#henry.duri1

[embrcssemoi]

"That I am." He bobbed his head to her response, and for a moment there, it felt like that was all that she was going to give him, but as Duri went on about how she would describe him, it hit closer to home than he would've expected. He didn't consider himself to be someone hard to read. He wasn't secretive, but didn't wear his heart on his sleeve either. He sometimes acted impulsively and others, he wondered if he should have said this or that. Henry was not a mystery like the petite brunette standing in front of him, neither did he want to be. He did lick his lips a lot, but he also drank more water than men his age usually did, which would make up for the softness on his lips and skin.

It was odd to him, however... the way his earning for her simply grew at her description. He wanted to press her against those bookshelves and let her have a taste of how soft his lips were, since she'd been the one to bring them up in the first place, alas, he didn't. He wasn't an animal. His mother had given him manners, after all.

Her laughter echoed around the empty bookstore. Sweet and short. Like a prayer. Like a secret she'd been keeping from others. Like one of those flowers that bloomed once a year and he simply had been lucky enough to had been present for it. It left him wanting to hear it more often, he realized.

"Hm. I see. Not a writer, just an avid reader." And maybe that same laugh had been what had prompted Henry to reach for her wrist and make her turn around. Maybe her words had hit a string on him, because he was now stepping closer than he should have had, one hand cupping her chin while he looked into her eyes. "Dinner and drinks." He settled, his voice hoarse with a strange desire he'd been feeling for her, his thumb tracing her bottom lip as he continued. "And then I'll let you have a taste of my soft lips." His voice dropped to a whisper as he leaned in even closer, his lips almost touching hers before they changed directions and moved up to brush against her earlobe as he spoke. "Probably even bite them if that's what you're into."

Finally, he pulled away, feeling the heat that emanated from his body meet the coolness of their surroundings. "I'll see you at 8, Duri. With a signed copy."

Yes, he knew it was stubborn.

She had laid out her rules quite clearly, but, if she wasn't easy to go out on second dates, then he needed to nail it down on the first. He thought, as he exited the shop.

END.

"You're Henry." Duri's simple response might have been frustrating, and she knew that she had the tendency to skew that way, the way she spoke both blunt and a little cryptic, all at the same time. She loved the confusion she caused, if only because it tended to weed out the people who she wouldn't otherwise want to spend time with. People who matched her on her own level, or who found a way to rise or sink to it, those were the people she wanted to build a drawbridge for into her little castle of stone. "You go home every night and think about the interactions you had that day, not all of them, but a lot of them. Did you walk away from that interaction looking like a charming guy? Should you have said this instead of that? Did someone see a hint of self deprecation slip through a crack in that carefully constructed facade that's 50% you and 50% who you wish you were? And you look like you have soft lips. Makes me wonder if you bite them or lick them a lot."

The laugh that slipped from her was genuine and startling, even to herself, and she lifted a hand to cover her mouth for a moment as she settled herself. "No, I'm not a writer. I don't think I could ever sit down and articulate thoughts on paper the way I can when I'm saying them out loud. I just read a lot of different thoughts by a lot of different people, and I hold on to the ones I like the most." She was startled for a moment as he reached out to grasp her wrist, though she turned without protest, knowing full well that if anyone else had grabbed her like that, she would have swung around and slapped them, or at the very least shoved them off.

"Dinner, drinks, and then I'll decide if I still want a signed copy. And I'll warn you now that getting a first date is easy, but I don't do second dates unless I'm really impressed, so you'll have your work cut out for you if you have the time of your life and just have to see me again." The smirk she gave was playful but wicked. "You can pick me up here, at 8. That's when the girl I hired to close gets in."

[embrcssemoi]

"And how would your write me in the book of your life?" He shifted the question back to her, since she was so adamant in hearing that answer from him, it was only fair that she would offer him some enlightening, too. However, Henry doubted that when it came to this beautiful brunette across from him, anything would be as simple or as straightforward as most things were in his life... and he couldn't help but feeling excited at the thought. "Am I just your friend's famous brother that showed up wanting to know how his sales were doing? Am I a customer you won't remember the name once I leave? Am I someone you wouldn't have cared much about in the first place? Do I listen to dad rock in my car, do I turn on the local radio or do I drive in silence?" About the music, none of them were true, but he was curious as to what she would say.

