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A Novel Love Story

Book by Ashley Poston · 21 quotes · Book Boyfriend, Flowers, Bed And Breakfast

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A Novel Love Story Quotes

“And when I snagged his lip again, he groaned and held on to me tighter, breaking apart just long enough to growl, "Gentle, sweetheart," before he kissed me again. And fuck, I didn't know if it was his main character magic, or the fact that I'd never been called sweetheart with such hunger, but it burned deep in my middle, below where the butterflies had burrowed and lain dead for years. His heroine could have him tomorrow. I wanted to have him now, this second, in my m---”

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“Jasper frowned at the name. "Like, a meet-cute?" "At the end," I supplied. "It's when Darcy tells Elizabeth he loves her most ardently, when Mark brings Bridget a new diary, when Harry tells Sally he loves her, when Will buys Junie the inn." I smiled up at the name, putting my hands on my hips. "The grand romantic gesture." So, obviously, we named the bookshop the Grand Romantic.”

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“She took me through the parlors and the kitchen, and I marveled at the beautiful ceiling molding, the wooden banisters up to the second floor, the crystalline chandelier in the dining room. The furniture was tasteful and sparse, plastic over the fainting couches and coffee tables and wingback chairs, so that as they stood in stasis they wouldn't collect dust. The second floor was just as gorgeous, the rooms all themed in different flowers. The yellow daffodil room was my favorite. The wall with the headboard had an entire mural of huge daffodils blooming across it. Junie's handiwork, I was sure. Just like the mural on the side of Frank's Auto Shop, and the logo for the Grumpy Possum, and even Gail's bar scene. She showed me all the different rooms, each with a different flower theme and a different focal color--- lavender and coral and sage. The pink ones--- roses--- matched Junie's pastel hair.”

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“The loft looked different in the daylight. The cushions against the window seat were a bright mango, the hand-embroidered pillows stitched with the same color in blossoming wildflowers. The artisan had painted floral designs on the dresser, on the wardrobe, and around the floor-length mirror. Outside, the rain had given way to verdant foliage and strong redbrick buildings, interspersed with colorful colonial row houses and Victorian homes.”

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“He finally returned my gaze, and held it. A knot lodged in my throat, because he was closer than I expected, and his eyelashes were darker than I expected, and long, and there was a gray rim around the inside of his irises that looked like crowns of storm clouds surrounding a peridot. His gaze made the butterflies in my stomach shake off their hibernation and want to remember how to flutter again. Oh yes, he had to be the main character. Book boyfriend material, once someone fixed him up. But then: Where was his heroine?”

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“I paused at the top of the spiral staircase, and soaked in the view. In the daylight, the bookstore took on a new life. Motes of dust danced in the sunlight that streamed through the windows. It looked a lot cozier, as the colored glass window ornaments threw rainbows across the bookshelves and pirouetted across the hardwood floors like flecks of dappled sunlight on sand. Bookcases, filled to the brim, reached up to the ceiling, cluttered with so many colors and kinds of books, short and fat, long and wide, that it almost felt like an assault on the senses. The center of the bookstore was open to the second floor, where tall bookshelves towered so high you had to reach them with ladders. Heavy oak beams supported the roof. Planetariums and glass chimes and other ornaments hung from the rafters, catching the morning's golden light and throwing it across the store. The shelves were made from the same deep oak as the ceiling beams and the banisters on the second floor, signs hanging from the eye-level shelves detailing the different sections of the store: MEMOIR, FANTASY, SCI-FI, ROMANCE, SELF-HELP, NATURE, HOW-TO... This place was beautiful. I wondered, briefly, what it would be like to own a place like this. It was magical. A shop that sold the impossible inked onto soft white paper.”

