Five Years Outside Their Photos, So I Finally Walked Out Forever novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: Flowers at the Library

Gavin came to the library at ten past noon with three dozen roses.

I was shelving large-print mysteries on the first floor, and I heard the front doors open and the whole reading room go quiet.

The oldest regular at the crossword table, who is eighty-one and has never been quiet in her life, said, "Well."

He stood in the middle of the carpet in his best blazer, holding the flowers.

The roses were red, and the cards stuck in them said "I'm sorry" in six different places.

"Willa," he said, loud enough for the stacks to hear. "Can I have one minute?"

A dozen people looked up from their books.

I knew this trick.

He'd used it on a waitress once, and a customer who wanted a refund, and his own mother.

When Gavin apologized in front of an audience, you couldn't say no without becoming the villain.

I put the mystery on the cart.

"One minute," I said.

He dropped to one knee.

An actual knee, on the actual carpet.

"I was wrong," he said, and his voice cracked in the right place. "I let my mother push you out of those pictures, and I let you stand there holding a light, and I'm ashamed of it."

The woman at the crossword table put down her pencil.

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