All things considered, he thoroughly enjoyed being described by her... even if his charismatic ways had been inherited from a man he was trying his hard to forget, the resemblance was uncanny. "Are you a writer, yourself or just an avid reader?" He caught himself asking, after all, the way she would put things in perspective was different from most people. It made him go back to some of his creative writing workshops back in University and how he and his classmates would overanalyze every aspect of every bit of each other's writing. "An addition to the young bookshop owner who drinks iced coffee, loves witty remarks and has a shy smile she's very cautious who she displays it to?"

Henry moved after her and although he did pierce her personal space again, this time however, he didn't touch her, figuring that keeping his hands to himself would make him less pushy. "You don't strike me as someone who would ever lose your mystery and allure, Duri." Henry then offered a smirk of his own, goofy and playful as he finally reached for her wrist and prompted the brunette to turn around and face him. "So. Signed copy, dinner and drinks?" / @folliesofmiceandmen

"Like or dislike, I became a part of your story the moment you walked into the shop. Isn't that how these things go? We walk into a shop, and meet someone, and they might just be a passing thought or a face in a crowd, but by the very nature of their being there, existing in that space, they've become part of the story." The world wasn't as black and white as ink on paper, but stories were all the same, temptations and choices and conversations. A piece of this or a scrap of that, an interesting quote or a thoughtful line of dialogue.

"You made an impression, something tells me that you make an impression a lot of times. Good, bad, otherwise, you know that you have a presence in a room, and you're very good at wielding that presence. It's a fascinating character study, you know. Authors don't usually stand out, they disappear into their work and become a voice for others. You've got a voice all your own outside of the work." It was much easier to connect with a person like this, someone who could just be a literary tool in the story she was writing in her head, another character to trade witty banter with. She could only hope that he would just think of her as a character, too, and make life much easier for the both of them.

"I guess it depends." Duri's expression changed, then, more playful and coy than before, the smirk on her face bright, maybe a little scary in the right light. "If I let you take me out, do I lose all of my mystery and allure? Because that's no fun for me."

[embrcssemoi]

To someone who had always been involved in fictional worlds and using words to convey his feelings, his thoughts of reality and everything else, it felt extremely comforting (but also, a strange disturbance of his inner peace) to be talked to in the same way he usually did when he was all by his lonesome, typing up stories he would never tell. How would he describe her? Like a loud bang in the quietude of his day. Someone who shook him awake without moving an inch. He would describe her as a quiet storm, gathering in the countryside and slowly moving towards the city with her imponent clouds and bringing both fortune and distress to people.

"Why would you like to be in the story of my life?" He asked instead, not moving from his place by the shelf, but shifting in his place to lean sideways against it, since Duri had stepped away from his immediate closeness. "Did I make that much of a good impression, Duri?" Alas, she was right, though. Should he ever write a story of his life, she was probably going to be the mysterious bookshop owner who held his attention for a chapter or two, but then again, it wasn't like the women he took to bed were that much different. Even if Duri, herself, did not abide to society's norms of binary genders. It wasn't like that. But Henry just didn't see himself entertaining others for more than a chapter or two. "What do you say? Do I get to take you out for drinks though--and food? I'd like doing proper research when I write about subjects I'm unfamiliar with." / @folliesofmiceandmen

Duri had always been good at masking exactly what she was thinking, and right now, as she leaned against a bookshelf, being trapped in under a warm body, eyes turned up to watch the face of the man attached to it, her expression didn't shift in the slightest. Her eyes might have darkened, and she was definitely biting into the side of her cheek just a little, but she didn't give too much away. Because that was the game, and she didn't want to know what happened when the game wasn't fun anymore. That stabbing dark fear in her chest felt like an all too real possibility, that the game would stop being fun and she would be alone in her bookshop again, thinking too much by herself.

