Notes Left at Table Seven

Chapter 4

M

Seven hated bananas.

Not eating them.

Apparently, that would have been too reasonable.

He hated the sound of other people eating them.

I discovered this on Saturday morning.

The answer was waiting for me inside Persuasion, tucked between pages 84 and 85 like it had always belonged there.

M,

Start over?

There are at least six answers to that question, and I'm not emotionally prepared to give you any of them before noon.

I smiled.

Below it:

As for irrational hatred: bananas.

I frowned.

Not the fruit itself. The sound.

Nobody needs to eat something that wet that loudly.

A laugh burst out of me.

"Mara?"

I slammed the book shut. Nina looked up from behind the counter.

"What?"

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

"You just laughed at Jane Austen."

"I remembered something."

"What?"

"Something funny."

She waited. I waited.

Her eyes narrowed.

"You're being weird."

"You're always weird."

"Different category."

I tucked the book beneath my arm.

"I'm shelving."

"You're holding one book."

"Quality over quantity."

I walked away before she could ask anything else.

Behind the fiction shelves, I opened the note again.

There was more.

Other honorable mentions:

People who stop walking in the middle of sidewalks.

Wet socks.

Voice notes longer than three minutes. At that point, call me.

And whoever decided fitted sheets needed elastic on every side.

I bit the inside of my cheek.

Then:

My turn.

What's your real name?

My smile disappeared.

I read the question again.

Four words.

Perfectly ordinary.

Somehow far more intimate than everything else we'd written.

What's your real name?

I looked automatically toward the counter. My name tag was sitting beneath the register. I hadn't put it on yet.

Maria Rana Reyes.

There wasn't anything particularly dangerous about giving a stranger my first name. People gave strangers their names every day.

Baristas.

Receptionists.

Delivery drivers.

People standing beside each other at parties.

But this was different.

Names changed things.

"Mara!"

Nina's voice carried across the store.

"Customer!"

I folded the note.

"Coming!"

At 11:40, Eli walked in carrying an umbrella that looked suspiciously new. I noticed immediately. Not because I had been waiting for him. Because it was bright yellow. Painfully yellow.

The kind of yellow normally reserved for traffic signs and children's raincoats.

I stared.

He stopped in front of the counter.

"Don't."

I looked at the umbrella.

Then at him.

"I didn't say anything."

"You were going to."

I smiled.

The irony was not lost on me.

"Nice umbrella."

"My sister bought it."

"Your sister hates you?"

"Apparently."

He leaned the umbrella against the counter.

"It was this or one with ducks."

"You chose wrong."

"I knew you'd say that."

My hand paused above the register.

"You knew I'd say that?"

"You seem like someone who'd choose ducks."

"I don't know whether that's an insult."

"It wasn't."

He said it so simply that for one annoying second, I forgot what I was doing.

The register beeped.

"Four dollars," I said.

"I haven't ordered yet."

"You'll get the same thing."

"What if I'm changing?"

"Are you?"

"No."

"Four dollars."

He shook his head and reached for his wallet.

"Terrible customer service."

"And yet you keep coming back."

The sentence left my mouth before I could catch it.

His hand stopped. My brain immediately requested evacuation. He looked at me. I looked at the register.

There were approximately seventeen ways he could interpret what I'd just said, and I disliked all of them.

Then he tapped his card.

"Maybe I like terrible customer service."

Beep.

Approved.

I handed him his receipt.

"Table Seven?"

He glanced toward the back.

Someone was sitting there.

A college student had spread a laptop, three notebooks, two highlighters, and what appeared to be the entire contents of her backpack across the table.

Eli looked almost offended.

"Occupied."

"Devastating."

"I'll recover."

"Thoughts and prayers."

He looked at me.

I smiled.

Recognition flickered across his face.

My stomach did something profoundly unhelpful.

He pointed at me.

"You stole that."

"Borrowed."

"From me."

"No proof."

"Documentation?"

"Exactly."

He laughed.

Then took his coffee to Table Five.

I tried not to notice him after that.

This became significantly harder when I remembered that Seven's note was sitting beneath the counter.

What's your real name?

Eli knew my name. Seven didn't.

That should have been enough.

Except my brain had apparently decided it was now a detective.

Maybe Seven was pretending not to know. Maybe Eli hadn't noticed my name tag before.

Except he had.

He'd said it.

Several times.

Mara.

I looked toward Table Five.

He was reading.

I looked back at the register.

No.

Seven wasn't Eli.

Good.

Excellent.

Mystery solved.

Again.

I should have felt relieved.

Instead, something small and inexplicable sank in my stomach.

Which was stupid.

Because if Eli wasn't Seven, that meant there were two interesting people in my life instead of one.

