Chapter One: The Bookstore

I wasn’t looking for anyone that day. Honestly, I was just killing time. The little shop in the San Francisco Ferry Building was tucked between a florist and a baker, lit like a secret. Smelled like rain, flowers and a dozen unread stories.

She didn’t rush either.

She came in like she belonged there—dripping coat, flushed cheeks, fingers already unfastening the top button like she needed to breathe. Her eyes flicked across the titles like they were old friends. She moved with the quiet confidence of someone who knew exactly where to find what she needed. And yet… she lingered.

Near the fantasy shelf, she reached for the same book I had just started to extend my hand toward…

Our fingers brushed. She didn’t flinch.

She looked up, met my gaze, and smiled like we were in on the same joke. “Everyone thinks they’re the first to find this one.”

“I wasn’t,” I said.

“But you wanted to be.” she replied quickly.

She let go of the book, letting me take it. Her fingers, warm from her gloves, brushed mine again—felt intentional this time.

“Do you ever think about how characters meet?” she asked, eyes lingering on mine. “Like… if the timing had been off by a second, the whole story wouldn’t exist.”

“All the time,” I said. “Those first pages matter more than people think.”

She nodded, thoughtful. “I like when they meet by accident. Like fate had to shove them together.”

“Even if it’s only for a chapter?” she asked curious.

“Especially then.” I replied, noticing how she was drawing me in with every question.

She smiled—something secret tucked behind it.

“I don’t usually talk to strangers in bookstores,” she said, almost like she was trying to convince herself it was a bad idea. Her cheeks flushed a soft pink. “But there’s something about you that makes it feel like I’ve met you before.”

I smiled. “Maybe in a past life. One with better weather.”

She laughed lightly, then caught herself and cleared her throat. “I’m not actually from here. I’m just in the city for the day. My uncle passed, and I have to go back home… to Petaluma.”

She paused, looking slightly embarrassed for a second, like she'd shared too much. but then continued anyways, “Apparently he left me his little farm. Chickens. A fig tree. I don’t know the first thing about either.”

Her voice trailed off into a quiet laugh.

I waited. Gave her space to decide what came next.

She blinked, then smiled like she’d forgotten why she came in at all. “Sorry, I didn’t even tell you my name, did I?”

“No,” I said, gently. “But I’m Ashen.”

She opened her mouth like she might respond, but a voice called from across the store.

“Honey, we need to go if we’re going to make the ferry!”

A woman—older, elegant, urgent—stood at the door, holding an umbrella.

She looked at me again, eyes dancing somewhere between regret and curiosity.

“I should go,” she said.

Then, just before stepping away, she leaned in with a smirk. “If this is a book,” she said, her voice just above a whisper, “maybe we’ll meet again in Chapter Two.” She took one step back, with a twinkle in her eyes. “You know where you could find me.”

She turned, buttoning her coat as her mother reached for her hand, tugging her gently but urgently toward the door. In her rush, she moved too fast—and something small slipped from her head.

A silver hairpin. Ornate. Velvet. Something that looked like one of a kind.

It hit the floor with the softest clink, but neither of them noticed.

By the time I realized what it was, she was already stepping into the storm, pulled along by urgency, by time, by a ferry that wouldn’t wait.

And just like that, she was gone.

I didn’t get her name.

But I got the feeling that this is a beginning.

Chapter Two: The Next Chapter Calling Me

I didn’t get a chance to say it in the moment, but I live in Petaluma too.

And I know how this sounds—like I got swept up in a moment and didn’t know how to let it go. But it wasn’t like that. I’m not some hopeless romantic chasing a ghost. It wasn’t obsession. It was... a pull. Something deeper. Quieter. A feeling that wouldn’t loosen its grip, no matter how I tried to shake it. Like the world had nudged me, gently but firmly, toward a moment that wasn’t finished yet.

I told myself I’d go back to the city bookstore, just once more. Then again. And again. I passed it every week during my commute, sometimes stepping in, pretending I needed something. But it was always the same. Same hum of quiet music. Same soft light. But she wasn’t there.

I kept the hairpin in my coat pocket. Not out of sentimentality—at least not at first. But touching it reminded me it wasn’t all in my head.

Eventually, I stopped going.

Instead, I started searching closer to home.

Sonoma County has a few bookstores. Bigger ones. The kind where it’s easy to miss someone, and even easier to forget them. I went to each of them. Browsed the romance section. The fantasy shelves. The newer releases. Sometimes I bought something just to stay longer. Other times I brought a book and pretended to read, hoping I could turn the page to the next chapter.

I even embarrassed myself once or twice—trying to explain the story, describe her, the way she looked. The flushed cheeks. The silver hairpin. They wanted to help. But none of them could say they had seen her.

Still, I kept going.

I’d sit with a coffee, rereading old stories and pretending they were signs. Hoping to bump into her again. But deep down, I knew… I couldn’t keep waiting in doorways hoping fate would bring her through.

And then, one evening, it came to me—not like an idea, more like a calling.

A way to bring her to me. To bring anyone like her to me.

The Velvet Chapter.

A bookstore not just to sell stories, but to create one.

Mine.

Ours.

If she ever finds it… she’ll know.

And I’ll be there—waiting, watching the door..

Every month, I’ll leave her a letter. Tucked between the pages. Behind the counter. Somewhere only she would think to look.

A story within the story.

A way to say what I never got to.