"Let's say, for the sake of argument, that you were writing me. What's my story? Am I the hero or the villain? Am I an unreliable narrator?" Her lips twitched, up into a little smirk that she tried to bite back, but managed to slip out, anyway. Her fingers walked up his chest, and she gave only the slightest push before slipping under his arm and moving down the shelf a little, rearranging a book or two along the way to look busy, and not appear like she was playing the game she definitely was. "One day, when you write the story of your own life, what chapter do I show up in, and how do you present me to the world? The mysterious bookshop owner who held your interest for a chapter or two? The secret villain who rattled your carefully constructed persona? The person who loved cheap chinese food sitting in cars talking until three in the morning? Go on, author man, write me a story."

[embrcssemoi]

"Is that what you do?" Henry looked up from the stack of books he's been helping her organize. In alphabetic order of author, as he'd noticed the shelves. "You shine your light to attract the right type of moths and burn them in your flames?" He wasn't going to ask if she considered himself to be a moth. He actually knew he was. After all, he'd decided to spend some extra time in Bella's Books and help her out sorting out books when Henry Huang, the one who drove a nice Audi around town, had no obligations whatsoever to do so. That cat and mouse game they were playing was more interesting than the going home. Sharing and withholding information, the give and take, the subtle dance they'd been doing around one another... he, more than she. The young author wondered just how far he could take his actions with her without making it seem like he was desperate... or worse: without pushing her away. "I wouldn't say I liked hanging out with my mom when I was a teen. I fall more on the protective side of things. Mom, sister... I have to keep an eye out for the shitheads, you know?" Meaning the ones like him, who weren't interested in settling down, thus making a fool out of the women in his life.

But he wasn't going to bring them up right now. What he did do, was to turn around and step closer to Duri, noticing her leaning against the shelves beside her. "See... there's a difference between writing mysteries and being in one." He said, eyes down on her dark hues, voice as low as a quiet prayer only allowed to her ears, his fingers reaching up to touch the end of her strands, trapping them between his fingers. A slight touch without actually touching her. "I have no idea what you like as I'm not writing you." He inched closer, brushing that same strand behind her ear as he used his free arm to lean onto the shelf. "I have no control over you and I can't predict your actions. You're a mystery to me... do you want me to figure you out, though, Duri? Because I can certainly try." / @folliesofmiceandmen

It almost felt like a game, revealing little kernals of truth about oneself, giving away just enough to seem likable and approachable, holding the more important pieces close to the chest. Duri was having fun with this conversation, and that felt like a ballpark he wasn't sure how to approach without being extremely careful not to step out of bounds. Of course there were things about her that would run off even the most determined of people, and she'd experienced that first hand before. Part of her wondered if she could push this Henry to that point. "I have daddy issues, so I guess we make an interesting set. When I was a teenager, people thought it was weird that I liked hanging out with my dad, but he was cool, and he was funny, and he could shuffle a deck of cards with one hand. I don't think you should be playing dumb to seem approachable, though."

She paused for a moment, just enough of a moment that when she looked up, he was in her space and her breath caught for a second in her chest. "If you shine your light, the right kind of moths will be attracted to it."

Clearing her throat as subtly as she could, she waved her hand in the direction he should take the books, considering him for a moment. "Bold of you to assume you'd ever get to the third marriage proposal stage in the first place, Henry. I have a tendency to ghost after date number one, three if the chemistry is just... there." She regained enough composure to smirk, head tilting a little as she leaned against the bookshelf beside her. "You like mysteries, right? You write them. I wonder if you're good at figuring them out, too. What kind of food do you think I like?"

