Elsa Shore has fallen in love with a girl. This is her fourth life though, as she always dies whenever she turns nineteen. This is because she is a Traveller; an immortal being meant to keep watch over time - not meddle in it or the love lives of mo...
Elsa Shore was, above all things, a realist. She envisioned a future for herself as a proud lady who wrote novels to pass the time, owned at least two cats and consumed an almost lethal amount of sugary foods and caffeine drinks.
The only problem she'd had since birth was that Lady Life kept her from living out hers.
As a reincarnated immortal - in her 4th life, no less - Elsa had grown accustomed to living in the shadows.
Like an extra in a stage play, she remained unseen in the background while everyone else got their parts on the stage. Every time she reached eighteen, her story closed, and her life was snuffed out of her like a candle losing its flame.
Live a life!
Die at eighteen.
Live another life – this one a little better!
Die at eighteen.
Live again – only to - guess what? - die again at eighteen.
And on and on it went – a dance she'd unwillingly partake in four times with her 5th life and death date just around the corner.
She was essentially cursed to be alone.
That is until she met Nina Moores.
Beautiful, charming Nina with her lovely smile and lady-killer eyes.
They'd met on her 4th eighteenth birthday in a cozy café in New York called Coffee and A Kiss. Unruly graduates of Rowland High School were known to frequent the place, but Elsa was drawn to C&K not in hopes of landing her first kiss or drinking an overprized coffee – she was there to read.
Frank Novath – the man who owned the café had stacked the place with all the novels his late wife Anne had loved. According to Frank, Anne had died before her time, and he'd elected to fill the coffee shop they would have run together with all the books she'd loved so much.
As for the name, Frank had loved coffee, and Anne - well, she'd been a romance lover – preferring books that ended happily with couples that kissed.
The patrons who fancied C&K - well aware of the cafe's origin story - often brought their sweethearts to the place to have coffee and snog each other silly over their coffee mugs.
It was ironic then that Elsa sat in C&K now, sipping a screaming hot coffee, hoping to kiss the even hotter girl who sat across from her in a neighbouring booth – though she hid her desire to do so behind a copy of Love Your Life by Arthur Lyworth.
Having lived through four different reincarnations, Elsa was forever in awe of the power of books, seeking refuge behind their covers.
Books told stories that never changed - their pages held permanence and were forever bound by loving book jackets that protected the accounts within from the wear and tear of time.
Like her, books were timeless - magical even - and Nina Moore, the girl she longed to share her first kiss with, was no different.
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