The Dead Romantics

Florence goes to the Bar None and meets the owner, who says her dad came in for Thursday poker night and always bragged about Florence’s writing. He introduces her to Bruno, the Elvis impersonator her dad liked, and Bruno agrees to sing at her dad’s funeral.

Ben approaches Florence as she stands outside the cemetery. She notices that he wears a gold wedding ring on a chain around his neck. He suggests that maybe he’s haunting Florence to help her believe in love again. Florence tells him she doesn’t need help and thinks: “I tried love. It didn’t work. The end” (150).

They pass the bookstore, which has a poster of Lee’s book in the window. There is also a big stack of Ann Nichols books, including the ones Florence wrote. They go inside. Florence asks Ben how he became a romance editor. He says he read a romance book once that changed him, and he realized he wanted to help publish other books like that. Florence asks if her book was one of the good ones and Ben says it was.

Florence promises she’ll try to finish Ann’s manuscript and is rewarded by his smile. Florence realizes, for the first time in a year: “I wanted to learn a new story.