[embrcssemoi]

Oh shit. Henry liked how this girl, scratch that... not a girl, get on with the program, Henry! Alas, he liked how she went on about her life. "You don't leave much to imagination, do you? I like that." He smiled. Again, smiling came easy to him. Whether they were genuine or not, they were easy. Effortless, even. It came with the type of career he'd chosen, too. You have to make yourself approachable. "Alright. Name's Henry, that much you've known. No nicknames, at least none I like or care about, 6' 1¼", Aries." He didn't care much about zodiac signs, but he had to do some extensive research on them due to one of Ellen Brooks murder mystery books, so apparently, being an Aries meant that he was direct and honest, which, well... Henry was, but some girls he'd been with didn't seem to like that he was an Aries. Right. "My favorite color is the shade of dark blue right before we start noticing the first stars in the sky when we're by the beach." If she was going to be poetic with her descriptions, then so could he. "I've never been married either, I suck at math and science and sometimes I play dumb to make myself more approachable. I am a momma's boy, but not the weird type."

And then, the more she went on about her commitment issues, it struck even more true to Henry. Closer to home, if he were being honest. Commitment took a lot of effort and sometimes, even then, it might not end up paying off. "You know, Duri..." Henry, stepped away from the counter, taking some of the books she'd been holding. Not much out of the goodness of his heart, but because he wanted to be closer to her... especially after the conversation. "Since we agree on a lot of things, especially one getting food with our drinks, I can't really leave you hanging, can I?" He smirked, then pointing to the stack of books in his hands. "Where should I put these?" And, as he followed her instructions, he continued. "I think we'd get along nicely. I'm not exactly looking forward to being your third marriage proposal, so don't worry about that. What kind of food do you like? So I know where to take you." / @folliesofmiceandmen

"I think it's safer to say that I'm aware of you. I haven't learned a single thing about you yet to know if I like you or not." Duri lifted an eyebrow, reaching up to carefully trace her finger against that little smile line on his face before she pushed away from the counter and grabbed a few books. Her feet carried her around the counter and she headed for the shelves to start stacking them where they went, wondering if he would follow her or not. "Duri. 5'3. Cancer. My favorite color is that kind of pinky orange the sky is when the sun first rises in the morning, I've never been married, and I suck at math." Because those were the typical getting to know you kind of questions that people who made friends tended to get around to. Duri found it just a little easier to get them out of the way early.

"It's fine. I know I'm a miserable bitch, people telling me or not telling me has never changed that." There was still a hint of a smirk on her face as she said it, a sort of pride in a title she'd never had a say in. Because there was something powerful in embracing it instead of fighting against it. "I've been proposed to twice, I know that it'll happen if I let it. I can't decide if I'm waiting for Prince Charming or if I'm so terrified of commitment that I prefer hookups and friendship that occasionally ends with naked time. I'm not oblivious to how good it can be to have companions. Or friends."

She smiled again, but a little more genuinely this time. "She is fine. They is fine. I don't use masculine pronouns, but otherwise, I'm okay with whatever comes out." She finished with the stack of books in her arms and turned to look at him, an eyebrow lifting. "Are you asking me on a date or are you taking your playful flirting to a logical conclusion, because if it's the former, I like food with my drinks, and if it's the latter, I bet I could find a signed copy of your book on ebay."

[embrcssemoi]

Despite knowing how nice Ellie's descriptions of him tended to be, he couldn't help but agreeing with Duri. Normally, upon talking about a New York best-selling author, people tended to imagine someone obnoxiously full of themselves (not that Henry couldn't be that sometimes... his father's arrogance still ran through his veins when among his peers). Still, he smiled. Smiling came easy to him as it helped easing people's thoughts. It tended to lower their walls around him. And then, came the 'playing dumb' kind of deal to him. It wasn't a mask he wore, per se. Henry really could be this innocent, goofy guy, but he also had a sharp mind sometimes. "So you like me, huh?" She had never once said that, but he liked joking around with the topic. Cocky, yes. But in the playful way that tended to make women laugh and drop their underwear to the ground around him. "See... the thing is that, now you know I'm Henry Huang, but I haven't gotten a name yet and I don't think it's fair of you to keep withholding information like that."

Her next words, however, almost kicked the smile out of his face. While Henry didn't make a job to overanalyze people, it did seem surprising how quickly Duri jumped to defend herself the way she had. Had someone judged her for being like that? With walls seemingly as tall as the skies? "See... the thing is... I never said you were miserable... let alone, called you a bitch. But... people can still hurt you no matter how long you've known them." His father was the true example of that. Over a silly, meaningless affair, he'd lost a wife and three kids in the process. It still stung to think about it. "Just like companionship can come when you least expect it and show you great things, you know? It'll happen if you let it."