That was mathematically better.

Emotionally, apparently, mathematics had no jurisdiction.

The real proof came at 1:17.

I was carrying a tray toward Table Six when the bell rang.

A man walked in.

Tall.

Gray coat.

Maybe thirty.

He went straight past the counter.

I watched him move toward the fiction shelves.

Then Table Seven.

The student had left ten minutes earlier.

The man sat down.

He didn't order anything.

Instead, he reached into his coat.

My steps slowed.

He pulled out a book. A faded paperback.

My heart stopped.

Persuasion.

No.

I nearly walked directly into Table Four.

"Sorry."

I steadied the tray.

The man placed the book on Table Seven. Then stood. Then walked toward the bathroom.

I stared.

Across the café, Eli was still sitting at Table Five.

Reading.

My pulse climbed into my throat.

There.

Proof.

Actual proof.

Seven had just put the book on the table.

And Eli had been sitting ten feet away the entire time.

I deposited the tray so quickly the spoons rattled.

"Everything okay?" the customer asked.

"Perfect."

I walked back toward the counter.

Normal pace. Very normal. Nothing to see here.

I looked at Table Seven. The book waited. Then I looked at Eli. Still reading.

I felt something loosen inside my chest.

Relief.

Definitely relief.

Probably.

Nina came beside me.

"You look like you've solved a murder."

"What?"

"Your face."

"I don't have a face."

"You definitely have one."

I grabbed a cloth.

"I need to wipe Table Seven."

"It's clean."

"Preventive wiping."

"That's not a thing."

"It is now."

I crossed the café.

The man in the gray coat still hadn't returned from the bathroom.

I reached the table.

Persuasion.

Same copy.

I touched the cover.

Then hesitated.

Too obvious.

I glanced toward Table Five.

Eli turned a page.

Not looking.

I opened the book.

Page 84.

Nothing.

Page 85.

Nothing.

Page 86.

Nothing.

"What?"

I flipped through it.

No note.

I checked again.

Nothing.

The man returned.

I snapped the book shut.

He stopped beside me.

"Sorry," I said. "I thought this was store inventory."

He looked at the cover.

"Oh. It is."

"What?"

He pointed toward the counter.

"The guy over there asked me to bring it back."

Everything inside me stopped.

"What guy?"

He turned.

Pointed.

Not at Eli.

At Mr. Whitaker.

My boss stood near the office holding a clipboard.

"He said it was left in the stockroom."

"Oh."

The man smiled politely.

"I was heading this way anyway."

"Right."

I stepped back.

"Thanks."

He walked away.

I stared at Persuasion.

So.

Not Seven.

Not evidence.

Not anything.

I looked toward Eli.

He had moved.

Table Five was empty.

My eyes swept the café.

No Eli.

The yellow umbrella was gone too.

"Where did—"

The bell above the door swung gently.

I stared at it.

He must have left while I was talking to the man.

My brain attempted to construct another theory.

I refused.

"No."

I walked back to the counter.

Nina looked up.

"Did you preventively wipe it?"

"Shut up."

I answered Seven that night.

Not immediately.

I made him wait until after closing.

This was partly because I had work to do and partly because I'd decided it was important not to appear too eager to a person who couldn't actually see when I answered.

This logic did not survive examination.

At 9:08, I sat at Table Seven.

The bookstore was dark except for the lamp above me.

Persuasion lay open.

I unfolded our increasingly crowded piece of paper.

His question waited.

What's your real name?

I clicked my pen.

Then wrote:

Absolutely not.

I smiled.

Added:

Nice try.

Then:

I think names would ruin it.

I stopped.

That sounded harsher than I meant.

So I continued.

Not because I don't want to know yours.

I do.

My pen hovered.

That felt dangerously close to an admission.

I considered crossing it out.

Didn't.

But right now, you don't know who I am. I don't know who you are.

There's something nice about that.

I thought for a moment.

You can't Google me.

You don't know anyone who knows me.

You don't know what I look like, what I do, whether I'm impressive or disappointing or painfully average.

I stopped at that last word.

Painfully average.

I almost scratched it out.

Instead, I kept going.

You only know what I choose to put on this paper.

And somehow that makes it easier to tell you things.

I leaned back.

The bookstore hummed around me.

The refrigerator.

The heater.

Rain beginning softly against the window.

I looked at my words.

Maybe that was the strangest part.

Seven knew almost nothing about me.

And because of that, I could tell him almost anything.

I wrote:

So I propose rules.

Then numbered them.

1. No real names.

2. No phone numbers.

3. No social media.

4. No asking the bookstore staff about the other person.

I laughed quietly while writing that one.