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“And then we came to a stop in front of a large yellow Victorian house that sat, so stately, between two brick buildings, like a misplaced Lego piece, overgrown with ivy and bluebells and honeysuckle. The Daffodil Inn looked exactly how I'd imagined. The bed-and-breakfast was fresh and bright, the dentils all painted across the edging on the roof, the corbels replaced, the sawn spandrils and turned spandrils all given proper attention. The bay window was set with a stained-glass daffodil, the same one that encrusted the window in the front door. Around the inn, encasing it like a lovely cage, was a wrought-iron fence overgrown with ivy and honeysuckle that bled into the rose garden that surrounded the house.”

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“Once I crossed Charm Bridge, would this town even be here anymore? I wasn't sure, and with mounting certainty, every fiber of my being wanted to just get lost in this book. For a moment. For a few hours. For a night. I grabbed another onion ring, and curled Anders's jacket tighter around me. It smelled like woodsy cedar and chamomile tea and the old, loved pages of a childhood novel. It was the kind of scent I could drown in.”

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“And, to be honest, I thought that maybe being around you would help because you just exude happiness. You don't notice it, but you're always smiling when you're in this town. When you're talking to Junie or Ruby or Maya, or walking down the street, or eating honey taffy--- you're just... happy. I want to fell that again, too. So, so badly." I reached over and threaded my fingers through his, and squeezed his hands tightly. "If I could give it to you, I would." "It would taste sweet, I'm sure," he said, dropping his eyes to my mouth. "Like you." My stomach burned. I wanted him to kiss me again, sitting on this park bench, on such a lovely summer night. The fireflies danced around us, the wind winding through the trees, and when he set his eyes on me, I felt like the only story he wanted to read.”

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“This is..." I couldn't come up with the words. "My favorite place in town," he replied, and carefully we walked over to the edge of the bell tower. The sun was slowly sinking down between the rolling hills of the Catskills, purples and blues and pinks. "I've never been up here with anyone else." My heart fluttered. "No one?" He shook his head. "But I thought you'd appreciate it." I glanced up at him as the setting sun made the harsh lines of his face softer, the blond of his hair more gold. This was a special place--- meant for a grand romantic gesture. It was a place wasted on me. I was stealing all his heroine's moments, wasn't I? It was a sobering thought.”

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“The man was handsome, and he taught English in the same department as me--- and the second he showed up at my apartment and saw my bookshelf, he laughed. "You turn them around when guests come over, right?" he asked, motioning to the sanguine embraces and lusty women across the covers. He plucked one off the shelf--- a vintage-looking bodice ripper with Jason Baca on the cover, inches away from dragging his tongue across the woman's neck. "This Fabio's not exactly a Chuck Palahniuk." "That's not Fabio." "My mistake, they all look the same." I sighed. "Well, that's a pity." "Why?" "Because you have to leave. The door's there, if you've forgotten." He chuckled nervously. "I didn't... You're kidding." "No. I didn't judge you when you said you collected swords. You don't put them away when company comes over, do you? Besides, romance outsells every other genre--- by a lot, and it's still growing even when sales in every other genre are declining. In the US alone, romance sells about nineteen billion units a year." I plucked the paperback from his hand. "You can take that to your next fight club. Now there's the door.”

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“It was a short walk from the bridge to the waterfall, and I heard it long before I actually saw it, a loud, roaring sound that reverberated like rolling thunder. We passed under an outcropping of rock, and then there it was on the other side. Quixotic Falls. It took my breath away. The waterfall was so tall, I had to crane my neck to see the top of it. Shimmers of a rainbow reflected in the mist and sunlight, and the air was cool and damp. It felt good in the humidity of the afternoon. I closed my eyes, and enjoyed the mist that clung to my skin, coagulating into droplets. We walked along the underside of it, and the sunlight hit the falling water like it was glimmers of glass. The tunnel between the rock face and the waterfall was smooth and rounded from thousands of years of erosion. Vines crawled across the rocks--- morning glories and four o'clocks and honeysuckles. The waterfall poured down into a small watering hole that then slowly wormed its way into a larger river down the mountain. I knew this place would feel whimsical. Surrounding the swimming hole, the bright pink heather and stark white yarrow mixed with coneflowers and black-eyed Susans.”

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