Not a girl. It was nice to be taught things... like breaking stereotypes and all. He wouldn't have pegged her for someone who was non-binary simply due to how she presented herself, but, luckily he was there to be proven wrong. "You're not exactly a stranger, anymore, though. But I'll beware of you, Duri." He winked at the brunette behind the counter, before offering her a smirk again. "Should I use different pronouns with you though? I'm not one to keep repeating past mistakes, you know?" Because yes, while he was silly and goofy, Henry was also polite and respectful. "As for the signed copy, that depends... can I use it as bribery to take you out for drinks?" / @folliesofmiceandmen

"Ellie talked about you a lot." Duri offered that with nothing further for a moment, eyes wandering the face of Henry Huang for a long time before settling on the laugh line on his face, just beside his mouth, that cut a swath across smooth skin almost like a river. He smiled a lot. There was nothing necessarily wrong with that, she reasoned, but there was something about seeing it on a person's face that struck her. She wondered if her own face painted her out to be a miserable shrew who never laughed or smiled if she could help it. Not that she was that, she laughed, she smiled, she knew how to enjoy herself quite a bit, but she was guarded, knowingly so, and knew that didn't paint a good picture at first. "Hearing about a hot shot New York best selling author, no matter how nice a picture his sister paints of him, leaves one in the mindset of a cocky, arrogant prick with his head up his own ass. You are... not that. Surprisingly."

For a moment, she looked away from him, off to the other side of the shop, just for a change of scenery. Her teeth curled around her bottom lip and she chewed for a moment. She wasn't quite sure what she wanted to say to him, if anything at all. "I certainly don't like having to rely on anything or anyone else, if that's what you mean by detached. I'm not some miserable, frigid bitch who shuts absolutely everyone out and refuses to admit that I have friends. I do have friends. I just like to make sure that I don't pile all of my eggs into baskets before I know how strong the baskets are. People hurt you when you trust too quickly."

Finally, a smirk tugged at the corners of her lips, and she stretched for a moment before standing up from the chair and leaning on the counter careful not to invade too much of his personal space. "Not a girl. The concept of the gender binary is a stupid one, and boxes people in to preset notions and conceptions. I am simply a person, a stranger, and definitely not a silly one. And you, Mr. Henry Huang, should always be afraid of strangers." That smirk lingered for a moment. "If I get a copy of that book of yours in here, will you sign it for me?"

[embrcssemoi]

"That would be very, very silly." Henry bobbed his head, granting the brunette across from him a chuckle as she'd been doing one hell of a great job letting that charming smirk linger on his lips for longer than Henry had initially intended for it to. "And you don't strike me as a silly woman. Should I fear you instead?" He asked, his shoulders relaxing even more as Henry leaned forward onto the counter, resting his arms on the cool surface and watched her. Maybe that was what she wanted? Not answering his questions directly, throwing jabs at her own tastes, deflecting from a few jokes of his here and there. Nah, this heart-shaped-face brunette sitting comfortably across from him and casually sipping on her iced coffee seemed to be clinging to the idea of being a mystery to the ones around her... Or so that was the impression Henry got from her. There was only so much an online Psych diploma would allow you to analyze in a person.

The mention of her not being into true crime struck him a surprise. A nice one, in fact, because there had been a rise in the numbers of women being completely addicted to true crime, and it was more clear to see whenever one of his podcast episodes originated from a true crime story. "The Bone Collector isn't true crime, though." Henry explained. "Just really well-written and with different, creative crime scenes." But maybe he'd gotten it wrong? Maybe she was more into the bloody aspects of murder than intricate crimes. "But I get that, and that's a really interesting way of looking into it. You like being detached from things, do you?" Maybe he would be overstepping for assuming so, but if she had that relationship with characters in a movie or TV show, then it was easy to assume she was even worse with people in her life. Not that he was there to judge her.

