We Are Inevitable by Gayle Forman (read aloud txt) 📕

ones are kaput—like Dress You Up, which still has its dusty mannequins in the window—and which are just closed.

Ira slows to wave to Penny Macklemore as she unlocks the hardware store, one of many businesses in town she owns. “Good morning, Penny!” He unrolls his window, showering us both with a blast of Northwest air, whose dampness makes it feel far colder than it actually is. “You’re up early.”

“Oh, I’m always up this early,” Penny replies. “That’s why I catch all the worms.”

“Well, we’re off to buy some new shelves,” Ira replies. “See you later.”

We drive toward the interstate, down the winding road, past the mills that used to employ half our town and now stand empty, partially reclaimed by the forests they once transformed into paper.

“Your mom and I bought all our furniture from Coleman’s,” Ira says as he merges onto the interstate. “It’s run by a husband and wife. Well, it was until Steve died. Now Linda runs it with her daughter.” Ira pauses. “Kind of like you and me.”

“Right,” I say, wondering if Linda Coleman’s daughter also has fantasies about her store going up in flames. Wood, after all, is as flammable as paper.

“No matter how long it’s been,” Ira continues, “Linda always remembers the last thing we bought. ‘Ira,’ she’ll say. ‘How’s that display table working out?’ Even if it’s been years.”

What Ira is talking about is the hand-sell. He is a big believer in the hand-sell. Once upon a time, he and Mom were very good at it. Before the asteroid came and ruined the business and frayed his brain, Ira had an almost photographic memory of what any given customer had read last, and therefore an uncanny ability to suggest what they should read next. So for instance, if Kayla Stoddard came in, stopping to chat with Mom about the brand-new coat (with tags on) Kayla had scored at the Goodwill, Ira would remember that the last two books Kayla had bought were Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, and would surmise, correctly, that she was on a Poirot kick and would quietly have Appointment with Death ready for her. He and Mom used to sell a lot of books this way.

“Linda will find us a good replacement for the broken shelf,” Ira says as a gasoline tanker tears past the Volvo on the uphill. “And then we can organize a bit here and there and turn things around.”

Ira often talks about turning things around. But what he really means is turning back time, to before the asteroid hit. And though I’ve read a fair number of books about the theoretical possibility of time travel, as far as I know, no one has invented a time machine yet. Still, I don’t blame him for wishing.

When we pull into Coleman’s, right at eight, the store is dark and locked. I run out to check the sign on the door. “It says it opens at nine,” I call to Ira.

“That’s odd.” Ira scratches his beard. “I could’ve sworn it was open from eight to four. Linda arranged the schedule like that so they could be home with the kids in the evening. Though the daughter, Lisa is her name,” Ira says, snapping his fingers at the synaptic connection, “she’s grown now, so maybe they changed the hours. Now we’re going to open late.”

He frowns, as if there will be people waiting eagerly at our doorstep the way we are waiting at Coleman’s.

“Well, since we have time to kill, do you want to get some breakfast?” I ask.

“Sure,” Ira agrees.

We get back in the car and drive toward a shopping center. On one end of the parking lot is one of those giant health food emporiums. On the other side is a bookstore. Its windows are jammed with artful displays of new titles, smiling author photos advertising upcoming readings, a calendar of events. All signs of a bookshop thriving—in Amazon’s backyard, no less—having survived algorithms, pandemics, TikTok. A reminder that not all species went extinct after the asteroid hit. Just the dinosaurs.

The sight of the store deflates Ira, who slumps in his seat and refuses to get out of the car. “Just go grab me something.”

The health food store is decked out for Halloween: gourds and pumpkins and artisanal candy with “real sugar” because apparently that’s a selling point. The prepared-food area is like a museum: fresh-cut fruit symmetrically laid out, a buffet of scrambled eggs and fluffy biscuits warming under a heat lamp. Ten dollars a pound. The egg breakfast at C.J.’s is five bucks, including juice and coffee.

I set off for something more affordable. And it’s there, between kombucha scobies and shade-grown coffee, I see it: a table with records for sale. The cheapest one is twenty bucks. They go up, significantly, from there.

A tattooed hipster mans the table. He wears a fedora with a feather in it. I can’t tell if it’s a Halloween costume or just his “ironic” style.

“You collect vinyl?” he asks.

“Me? No!” I tell him. “I don’t like records, or CDs, or music, for that matter.”

The hipster rears back as if I just informed him that I mutilate kittens for fun. “What kind of person doesn’t like music?”

My reply is automatic, an age-old distinction I don’t even question: “A book person.”

Around eight forty-five, bellies full of on-sale granola bars, we pull back into the Coleman’s parking lot just as a guy wearing a red vest is unlocking the metal gate. “Hello,” Ira calls, leaping out of the car. “Are you open?”

“We open at nine.”

“Could we come in now?” Ira replies. “I’m an old friend of Linda’s.”

“Who’s Linda?”

“Linda Coleman. Owner since nineteen seventy . . .” Ira points to the sign, the words dying in his mouth as he sees the placard beneath the Coleman’s sign that reads UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT.

“Oh, yeah, they sold the store,” the guy tells us.

“To your family?” Ira asks unsteadily.

“To Furniture Emporium,” he replies.

“Does your family own that?” Ira asks.

“No, it’s the chain.