New Romantics

Chapter 17

A robbery.

Paperbound's first robbery in over one hundred years of operation. And it was all my fault.

"You locked up shop correctly," Magda said, her grief-stricken face painted shades of red and blue from the cruiser lights. The slight woman was disheveled as though she'd hastily dressed before coming here, mouth pressed in a tight line. Behind her, her sons spoke with the officers on the scene, while a representative from the university spoke quickly into their phone. Glass littered the sidewalk from the gaping, jagged hole in the bay window display, and the small window on the front door, yellow tape blocking most of the debris, the lights flickering.

"I should've been there," I said hoarsely. "Maybe I could've—"

"You could've gotten hurt," Magda said quickly. "They could've hurt you, Aria."

Tears pricked my eyes. Blinking rapidly, I shrunk into myself and forced myself to look anywhere but the storefront. Even if she was right, it did little to assuage my guilt. Beside me, Leo threaded his fingers through mine and I leaned into his warmth. "What did they get?"

"I'm not sure, yet." A heart-breaking sniffle. "We will find out shortly. I'll let you know as soon as I can."

"What can we do?" Leo asked Magda.

Wiping a stray tear from her cheek with the back of her hand, Magda shook her head. "Nothing right now. Just get home safe and sound."

"I can come in the morning to help clean up," Leo insisted. "I can get a couple of guys together."

"Thank you, Leo. Thank you." She glanced at the officers. "I should go talk to them. Aria, again, I am so relieved you're not hurt. Don't worry about coming in tomorrow. I know your parents are in town." Her voice quivered again, and my stomach sank. "There's not much that can be done until we get everything cleaned up."

"Okay," I said, throwing my arms around Magda and squeezing her tight. "Please let me know if you need anything."

Leo and I walked in silence the rest of the way home. It was a comfortable yet distracted silence. The kiss under the fireworks felt like a distant dream. We parted in the stairwell of the second floor with a tentative kiss that made my toes curl, exhaustion turning my bones into rubber.

"Are you going to be okay?" Leo whispered, pressing a small kiss to the corner of my mouth.

I smiled. "Yeah. Thanks for an otherwise great night, Leo."

"You're welcome." His fingers drew small circles in the divet of my lower back. "Call me if you need me, okay?"

Need me. The words touched my lips so softly, I thought I hadn't heard him right. "Okay. Goodnight, Leo."

"Goodnight, Aria."

♡ ♡ ♡

"Aria!" Mom shouted as she threw open the door of the small, white taxi outside of the Hampton Inn they booked for the next three days. Without hesitation, I ran into her open arms, every emotion I felt over the last two and a half months hurtling back tenfold. As though a switch had been flipped on the first day of October, the air was frosty in my lungs, and my cheeks burned from the chilly breeze.

"Where is your jacket?" I asked, squeezing Mom harder to keep the chill out of her small body. Behind her, Dad unloaded their bags out of the trunk, an OU cap on his head, and unlike Mom, he wore a thick jacket. "This isn't Sacramento!"

"Menopause," Mom said, fanning herself with her thick, slightly wrinkled Harlequin romance novel, the cover depicting a dashing pirate and a scantily-clad maiden. The apple didn't fall far from the romance-loving bookworm tree. "I'm boiling! This feels so much better!"