Her face changing with the realization that he was not only Ellie's brother, but also, not the PR of Henry Huang, but the man himself made Henry's chest feel differently for a second there. A fuzzy feeling crossing it and leaving as fast and as unexpected as it had arrived. "Henry Huang, yes." Finally, he offered his hand for her to shake, then returning to lacing his fingers around one another over the counter once the handshake was over. "Why surprisingly, though?" He asked, cocking his head to the side. "I've been giving you that much of a terrible first impression?" / @folliesofmiceandmen

"I might, but I'd never tell you about my secret torture room. That would be silly." Her eyes rolled in perhaps the most dramatic fashion possible, a true actress, putting on a show for the hungry masses for a moment before her expression fell flat again, trying to mask the genuine amusement and levity she was feeling at this conversation. Duri had always been a girl with walls, those tall ones made of stone that were hard to break through. She liked that about herself, because it meant she didn't get hurt. Friendship were arms length for a long time before she softened to people, though there were the persistant ones that kept coming around even when she was rude. Devi had basically planted roots from day one, but for the most part, it was good at weeding out the people who were only there for a good time and not a long time.

"I don't like it when it's real." Her voice was soft when she spoke up again, eyes darting up and giving him the briefest of glances before she looked away again, shoulders lifting and falling in kind of a useless shrug. "I don't like true crime, because I don't like that real people suffer. In splatter movies, in horror novels, those people aren't real, you don't have to feel that impact, losing someone." Like her dad. That had been the worst time in her life,

Duri finally looked up again, and her eyebrow lifted, mouth opening to ask a follow up question when he said something that clicked in her brain. "Ellie is your sister." Ellie had given her a little run down of her family. Siblings, mom, dad, the whole lot. This had to be the Henry she was always raving about, the super funny and super cool autho-- Her eyes widened a bit and she blinked. Once. Twice. And then she shook her head a little. "You aren't the PR guy, are you. Henry, right? I've heard so much about you, most of it good. Surprisingly."

[embrcssemoi]

It was funny how this petite bookstore owner seemed to find her particularities somewhat strange, and maybe that was his online-Psychology classes speaking, but weren't those peculiarities that made people unique? Maybe she'd been told she was strange growing up, maybe people judged her tastes too much, maybe she had been trying to fit in... maybe he was overanalyzing someone he'd just met like she was a character of one of his books and that wasn't fair. Nor right of him.

"Why is it so bad that you like torture-porn movies, though?" Henry asked, finding it amusing that someone with such soft looks would have these tastes. They weren't bad, they just didn't fit the norm. She didn't fit the norm. Nothing wrong about that. "Does that mean I should worry about you having a secret room in the back of the shop—" As he once again learned forward onto the counter, his finger motioned to nowhere in particular behind her, simply to illustrate his thoughts as he usually used his hands a lot when he spoke, "—ready with torture machines and waiting for me to fall straight into your trap?" He smirked a bit, finding amusement in their conversation. Yes, she had mentioned not having to worry about people flirting with her on every corner, but it came unintentionally with Henry. He hadn't intentionally waltzed into this bookshop, looking for a pair of beautiful sad eyes to connect to and be charming with. "Alas, you should give Jeffery Deaver books a try, in case you haven't. The Bone Collector ones? They might be right up your alley with the gore-y, mysterious cases."

He did, however, notice how her smile, laced in customer service sympathy, transformed into one more genuine. Who would've thought? Actually, Henry would. He could be somewhat cocky like that sometimes. Alas, he was glad to have witnessed the transformation in her face, as if he'd managed to make a crack in her armor as he would often so easily describe with words within the pages of his books. "See, people do have lots of stories to tell about the Springs miraculous healing properties. Sometimes, they don't mean the waters." Henry said between her explanation of how she'd ended up there and the reason why she did. "You don't say..." There it was, that charming smile back on his lips again. "You mean the town's best baker in the world ever, Ellie Bowen?" Yeah, yeah, call him a weirdo for always hyping up his family the way he did. "I think it's a family thing... remembering the small things... Like names, PhD titles, gambling hobbies..." Hopefully she'd take the hint. / @folliesofmiceandmen

"Criminal Minds, yes. I never got into the other ones." Which was a strange thing, she thought, considering they were all basically the same show, just with different faces and different cases. She figured it was something about the way the crimes were shown, inside the mind of a killer, all that. It was very much focused on the psychological. "I also owned every single Saw movie on DVD, though, and loved them more than anything else in the world, so we can't exactly say I have the best taste in the world." The mysterious PR manager was easy to talk to, at least. It was nice, not forcing awkward chit chat over the counter while Duri simply waited for whoever was standing in front of her to get bored and walk out of the store.

