You just read a book about two people who showed up.

That's it. That's the whole thing. They showed up on Tuesdays and Thursdays and sat across from each other and drank bad coffee and good tea and didn't die. The most radical act in this book is breakfast.

I wrote Same Time Thursday because I wanted to write a love story that didn't know it was a love story until it was too late to stop it. I wanted to write about grief that doesn't end and identity that doesn't resolve and a dog with terrible boundaries and a woman who names a plant like it's the bravest thing she's ever done... Well, because it is.

If you're reading this, you stayed. You stayed through the floor and the ceiling and the crack and the three weeks and the cold tea and the collar. You stayed the way Dottie stays. The way Theodore stays. The way two people in a booth stayed when everything in them said don't.

Thank you for that.

If this book made you feel something, if you laughed at Theodore or cried at the cardamom or held your breath at the foghorn, vote for it. Booklist it. Send it to the one person you know who needs to hear that showing up is enough. That's how stories like this survive: not through algorithms but through someone saying read this to someone who needs it.

If you want more of my work, REMEMBER ME TO THE PRIEST, JUDAS, and WHITE BABY are waiting for you. Different worlds, same philosophy: nothing convenient, nothing neat, everything earned.

For news, early chapters, behind-the-scenes chaos, and the occasional unhinged author update, join the Inner Circle at jessechinedu.com and subscribe to my Substack @indig0jesse.

Find me everywhere - Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Discord, Reddit, YouTube - @indig0jesse. Come say hello. Tell me which chapter broke you. I want to know.

The light stays on.

- Jesse.