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A little secret is that, as much as she and her publicist like to commiserate about all the logistics, lodging nightmares, travel mishaps, and technical snafus at events, Samira’s favorite part about being a successful author is the book tour.
Staying up ‘til the sun rises with a hard copy of the latest chapter she’s written, gray skimming lines across the pages because her printer is on its last legs, annotating the margins with edits she wants to make in blue ink; the feeling she gets when her editor sends back her manuscript after the final round of copy edits; holding in her two hands the weight of her hard work and hours spent when she receives the box in the mail with her complimentary hardcover copies, seeing her name — her dad’s name, too — embossed on the matte dust jacket. All of these are things she treasures about the writing and publishing process.
But the tour, when she gets to see and talk to readers — when she gets to soak in their stories of where they’ve been in their lives when they’ve read her previous books, how her words have stuck with them through periods of change and upheaval and joy and sorrow — that’s her favorite part.
It’s one of her biggest sources of inspiration. Meeting people whose paths she will likely never cross with again, filing away the details about their lives they choose to share with her in the fleeting moments they have together as she’s signing their book, slotting these details into the portraits she paints in her head of humanity. Smiles and tears and embraces, the waver of pain in their voices when they mention dark times her books have helped them through, the way some will carry a well-thumbed copy of an older novel of hers in their hands like a talisman hoping she will sign it. (She will, she always will.)
Tonight’s a relatively quiet night, though; a small-scale reading and signing at an indie bookstore with a wine bar attached. The space is warm, cozy. Inviting with its dim tungsten-lamp lighting. When she entered the room and saw the cozy corner they’d set up for her, saw the chairs set up in a sort of seminar-style semicircle facing the spot where she’d sit for her reading, she thought it was the most intimate space where she’s done an event in all her years.
Even more than usual, when the time comes, she can really feel every set of eyes on her. Everyone is dialed into the cadence of her voice as she reads from the passage she’s chosen, all bodies angled to face her, her voice filling the room without the need for a microphone. It’s almost sexy, she thinks.
Samira feels a particular warmth coming from one side of the room. Doesn’t dare turn her head toward it, lest she lose her place in the paragraph, never mind that she’s certainly memorized the words at this point of the tour. Only when she finishes the passage does she allow her eye to wander in that direction.
The breath is nearly stolen from her chest. She knows instantly which person the heat of attention was coming from. She’s not sure how she knows, just that something feels right in her chest about it. She’s often right about people; a honed sense of intuition from years observing minute interactions, from studying people and how they move about the world, from wielding her words to describe these things, allows her this.
She can’t help it as words about him fly into her brain like letters stamped by the hammers of a typewriter.
An older man — forties, curly hair like he spends a tasteful amount of time and products on it, black long-sleeve polo that looks luxe enough to impress but not so expensive as to be showy — sits in one of the chairs, his head cocked slightly in appraisal, one arm crossed over his broad chest and the index finger of his other hand pressed over his pouting lip, like he’s been deep in thought. Creases by his mouth twitch with the ghost of a smile when they make eye contact.
He is, to put it simply, incredibly handsome.
Devastatingly so, in fact.
The intimacy of the room feels like it’s slowly closing in on her when this word — handsome — comes to mind. She feels like he can see the words as she’s thinking them. Doesn’t know how she knows this. Something in her chest. Intuition?
And then she’s being shepherded back over to the signing table. There’s a quiet bustle as the small crowd shuffles about, gathering their coats and scarves, branded tote bags and brand-new, unbroken-spine copies of her book.
She tries to savor her favorite part. She tries to put on her best smile and deliver her most sympathetic touch of hands, tries to personalize the notes in each signing based on what they converse about, tries to take in the details she usually does. But she finds that her mind keeps wandering to a one-sided smirk, a strip of white hair just above an ear, a curve of bicep in a slim black sleeve. She tries not to crane her neck to see if he’s in the line, tries not to let her gaze keep wandering towards the exit to see if he’s dipped out before they ever get a chance to exchange words.
“Thank you, Avery,” Samira says to the last person in line, a young college student who claims Samira is her role model, as she signs her name on the title page. “It makes me really happy to hear from emerging writers. And I mean it when I say that — you’re an emerging writer, not an aspiring one.” Avery beams shyly as she accepts Samira’s encouragement.