She wasn't exactly known for being a stellar conversationalist, after all.

His question was startling in a way that Duri wasn't used to. She had spent a very long time trying to make sure people didn't ask her about herself. Making herself seem so utterly boring and unapproachable that people didn't even care to try. Her own smile, one of those customer service painted on smiles that she had perfected over the past three years with lots of practice in the mirror, faltered a little, changed a little, felt a bit more genuine as she shrugged her shoulders. "It's exciting, isn't it? Owning a business. I don't think I ever had a dream to make come true. I figured I'd end up in a high school library, wasting away forever. And this place just kind of... fell into my lap. I went to college with someone who grew up here, she would talk about all the places in this town, how cool it was here. After I graduated and didn't have anywhere else to go, I came here. to see if it lived up to all the hype. She works over at that bakery, now. Still remembers my name even though we only saw each other a few times. I guess I bought this place because it felt like it made sense at the time, even if I had no idea what I was doing. So this is the dream I didn't have to wake up from, instead."

[embrcssemoi]

Growing up, Henry had devoured books like the ones written by Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott, but nowadays he found it hard to keep up with historical fiction. Did that make him a literary snob? Oh, well. Sometimes he indeed was. "I tried reading the first book, but the main character was too dull, too lifeless, I guess. Too whiny, too." That whole family seemed to be a bunch of whiny aristocrats, but then again, with that much money, what else could they do? "Maybe that's why I didn't give much chance to the show. I've seen there's color there, so that's a good thing." But, when it came to Shonda Rhimes, it was hard no to add color.

Too much dramatics, too. But good representation.

Giving into her words, Henry nodded, his hand moving up to rest against his chest in a dramatic way. "Ah... You caught me." It was better to be mistaken by a PR manager than the writer himself, wasn't it? If she knew, she would probably think he was either one of those insecure writers who wanted to hear about what people thought of them, or, the arrogant ones, hungry for the thrill of being recognized, the magic in knowing they were adored worldwide. Henry, however, stood right in the middle of those two. A perfect kind of balance — or so he would like to think.

"Well, yes. Criminal Minds, CSI, Law & Order, the Agatha Christie's BBC Specials..." He listed a few of the shows he liked watching growing up, some of them, he even stayed up late to watch when he was younger. "Takes one to know one?" Henry arched his brows as he watched her take a sip from her iced coffee, and he knew it was iced because the sound the rocks did as they collided against one another was highly familiar to him. One of the women he'd dated in the past was far too much into iced coffee. He happened to like his hot. Hot, black and sugar-free, which, most people didn't think it would be possible. Most judged him to be a latte kind of guy.

Yikes.

The word cheat almost made his perfectly untouched, charming smile falter a little. What was it about fathers teaching their offsprings how to cheat? Well... in her case, it was more in the lines of gambling than messing around with romantic relationships, but even so, it struck an invisible chord inside Henry's chest. One, that eased up as she listed all the things she liked about quiet and peaceful little Hemlock Springs, with its half-lit streets and sunkissed parks. "Indeed it is." He nodded at her words. He supposed it was normal to compare oneself to Belle... and this place was called Belle's Books, so maybe that was where the name had come from, now that he'd thought of it. "But is it your dream come true?" He asked instead. Not that she needed to answer such a deep question on a first encounter like that, but how else would people get to know others, right? "Is that why you bought this place—where your PhD in library studies don't exactly apply, but it's far enough from blackjack tables?" / @folliesofmiceandmen

"Bridgerton is good, but the show is way better than the books are. Julia Quinn is a little too devoted to the men are providers and women are wives bit for me. The show feels a little more... comfortable straying from that." Duri shrugged, sitting back in her chair and pulling her legs up to sit a little more comfortably as the man rambled. Perhaps ramble wasn't the right word.