Technically, if Seven asked the bookstore staff about M, there was a one-in-two chance he'd ask me about myself.

5. No waiting around to see who picks up the book.

That one seemed necessary.

Especially after today's embarrassing detective work.

I hesitated before the last one.

Then wrote:

6. If either of us wants to stop, we stop. No explanation required.

I stared at it.

I wasn't sure why I needed that rule.

Maybe because things were easier to begin when you knew how they could end.

At the bottom, I wrote:

You can call me M.

Then:

Your turn.

I thought.

Our questions so far had been heavy.

Maybe too heavy.

I wanted something ordinary.

Something that didn't involve careers or regret or existential dread.

So I wrote:

Tell me three things about yourself that would never appear in a résumé.

—M

I folded the note.

Slipped it into the book.

Then carried Persuasion to Table Seven.

The rain outside had strengthened.

I stood by the window for a moment.

Across the street, someone ran beneath a newspaper.

A taxi splashed through a puddle.

A couple huddled beneath one umbrella.

Yellow.

I thought of Eli.

Immediately.

Annoyingly.

I wondered what he was doing.

Then I wondered what Seven was doing.

Two separate thoughts.

Two separate people.

Good.

I preferred it that way.

Probably.

Seven answered the next afternoon.

Fast.

Too fast.

I found the book at 2:36.

I knew the exact time because I checked.

For documentation.

Obviously.

His response began beneath my rules.

M,

This feels suspiciously like a contract.

Underneath:

But fine.

Then he'd rewritten every rule.

1. No names.

2. No numbers.

3. No social media.

4. No interrogating innocent booksellers.

I laughed.

5. No lurking.

6. Either person can leave whenever they want. No questions asked.

Then:

Agreed.

There was something about the word that made the whole thing suddenly feel real.

We had rules.

Which meant there was a we to require them.

Not a romantic we.

Obviously.

A grammatical we.

I kept reading.

Three things that wouldn't appear on my résumé:

1. I make excellent scrambled eggs and exactly four other edible things.

2. I once pretended to understand an entire conversation about cryptocurrency because I was too embarrassed to ask what blockchain meant.

I laughed.

3. I keep movie tickets.

That one surprised me.

Below it:

Not because I'm sentimental.

Then, squeezed beside it in smaller handwriting:

Okay. Maybe because I'm sentimental.

My smile softened.

I imagined a drawer somewhere filled with old ticket stubs.

Dates.

Movies.

People who may or may not still be in his life.

Little rectangles of proof that an ordinary evening had happened.

Then I noticed he'd added something else.

Bonus fourth thing because you gave me six rules and I'm renegotiating the terms:

I don't know what I'm doing with my life either.

I stopped smiling.

My thumb rested against the edge of the paper.

Seven had read what I'd written.

Not just read it.

Remembered.

I looked at the next line.

So if you're painfully average, M, at least there's two of us.

Something inside me went very still.

It wasn't flirtation.

Not exactly.

It wasn't even particularly profound.

But I read it again.

And again.

Maybe because most people responded to uncertainty by trying to fix it.

Apply here.

Try this.

Have you considered—

Seven hadn't offered advice.

He'd simply sat beside me in it.

Metaphorically.

Which was perhaps the strangest kind of comfort.

At the bottom was his question.

What are three things about you that wouldn't appear on your résumé?

Then:

And no copying mine.

—Seven

I took the note behind the counter.

Nina was on break.

I found a pen.

For once, I didn't wait until closing.

1. I read the last page of books when I'm anxious about the ending.

I paused.

True.

Deeply shameful, but true.

2. I can recognize my mother's footsteps from another room.

That one came without thought.

I stared at it.

Then continued.

3. When I really like a song, I avoid listening to it too often because I'm scared I'll stop loving it.

I read the three answers.

Small things.

Useless things.

Things nobody would ever ask in a job interview.

And somehow they felt more like me than half the information on my résumé.

I added:

Bonus fourth because apparently we're negotiating now:

I smiled.

I hate coffee.

Then:

Yes. I know where we are.

—M

I folded the note.

"Mara?"

I jumped.

Nina was standing three feet away.

I shoved the paper underneath the register.

Her eyebrows rose.

"What are you doing?"

"Nothing."

"You just hid something."

"No, I didn't."

"You absolutely did."

"It's private."

The word came out sharper than I intended.

Her expression changed.

Only slightly.

"Oh."

Guilt pricked immediately.

"Sorry."

"No, it's okay."

She reached for her apron.

"I wasn't trying to snoop."

"I know."

I hesitated.

Then smiled.

"It's just something stupid."

"Good stupid or bad stupid?"

I thought about Seven.

About Eli.

