Сьюзен Виггз - The Lost and Found Bookshop

In unguarded moments, Natalie felt a terrible anger at her mother for leaving her in the midst of the storm. Maybe old Julius had felt that way, losing his mother in the maelstrom after the earthquake.

She contacted a placement agency about hiring a general manager to run the bookstore. Neither of the two candidates was a good fit. The first one didn’t make it past the second page of the profit and loss report. “Not only can you not afford me,” he said, “you can’t really afford anyone.”

The second candidate created an elaborate plan involving angel investors and high-interest loans. To Natalie, it sounded so risky that she nearly hyperventilated.

She was mulling over other options when an urgent interoffice message appeared on her screen.

Another Mandy disaster. She’d screwed up a report and it needed to be redone.

Knowing Mandy’s opinion of her made it hard for Natalie to want to bail the woman out, but the habit was ingrained: redo the document correctly and get it done on time. It was such a simple thing.

Natalie sighed. She was about to tackle the report herself, correcting all the errors and updating the totals, when she remembered something Tess had said. If you keep rescuing people from their mistakes, they’ll never figure things out on their own.

But what if this was the mistake that would get Mandy fired?

Natalie spun slowly in her expensive ergonomic desk chair. She looked out at the Sonoma landscape, beautiful and unreachable.

Then she swung back and looked at her desk with its neat, organized stacks and files, and a concise spreadsheet displayed on her computer screen. There was a framed picture of Rick, another of her mom and Grandy.

God, I hate this job , she thought.

A single day at the failing bookstore had made her happier than a year at this grind.

Her fingers flew over the keyboard, highlighting Mandy’s errors and suggesting revisions. The pages of the spreadsheet whispered from the printer. She collected the still-warm job from the printer. Then she went down to the department to find Mandy.

Her colleagues were all hanging out together, chatting and sipping their afternoon kombucha or cold press coffee or whatever the beverage du jour happened to be. Mandy was regaling her friends about trying an aerial yoga class. When Natalie approached, Mandy stiffened. “Oh, hey, Natalie.” Her expression instantly softened into a pucker of concern. “I still can’t get over what happened to Rick. How are you doing?”

A part of Natalie wished the inquiry were sincere. She would like to confess that she felt like shit. She was sad all the time. She couldn’t sleep. She worried constantly about her grandfather. But there was no comfort in seeking solace from someone who didn’t care. She offered a noncommittal shrug.

“What can I do for you?” Mandy asked.

This was the moment Natalie was supposed to bail her out. She was supposed to pretend this job was not above Mandy’s pay grade. She was supposed to correct the mistake and cover up for the woman’s incompetence. She had been doing it for months and months.

“Did you do a final check on those numbers?” she asked.

“Sure,” Mandy said breezily. “I wouldn’t have sent it in if it wasn’t final.”

Natalie hesitated a few seconds longer. She was about to hand over the pages with her corrections. And once again, Mandy would be saved.

On the other hand, she could accept the woman’s word that the document was final, and Mandy would be toast. Out.

She was about to point out the errors when she hesitated again. No. Fuck it.

Then she said simply, “Okay,” and walked away.

And for some reason she didn’t understand, she took a deep breath and felt better. She remembered reading something she’d come across in her mother’s favorite Mary Oliver book when she was looking for a piece to read at the memorial. Listen—are you breathing just a little, and calling it a life?

Natalie knew she’d been too afraid to live her life. She had sold it to the firm for a big salary. But what she’d really sold was her own happiness. Despite her need for steadiness and predictability, she couldn’t stand her own life anymore.

She was furious at her mother for leaving her with nothing—no words of wisdom, no path to guide Natalie along the journey. Now she understood, finally, that the lesson was in the way Blythe Harper had lived her life.

She walked straight into Rupert’s office. He was bent over his golf putter, aiming a golf ball at a cup on the floor. “Hey, Rupert.”

The shot rolled past the cup. “Dang,” he said, straightening up and turning to face her. “You made me miss.”

“Sorry—” Don’t apologize. “I’ve decided to leave,” she said. “Right away.”

He glanced at the clock. “It’s only three thirty, and I still need those warehouse reports from your team.”

“I imagine you do,” she said.

“But whatever.” He waved a dismissive hand. “We might be able to spare you this afternoon. Get them in first thing tomorrow.”

“No, I mean I’m leaving. Today. For good.”

His brow furrowed. “You mean you’re quitting?”

“Yes.” She nearly hyperventilated as she said it.

“What the hell? You can’t quit. We’re in the middle of our biggest project of the year. The state wedding’s in two weeks, and I need you to manage the inventory for Cast Iron, and— Why would you ditch me now?”

She could give him a hundred reasons. All the ways she’d been slighted in the office. All the times she’d picked up the slack, not just for Mandy but for her whole department. For Rupert himself. The list could go on and on.

“You’ll have to manage without me,” she said calmly.

“For Chrissake, Natalie. Why? ”

“Because fuck you,” she said, and walked out of the room. She went straight to her beautiful new, perfectly organized office. She didn’t even bother to take one last look around. Her departure was sure to inspire gossip—she’d lost her mother and Rick and her mind.

She grabbed her few personal items—so few they fit in her tote bag—and walked out without a backward glance. Natalie, who didn’t have an impulsive bone in her body, drove away from stability, from safety, from everything she had worked for and focused on for the past decade.

A strange lightness enveloped her as she drove to her apartment, past the shady village green, the trendy shops and cafés and galleries and tasting rooms. Her favorite spot in town was the White Rabbit Bookstore with a sign over the door—feed your head.

Yet despite the town’s charms, she had never quite set down roots in Archangel, a place so inviting it drew tourists from all over the world. But it wasn’t her town.

Rick had once hinted that they could move in together. He had a rustic but well-appointed cabin on the banks of Angel Creek, the sort of place people pictured when they dreamed of getting away from it all. It had a deck with a hot tub, a massive bed of peeled timber piled high with pillows and quilts, and windows that opened to the fresh scent of juniper and rushing water.

But no books. Rick wasn’t really a book person. And although that seemed like a lame rationale for Natalie’s hesitation, she had never been able to fit herself into that romantic picture. It was her failing, not Rick’s. She craved security, which was exactly what he had to offer—yet she couldn’t embrace a life of security with him. Why?

Now she wrapped up her life in Archangel with a few phone calls—to a moving company that could pack everything up in a matter of hours, to the management company that would terminate her lease.

What did it say about her that she could shed this life like a skin that had never fit in the first place?