The Love That Dare Not Speak Its Name

“When you said antiques you, uh, you weren’t kidding,” a voice called out as the bell above Azariah’s door jingled.He poked his head out from where he’d been re-sorting his books and smiled. “Oh, hello!” he said, quickly navigating his way out of the maze of bookshelves that filled up one half of his shop. He wiped his suddenly rather damp palms against his pants (dark brown wool with a light tartan print, today, and a nice blue turtle neck under a lovely cable-knit jumper—no bowtie, it was casual Friday ). “How lovely it is to see you!”It was the man. The one from the flower shop. The one who Azariah had forgotten to ask the name of but had later looked up on The Internet, which was perfectly acceptable behaviour because they were neighbours and it’d been exceedingly impolite to have not asked in the first place, so.