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The bell above the door jingled softly—once, then again as it settled.
Raine wasn't at the counter.
Seraphina stepped inside anyway, arms folded loosely, her scarf still damp from the fading drizzle outside. The bookstore smelled the same as always—like old paper and warm wood and time caught between pages.
But it felt different without Raine behind the desk.
Seraphina hesitated near the front, fingers brushing along a table stacked with journals. She wasn't there to buy anything. She hadn't planned to come at all. She'd been walking by on her way home, eyes half-distracted, when she'd seen the lights still on. Something inside her had tugged.
Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe something else.
She wandered slowly between the shelves, letting her fingertips trail over spines without reading the titles. It was quiet. Peaceful in a way she wasn't used to—no music, no chatter, no clinking mugs or footsteps overhead. Just the hum of the heater and the soft turning of a page somewhere deeper in the shop.
She followed it.
Back through the aisles Raine always moved through so confidently. Back past the poetry, the classics, the shelf that always smelled faintly of cedar. She found Raine in the corner near the window, crouched with a box of old books at her side, sorting them gently like someone handling memories.
Raine looked up, startled for half a second. Then her eyes softened.
"Didn't think you'd come without coffee."
Seraphina smiled lightly. "Didn't think you'd be on the floor."
"I organize better down here," Raine muttered, brushing dust off her jeans. "Some of these haven't seen daylight in years."
Seraphina knelt beside her, careful not to crowd.
They didn't talk for a minute. Raine pulled out an old hardback and opened it, revealing a faded inscription. Seraphina leaned in just slightly, enough to read over her shoulder.
To someone who reads even the quiet things.
Raine didn't say who it was from. She closed the book gently and set it aside.
"You really love this place," Seraphina said, not asking.
"I think it's the only thing I've let stay," Raine replied quietly. "Everything else... comes and goes."
The unspoken settled between them—like people. Like Celeste.
Seraphina didn't fill the silence. She just reached for a book from the box and handed it to Raine.
They sorted together. Without plans. Without meaning to.
At some point, Raine got up to make tea. Seraphina stayed in the corner with the books, turning one open at random. It was a story about gardens and stars and a girl who built a new world out of broken maps.
She smiled faintly.
It wasn't a book she would've picked on her own.
But maybe—just maybe—it was the book she didn't know she needed.
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