On the Scene is a recurring reportage on a practice-focused cultural or artistic event taking place now or coming up soon.
Framed by an awning of technicolor bougainvillea that blooms in defiance of frigid March, Lovestruck Books beckons readers into an expanse much larger on the inside than its coy exterior would have you presume. As I descend into Cambridge’s most openly horny public space, I pass shrines of merch–”Live, Laugh, Lesbian” stickers, Taylor Swift Eras Tour pajamas, “Into the Wine, Not the Label” baseball caps, a ladle that reads “I Love to Stir the Pot.” Soon, “general fiction” gives way to esoteric and dare I say freakier delights. I quickly duck the gaze of a couple cuddling on the banquets, their book of astrology most certainly pretext for a proposition, squeeze past a group of young women murmuring “You have to embrace it!” and disperse a few preteens giggling by the erotica. I wonder what they are putting in the water, or in this case, George Howell Coffee & Wine Bar’s signature Red Velvet drink. But I’m not here for the lifestyle—I refuse to be a dilettante.
Yet unlike in the real world, at Lovestruck, a search for romance leaves one overwhelmed with choice. I need help, bad, and so approach a bookseller for advice. I exercise my own creative liberties: I tell her I’m looking for a gift for a “relative who’s in her 30’s, owns her own AI dating company and has been burned before.” The bookseller nods, “What tropes is she into?” I need clarification, so she rattles off a few: forced proximity, love triangle, amnesia, enemies to lovers—“Yes, that one!” She then gamely recommends three titles all for which, she assures me, romance “is not actually the focus.” As in, the female protagonists have their own jobs, their own lives. They’re too busy to chase or even yearn but by happenstance and often against their own will, are drawn inexorably towards love. Perhaps herein lies the heart of the fantasy: that no matter how much of a person you manage to become, true romance is destined to find you and, in the end, strike you down.
Maz Do is a writer living and working in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.
Article photos by Maz Do