
He ended up moving to a small beach town about two hours north of Los Angeles, when his uncle offered to let him take over his old bookstore - and it was probably one of the few jobs the Army didn’t train him for.
Tommy didn’t know a thing about owning, running, and managing a bookstore. Had never even worked in one. Sure, he was a reader and read a lot of books, but the books he read were… not that popular with the general population.
He doubted there were that many enjoyers of Napoleonic War dramas and biopics. At least in the states. Most of the online forums and reddit pages consisted of people in the UK.
Although his uncle had told him that delivery services like Amazon and the like hadn’t moved into the town yet so the store was still the main supplier of books for the town, and if he listened to the book clubs that used the table in the back as their meeting location, they would give him the lists of up and coming books from all genres that he needed to keep in stock.
And looking at the finances for his first official month as owner, he guessed his uncle had a point.
That didn’t mean the whole thing was easy however, far from it.
“I don’t think your parents will be that pleased if I sell this book to you,” Tommy told the nine year old girl as she placed the book on the sale counter. The book itself was a raunchy romance novel with a deceiving cover filled with cats and puppies. Tommy never expected to become a romance reader after moving here, but the book club that met Monday evenings pulled him into being one.
“They said that I can read whatever books I want,” the girl countered.
“And I think when they said that they implied any children’s book you want.”
“It’s called Puppy Love and has a bunch of puppies on it. How’s that not a children’s book?” the girl asked.
“It’s not a children’s book because you got it from the adult section, that’s located all the way upstairs,” Tommy pointed to the stairwell that led to the upstairs bookcases. The bookcases Tommy specifically remembered restocking that book with that very morning.
The girl huffed, a frown on her face and spun on her heel to go back to a shelf in the young adult section. Tommy picked up the book she had left and placed it on a shelf under the counter, filled with other books that he would need to restock once the customers left.
Then, ten seconds later, another person came up to the counter, setting down five books to purchase. So much for a short break.
Halfway through the afternoon, there was a short spall when there were only five customers in the store. When Carlos, the highschooler he had hired to help around on his free afternoons came by, Tommy took the opportunity to leave the register to him and get started on the various tasks he needed to complete around the shop.
“So you’re the new guy that Mr. Paul was talking about?” a voice sounded from behind him as he was restocking the shelves in the cookbook section.
Tommy turned around and looked up.
There stood a tall guy, maybe a half inch shorter than him, shirt curly hair gelled back, blue green eyes, and big muscles.
“I take it you’re talking about my uncle?” Tommy asked.
“Yeah,” The guy nodded, and Tommy spotted a small birthmark right above one of his eyebrows. It was cute. “He was telling me that he was about to retire and give the place to his nephew, I just didn’t…”
“Expect his nephew to look like me?” Tommy asked. The man was silent for a second, opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. Tommy laughed. “Don’t worry,” he said. “You’re not the first person to say it.”
Half of the old ladies who came in the first week he was running the place said the same thing. What was a man with his looks and muscles doing running a bookstore out in this town? He should be down south in LA, hitting up all the bars and clubs down there.
“Y- yeah… oh… yeah, what you said,” the man continued, stammering over his own words, looking way out of his element.
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Buck looked at the small unassuming bookstore from where he stood in the cafe across the street. When he had been driving through the sleepy seaside town five years ago he had run low on cash, he had walked into the cafe and asked about the help wanted sign taped on the front window. Five years later and he was still there, and had made friends and a pseudo family with people throughout the town.
One of the people he had come to regard as a friend was the owner and runner of the bookstore across the street, who had told him a couple of months ago that he was retiring and going to move to be closer to his sister in Oregon, and leaving the store to his nephew, who no one in the town had met before.
Buck didn’t know how he should feel about it. Leaving one of the most popular shops in town to some stranger.
“Have you met the guy who took over the bookstore, yet?” Buck asked as they were setting up one morning, pulling the outdoor tables outside.
“Guy that took over the bookstore?” Eddie asked as he carried a set of chairs outside.
“Yeah,” Buck nodded. “The old owner retired and moved out, gave the place to his nephew.”
Eddie shrugged. “I only go there when Christopher needs to get a book for school,” he said. “Haven’t been there since like… last October or something like that.”
Buck hummed to himself as he looked across the street at the store. It didn’t look any different, the same as it had since he moved to this town. He would have to go over there once he got off shift and meet the new man for himself.
He and Eddie ended their shift around 2:30, and while Eddie drove down the street to the elementary school to pick his son up, Buck made his way to the bookstore across the street.
Buck opened the door and heard the same bell chime that had sounded the numerous times he had come here over the previous years. The inside of the store looked the same as well. Same signs above the bookshelves, same sales counter, the only things that were really different were the books that were on the featured and new releases shelves. But those shelves always showed something different every time Buck came in.
Buck spotted a disinterested guy who was clearly a teenager standing behind the counter, he vaguely recognized him from around town and guessed that he wasn’t the guy who had taken the store over. Then his gaze traveled upwards to the second story, seeing a man, probably a couple years older than him, unloading books from a box and setting them onto one of the bookshelves.
Buck walked up the stairs and then studied the man for a second before going over to talk to him. He was kneeling on his knees, but Buck guessed he would probably be around his height if he stood up. He was also pretty muscular, a lot more than Buck would assume any bookstore owner would have any need to be.
But then again, maybe he did? Books got heavy after a while, didn’t they?
Buck cleared his throat as he walked up to the bookshelf and Buck saw the man’s shoulders perk up. “So… you must be the guy Mr. Paul was talking about?” Buck asked.
The man turned his head and shoulders to look up at Buck, raising an eyebrow he asked, “I take it you’re talking about my uncle?”
“Y- yeah,” Buck stammered, suddenly growing nervous as he felt the man study him. “H- he was telling me that he was about to retire and give the place to his nephew, I just- I didn’t…
“Expect his nephew to look like me?” the man said as he let out a soft laugh and stood up from where he was stocking the books. Buck got a better look at him now. And if possible, Buck thought he looked better than he had before. Buck stumbled over his words, and the man laughed again. “Don’t worry,” he said. “You’re not the first person to say that.”
Oh, that made Buck feel slightly better, he thought.
“Y- yeah… oh… yeah, what you said,” Buck said as he still stumbled over his words.
The man then held out his hand to him. “Tommy Kinard,” he said as he introduced himself.
Buck took it as he shook the man’s, Tommy’s, hand. “Evan Buckley,” he said.
Tommy smiled then, and Buck thought it was a nice smile. Buck thought that he would like to see it more often. “Nice to meet you, Evan.”
Buck couldn’t even find it in himself to tell the man he didn’t go by Evan.
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“So, Evan,” Tommy started as he walked up to the front counter of the cafe the following morning. Buck perked his head up from where he was cooking up an omelet behind the counter. “What would you recommend here?”
Buck smiled as he turned his head to face Tommy. “Well, Bobby’s not here today, so I’m head chef.”
Tommy’s face took on that soft smile it had yesterday. “So what would you recommend then?” he asked.
Buck hummed in thought. “I thought up this apple waffle recipe yesterday, would you like to be my guinea pig?”
“Why not?” Tommy said as he took a seat. “Let me see ‘em.”
“He calls you Evan?” Eddie asked later as Tommy walked back across the street to the bookstore.
Buck rolled his eyes. “So what?” he asked, only slightly blushing.