Samira takes a deep breath once Avery steps away, goes to reach for her overturned phone on the table when there’s a light rapping of knuckles on the desk.
“Hey, sorry — still open?”
It’s him, she knows, before she even lets her eyes travel up, up across his chest, up along his collar, up to his eyes. Hazel, she’d thought earlier, but now she sees a glint of green. A sort of mischievous tint.
“Depends,” she says, a smile promising to overtake her expression. “What’s your excuse?”
That seems to throw him off guard for a second. “Excuse?”
“For rocking up late to the line. What if I did have somewhere to be?” She teases.
“If you did,” he leans on one arm over the table, “you’d be trying to get there.”
Point taken. Her head bobs in acknowledgment.
“I wanted to be sure I was your last customer,” he offers in explanation.
“Oh?” She holds out a hand, asking him to slide his book to her across the table.
“Thought it was my best bet if I wanted to…”
She looks up from where she’s signing her name, one eyebrow crooked. God, he really is attractive. He lets out a little scoff — not derisive, more like he’s making fun of himself — and his lips press together in a charming little move.
“Cat got your tongue?” She smiles.
“Oh, and I’m sure words never fail you, Ms. Mohan of the Booker Prize Shortlist?”
If she’s not kidding herself, that’s a bit of affectionate sarcasm lacing his words. She’d love to see where this goes.
“You’ve done your research,” she commends.
“It’s on the jacket,” he replies, his voice low.
“So you haven’t done your research?”
“Oh, no, trust me, I have.”
The moment stretches. They haven’t broken eye contact once. Not even as she signed his book.
“Thank you for coming,” she says, a near whisper as she slides the book back to him.
She’d love to see where this goes but doesn’t know how to take it there. For all she knows about human interaction in theory, the real thing is harder when it’s standing in front of you.
“No, thank you,” he replies easily. Picks up the book — and then that’s it, his shoulders turning hesitantly, like he’s right there with her, wanting the next step but with no idea how to make it.
She watches his back as he takes a few steps away from the table. Sucks in a short breath. Hears the crack of the book’s spine.
And then, in an instant, he’s in front of her again.
“You forgot something,” he says, breathlessly, like he has to get it out before he thinks better of it.
Her eyebrows furrow in confusion.
“Your number.”
The smile promised earlier crests over her then. She holds out a hand expectantly again, and he grins boyishly as he hands the book back and she prints her number for him.
“Don’t be giving this out,” she warns. “I don’t even know your name, but I’ll know if my number is leaked it was the handsome man from Pittsburgh.”
“You think I’m handsome?” His grin turns even wider at that, a blush creeping across his cheeks and down the collar of his shirt, as he takes back the book with her phone number now inscribed in it.
“I think you’re handsome,” she affirms him. When he bites the inside of his lip, she thinks it, so she simply has to add, “Devastatingly so.”
“Now I am just dying to know what other words about me you’ve already written in that beautiful brain of yours,” he says, and Samira gulps. “Jack, by the way,” he adds, offering his hand to shake.
“Cocky, are we?” She has to say, and then, “Samira.”
She shakes his hand, cannot ignore the bloom of warmth radiating outward from him to her.
“Yeah, I know.” He smiles again. She likes it when he does. Likes when she makes him.
“Well,” he raises his hand, the book held high in it, waves with it. “Thank you.” He’s taking steps backward now, slow ones, like he doesn’t wanna turn around.
“My pleasure,” she says back, her hand half over her mouth, trying to bite back the smile that won’t quit. That makes him blush a little. He nods once, his lips rolling, then turns away. Samira gets an idea and decides to act on it before she can think to erase it from her mind.
“Wait—” she scrambles a little to gather her bag and coat into her arms, pocket her phone. And then she’s up and standing beside him, blinking fast, heart beating faster. “Do you have anywhere to be?”
He grins. It lights up his whole face.
“Depends,” he teases, using her own response from earlier. “On if you’re trying to go somewhere with me.”
“I’ve got my coat on, don’t I?”
“Then let’s get you a drink, Samira,” he says as he holds the door open for her to step out into the slowly falling snow.