The two men stood in the one spot conspicuously free of shelves. Open, unsacred, lifeless space, as far from books as it is possible to be in a bookstore. A no-man’s land of sorts, but there they stood in this patch of space meant for rearranging thoughts or deciding where to go next. At first glance, they seemed to be there to grab something quickly and leave, or perhaps to wait. In each other’s presence, a momentary reprieve from feeling out of place.

We, my daughter and I, were there to rearrange our thoughts, to mend our worn edges. Words might carry us someplace softer where we could escape into neatly bound pages where someone else’s problems — smaller or larger, didn’t matter — offered strange, familiar solace. The bookstore smelled of coffee and, in that section we were trying to pass through, cologne.

They were aggressively unremarkable, those men. Able to demand attention without effort, to compress the air around them into a self-satisfied density. Loud. Confident. Convinced. The kind of people who view their success as an inevitability, etched into marble, affixed in permanence rather than scribbled on the side of a red Solo cup.

Perhaps that was the cologne talking.

They stood in that bookless space, wearing athleisure wear of curated ease, possibly worn for the exertion of “watching the kids” for a bit.

Forgive me, sometimes I read too much into things. It was a bookstore, after all.

They were comfortable and loud, their presence as much volume as it was space, somehow sprawling across this nearly empty bookstore so close to closing. They were careless as they dismantled a woman one of them had encountered — socially, professionally, who knows? Didn’t matter.

“She had too much plastic surgery,” First Guy said. “Her face looked tight. Fake.” He sculpted the air with exaggerated movements. “She looked like a lemon,” he added, pleased with himself. “Which is fitting.”

Other Guy laughed. “Yeah. I totally get it.”

Encouraged, First Guy fumbled for more analogies, more ways to articulate how deeply unacceptable this woman was, what with her face and everything else about her. He pulled his features into grotesque imitations of whatever displeased him about her, which seemed to be quite a bit.

My face never keeps its mouth shut and must have betrayed me. It always does. A flicker of something, too small to name but enough to catch their attention. Disapproval, maybe. Or disgust. Some merciless and mirthless conveyance of this again?

I warranted enough attention for them to shift their bodies and pause their conversation, their gaze heavy.

What did they see? Stitches, scars, gravity, broken things, healed places of a full human?

Nah. Definitely another lemon. Or maybe a yuzu or a blood orange. I haven’t had work done on my body unless you count the pieces of bone, flesh, and pain-points removed, so they were left only the sour.

We considered each other. I’d guess they were thinking I was intruding without smiling. They would probably not guess I’d had another day of fighting tiny, bothersome dragons.

Their interest faded. Their laughter resumed, quieter now. Slick. Greasy.

I walked away to catch up with my daughter.

She stood in the Young Adult section trailing her fingers over the spines of books. She held herself carefully, her shoulders drawn inward in the way she does when she’s trying not to let disappointment show. Her fingers lingered on one book, then another. She’d had a hard day, the kind with sharp teeth and scales. The kind a mom can’t fix, except by standing between her and the world long enough to let her breathe.

We searched for books — anything, really — that offered comfort, distraction, or, failing that, instructions for building a trebuchet from empty bags of Nerds Gummy Clusters.

She didn’t notice the men. She didn’t register their voices lofting over the shelves. If she did, it was part of the din of the day.

I’d said nothing to them. Me. Lady Speak Your Mind.

Of course I didn’t. Because it wasn’t my place. Because the parking lot was dark. Because I’m not their mother. Because risk analysis. Because this is the way of things.

Strategy? Failure? Quiet calculus of motherhood?

If my daughter weren’t there. If it were daylight. If I were ferocious, less aware of what happens when certain men decide you’ve embarrassed them. Maybe I would have said something.

Probably not. But maybe.

But if I did, it would’ve been presented as a possible joke. Lemon Face clearly owes you an apology. How dare she. Big smile. Plausible deniability. Pointless.

But I didn’t. Of course I didn’t.

When we left, they were one shelf away from the self-help section. The Universe, perhaps also running on empty, only offered dad jokes.

We, my daughter and I, left without books and went home, a place where tiny, bothersome dragons give us passage and say, “We’ll catch you tomorrow.”