About handwritten questions and movie tickets and yellow umbrellas.

"Undecided."

Nina nodded.

"Those are usually the interesting ones."

She walked toward the espresso machine.

I looked down at the hidden note.

Interesting.

That was one word for it.

Eli arrived just before six.

No yellow umbrella.

No umbrella at all.

His hair was damp.

"You killed it already?" I asked.

He stopped.

"What?"

"The umbrella."

"Oh."

He looked almost guilty.

"I left it on the bus."

I stared at him.

"Your sister is going to kill you."

"That's tomorrow's problem."

"How long did you own it?"

"Twenty-eight hours."

"Impressive."

"Thank you."

"That wasn't praise."

"I accept it anyway."

I reached for a cup.

"Usual?"

He nodded.

As I made it, I remembered Seven's note.

I hate bananas.

I keep movie tickets.

I make excellent scrambled eggs.

I looked at Eli.

"What?"

I hadn't realized he'd caught me.

"Nothing."

"You were staring."

"I was not."

"You were."

"Customer service."

"Is staring included?"

"Premium package."

He smiled.

I handed him the coffee.

"Four dollars."

He paid.

Then instead of walking away, he stayed.

"Question."

My stomach did something stupid.

"Okay."

"Do you sell notebooks?"

I blinked.

"Notebooks?"

"Yeah."

"Back wall. Near stationery."

"Good."

He started to leave.

Then turned.

"Actually, which ones don't bleed through?"

I stared at him.

"What?"

"Pens."

He mimed writing.

"Some paper is terrible."

I don't know why that detail caught me.

Maybe because I'd spent the last several days paying far too much attention to handwriting.

"What kind of pen?"

"Fountain."

Seven used black ink.

Slightly slanted.

My heart kicked.

"Do you have it?"

"What?"

"The pen."

"On me?"

"Yeah."

Eli reached into his jacket. My pulse climbed. He pulled out a pen.

Blue.

I stared.

Blue plastic.

Cheap ballpoint.

"That's not a fountain pen."

"My fountain pen's at home."

"Oh."

"Why?"

"No reason."

He looked at me strangely.

I pointed toward stationery.

"Second shelf. The cream ones."

"Thanks."

He walked away. I watched him go.

Blue ink.

Seven wrote in black.

Meaningless.

People owned multiple pens.

Obviously.

But then Eli stopped beside the display.

He picked up a notebook.

Opened it.

And began writing something on the sample page.

My breath caught.

This was ridiculous.

Still, I leaned slightly sideways.

Not enough to be obvious.

Just enough to—

"Mara."

I jumped.

Nina was beside me.

"What?"

"Table Two needs water."

"Right."

I grabbed the pitcher.

When I returned, Eli was already at the register holding a notebook.

"Good choice," I said.

"Apparently."

I scanned it.

He tapped his card.

Then signed the receipt because our machine had decided to become difficult again.

I looked down.

His signature.

Eli Bennett.

Messy.

Almost illegible.

Blue ink.

Nothing like Seven's handwriting.

Seven's letters were careful.

Controlled.

Slightly slanted.

Eli's signature looked like someone had pushed a spider through wet paint.

Something inside me settled.

There.

Proof.

Not perfect proof.

But enough.

Eli wasn't Seven.

He couldn't be.

I slid the receipt toward him.

"Your handwriting is terrible."

He looked down.

"That's my signature."

"It's an attack on literacy."

"You asked my last name. Now you have it."

I looked again.

Bennett.

"Your records are complete," he said.

I smiled.

"Finally."

He tucked the notebook beneath his arm.

"Good night, Mara."

"Good night, Eli Bennett."

He looked over his shoulder.

"That sounds threatening when you say the whole thing."

"Good."

He laughed and walked out.

I watched the door close behind him.

Then I looked at the receipt.

Messy blue signature.

Seven's neat black handwriting existed inside Persuasion, hidden beneath the counter.

Two completely different hands.

Two completely different men.

Mystery solved.

This time, I believed it.

That night, I returned Persuasion to Table Seven.

Before closing it, I read Seven's sentence one more time.

So if you're painfully average, M, at least there's two of us.

I smiled.

Then I thought of Eli's umbrella.

His ridiculous signature.

The way he'd said maybe I like terrible customer service.

Another smile threatened.

I closed the book.

"This is getting complicated."

The rain tapped softly against the window.

I switched off the lamp.

I didn't know it yet, but the first rule we would break wouldn't be the one about names.

It wouldn't be phone numbers.

It wouldn't even be waiting around to see who picked up the book.

It would be much simpler than that.

We had promised each other we could leave whenever we wanted.

Neither of us had considered what would happen when we no longer wanted to.