Chapter 25 Summary and Analysis

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

This chapter is a flashback set six months before the main events of the novel. Izzy is working the coffee counter at Pegasus Books, a job she holds while presumably still in high school. Three months have passed since her first conversation with Marlowe, and she has developed an intense crush on him. She catches herself staring at him as he sits in his usual leather chair, reading a recent translation of Crime and Punishment and sipping a foamy latte.

Izzy's coworker Avery, who has worked at the bookstore since she was sixteen, teases her about a heart Izzy once drew on Marlowe's to-go cup—a drawing Izzy hastily turned into an apple before Avery could see it. Avery criticizes Marlowe's appearance and his drink order, calling it too fancy and too feminine. Izzy pushes back, arguing that coffee doesn't have a gender and that liking whipped cream says nothing about a person's sexuality. Avery dismisses her, calling Izzy one of those