Hyped, that felt a bit more appropriate. He was in full hype move for this book guy. Duri would have admitted that his name did sound vaguely familiar, but in the weird kind of de ja vu way that always made her skin crawl just a little. Her cup of iced coffee was lifted to her lips and she took a nice healthy drink before replying. "Are you this guy's PR manager or something? You seem to really be into him. I mean, I never knock the hustle, or shame a megafan. Did you watch a lot of Criminal Minds growing up, too?"

Duri's eyes moved toward her screen again, and for a moment, she was lost. She was back in Vegas, living a different life, and then she shuddered a bit as she shook her head. "I never liked cards, much. That was my dad's thing, but I did learn a lot about how to cheat if you ever want tips before a trip to the casino. I love it here. It's quiet. There aren't shifty guys waiting around every corner to buy you a drink and tell you how pretty your mouth is, and I own a bookshop, it's like the Belle from Beauty and the Beast dream come true, right?"

[embrcssemoi]

More often than not, Henry found people fascinating. While most wouldn't think much of ones living in a small town like Hemlock Springs, he, in all of his arrogance and money, still called it home. He, in the fame and fortune he'd been able to secure selling the books he'd write, still called it home. And he would often find incredible creatures wandering about... like the one sitting across from him, clickity-clacketing on her computer, in a quaint small town, after having dealt blackjacks and having a PhD to say the least. Henry hadn't even finished his masters degree because his first book had become a success.

"Period romance, huh? You're one of those Bridgerton fans?" Nothing wrong with that, he knew. It was a big wide world out there for book fans and there was room for everyone, but what did sting his ego was hearing that the brunette sitting nearby had never heard of him. Ouch. Way to be humbled. "Maybe you should give these guy's books a chance. If you're into splatter horror, that is." He added. "He writes criminal novels, so there's always some gruesome crime scenes. And his detective is a smart woman who doesn't really need dumb men running around solving the crimes for her." Which was something he remembered thinking about when he read a colleague's story once. Why make your heroine a woman if you're going to have the men around her do everything?

Henry thought about mentioning the New York Times calling him Agatha Christie's literary son, but that would be too much, wouldn't it? "Business is business... but, do you enjoy it? It's not blackjack, of course." / @folliesofmiceandmen

"Business is business." A few more clicks on her keyboard, eyes darting back and forth between the screen and the man leaning beside it, and then she shoved the keyboard backwards just a bit to get it away from her. "My dad did not prepare me for this, nor did eight years getting a PhD in library science, but I suppose some of that applies a little more than dealing blackjack. What is this book, anyway? I've never heard of this guy. Then again, I don't read a lot outside of period romance and splatter horror these days."

[embrcssemoi]

Not having it in stock meant two things: his latest book was either sold out or the bookstore had never ordered it in the first place. To the sake of his own sanity, Henry preferred sticking with the former option. "No need to." He offered the brunette one of his usual smiles, waving her words off in the nicest way possible. "It was just to feed my vain curiosity, that's all." Henry chuckled while leaning onto her computer's balcony. "How's business going? Good, I hope?" / @folliesofmiceandmen

where: bella's books with: open ( @hemlockstarters )

Her fingers flew across the keys, eyes locked on the screen in front of her, darting across it as she read at lightning speed. She had never really thought about what went into being a business owner before buying an entire bookstore out of nowhere, but Duri was so desperately determined to make it work that she might have done just about anything, and that had included digitizing all of the stores files the moment she could. It made life easier, on her and on anyone who came in looking. With a final click and a sigh, she looked up, defeated look on her face as she shook her head just a bit. "I don't have it in stock, but I can order it for you. It'll take a few weeks to get here, though, if you need it asap, you're better off driving a couple of hours to buy it somewhere else."