Morning light streamed through the tall windows of The Dust Jacket, painting golden squares on the wooden floors. Elara stood behind the counter, hands wrapped around a chipped navy mug. She hadn't slept.
How could she?
Rowan had walked back into her bookstore.
Into her life.
And hadn't recognized her.
Not even a flicker of memory.
Elara had wanted that. Had begged the magic for it. But now, with the ache back in her chest and Rowan's smile burned into her thoughts, all she wanted was to undo everything.
She traced the rim of her mug slowly, remembering the warmth of Rowan's fingers doing the same thing on late nights when they sat across from each other, reading quietly. Remembering the shape of her voice, the way she said "baby" like it belonged only to Elara.
And the fight.
The last one.
The screaming. The crying. The way Elara had closed herself off, again, and how Rowan had begged her not to.
How she'd left.
And how, hours later, Elara had found the pen. How the hurt had wrapped around her so tightly, it had choked out everything else.
"Let me forget her," she'd written. And just like that, the pain vanished. Until now.
Now, she felt everything again.
The door chimed.
She looked up, heart already in her throat.
It wasn't Rowan. Just a courier with a small parcel wrapped in old twine and brown paper. He handed it over wordlessly, nodded, and left.
Elara turned the package over in her hands. No return address. No name. Just a red wax seal in the shape of a rose.
Her stomach twisted.
Back in the office, she peeled it open.
Inside was a book she'd never seen before. The leather cover was cracked, brittle, smelling of something older than dust. No title. Just another sentence scrawled across the first page in that same eerie ink:
"Memory is not the enemy. Fear is."
She didn't know why, but her hands trembled.
At the bottom of the page, another phrase in smaller script:
"She remembers in dreams."
Elara's breath caught.
Rowan.
That night, it rained again. And as if fate were playing tricks on her, the bell over the door rang precisely at 7:47 p.m.
She didn't even have to look.
It was Rowan.
Same dark jeans, same soft sweater, same expression like she was searching for something she couldn't quite name.
"Sorry to bother you again," she said, shaking rain from her curls. "I meant to come earlier, but... I ended up walking."
"You're not a bother," Elara said quickly.
Rowan blinked at her. "You sure?"
Elara nodded. "It's just me here most nights. Company's nice."
Rowan stepped inside, glancing around. "This place is beautiful. It smells like stories."
Elara smiled faintly. "That's lavender, ink, and nostalgia."
Rowan laughed. "That sounds like a candle I'd buy."
They stood in silence for a beat too long.
"Do you want tea?" Elara offered. "I always brew some at night. Keeps the books from feeling lonely."
Rowan tilted her head. "Do books get lonely?"
"I think the unread ones do."
Rowan considered that, then followed her to the counter. "Okay. Let's keep them company."
They sat at the reading nook near the window, two steaming mugs between them. Rowan looked out into the rain, her fingers curled around her cup like it was the only warmth she had.
"I've been having these weird dreams," she said suddenly. "That's why I came back."
Elara froze.
"Dreams?" she asked carefully.
Rowan nodded. "Yeah. This bookstore. This street. It felt like... déjà vu. But stronger. Like muscle memory. Like I'd been here a thousand times before."
Elara's throat tightened.
Rowan took a slow sip. "There's always this woman in the dreams. I never see her face. But I feel her. You know?"
Elara nodded, barely trusting herself to speak.
"Sometimes," Rowan continued, voice softer now, "I think I hear her laughing. And I feel... happy. Safe. Then I wake up crying."
Elara's eyes stung.
Rowan looked at her then, frowning gently. "I must sound crazy."
"No," Elara whispered. "Not at all."
Rowan studied her.
"I'm Rowan, by the way. I never said that last night."
Elara smiled despite the ache. "I know."
"You know?" Rowan blinked. "Wait, have we met before?"
Elara hesitated. The air between them thickened.
"…No," she lied.
But her hands were shaking beneath the table.
After Rowan left that night, Elara sat alone in the store for hours, surrounded by shelves that had once witnessed love, now echoing with silence.
She pulled out the journal again.
She didn't write this time.
Instead, she flipped through its pages like someone begging it to speak.
On one page, ink had appeared without her writing it.
"Love remembers, even when we erase it."
She touched the words with trembling fingers.
The magic was unraveling.
Rowan was remembering.
And magic like love was never perfect.
It had cracks. And through those cracks, truth leaked back in.
Elara closed the journal and stared at the darkened window, her reflection barely visible through the glass.
She had asked to forget because of remembering hurt.
But now?
Now, forgetting was worse.
The next morning, she left a note taped to the door:
Closed until further notice.
Then she packed the journal, the pen, and a bottle of wine into her bag and took the subway to a hill she hadn't visited in months.
It was the park where she and Rowan had their first kiss. It overlooked the city. It smelled like pine and old promises.
She sat on the bench where Rowan once read her poetry—whispers in the dusk, followed by breathless laughter.
She opened the journal.
But instead of writing, she whispered.
"I want her to remember."
The wind rustled the trees.
No reply.
She waited.
Hours passed. The bottle stayed untouched. The pen is unmoved.
And yet, when she finally looked down at the journal again…
One new line had appeared:
"Then you must remember first."