Mandy
Books meant so much to me when I was fifteen and my father refused to be my father anymore. Books meant so much more to me when my mom's husband refused to be her husband anymore. But never have they been the dearest to me as the time when I've become an orphan. Probably because reading about fantasy was my only escape from the reality that I refused to except in a place I could never call home. It was far from home, it was hell.
Hell, reminds me of the text message I've received an hour ago. I couldn't even step inside the library. I thought it will be Chris, wondering about my proposal. If there was any, the whole world would've known. At least all the people who make up me world. But it wasn't from her, it was Jake. I still don't understand what he wants to say after ruining everything, I don't even dare to look at it. I've been frozen on the concrete floor beneath. I try to be strong, but strong word isn't strong enough to the amount of strength that I need to survive him. I want to block his number and never see him again. I've given him five years, they are supposed to mean something, if I ever have the answer to that, maybe I'll be able to move on.
I pulled up all the threads of strength there was left in me after his explosion to glance at my screen. "Mandy, I'm sorry?"
Sorry? A fucking sorry?
I smashed my phone against the hard concrete. What the hell this sorry means? It ricocheted into a million pieces, still nothing compared to what he's done to my heart. I don't even know what I expected from someone like him. he must regret dumping all the perks dating me got him.
I don't think library is good for me, I'm too restless to be quiet right now. but there is something that can be of help, the shop there, right beside. Wine shop.
Maybe I should let it go. Maybe a glass won't be so bad, maybe that is all I need. There can be a hundred of excuses to drink, but I needed only one, I want to forget him. just one day. Just one day that will never end. Just one day when I don't have to worry about Jake, when I don't have to think about him, or mom, or dad.
Red wine is my least favorite, it reminds me of blood and mom and slit wrist. But I know how good it works when you want to get drunk. Maybe I will regret it tomorrow. But why should I worry about something that might not happen?
I fresh bottle of wine usually isn't something I would opt to take to a library in a normal day, but also, if it was a normal day, I wouldn't have bought it at all. And I'm not planning on drinking and being miserable in the suite all alone. So, what the hell. I'm doing all the things I will hate myself for in the morning better make a perfect use of the trash-day of my life. maybe I'll run into a guy more handsome than Jake, I will take him to the hotel suite and fuck him in all the places Jake would've fucked that girl. now that would be a perfect end.
There was no one in the library, it was still open to enter. So, I did, no one stopped the wine to enter either. So, it entered too.
This… is… a… different… world. Different and old full of things I would never see in any modern library. But this is all but modern, there is not a single wall that is left without a book shelf, almost like the one making it had a weird thought of making shelves that aren't just as high as the ceiling, but they are in the ceilings as well. like the gravity doesn't affect them at all. Almost like the branches of an enormous trees, all of them moving in different directions, in different shapes. All this, although completely unexpected from the outside, it's more serene than being in a crowded library with lots of people looking in the book, meaning of something they can't understand. The mist is even different, like the ancient pages of book and ink somehow has been blended into a fine liquid and been spread into the air.
"Hi," I jumped at the sharp voice, completely unexpected in a public library. I turned to look at the eerily tall woman with ginger hair and pale skin looking at me. what a sight? I've asked for distraction, and I've got one.
"Hi!" I'm almost terrified to see someone when I'm holding a bottle of alcohol, she is not someone I would want to see on a normal day. Not because she wasn't pretty, she was plenty pretty. But she's too tall, too white, too shimmery, too loud to really be a normal person I see regularly. She eyes the bottle almost offended or defeated. Like it's something that happens again? Like people often come inside but not to read in a library, but just because they are too drunk to know it's a library. Why won't she be? It's not a bar.
"I think you're in a wrong address." Her gaze aligned to the bottle that was in my hand.
"I'm sorry." I hide it behind my book. Too late for that though. "I thought I was open all day."
"It is." Her eyes slowly moved to my face, and when they did, I can see the pity that clouded on her face. almost like… almost like she can read my emotions. "Are you upset?" did she really read my emotions.
"What?"
"I'm a great face reader. I can see you're in distress." She smiles and I won't lie, but I actually love her smile. her teeth were too white, too aligned, too perfected to be natural. And I love it. "Don't worry, I have a perfect book for you." she holds my hand and drag me to the backmost portion of her world. Almost like she's taking me to a place she doesn't let anyone go. "This is my personal collection." She waves a hand to the shelves resembling the ones in the front. Just the difference, all the books here has a modern cover but none of them seems familiar. And there are hundreds of them here and I'm a woke reader who had hundreds of books in her wishlist. How can none of them feels familiar?
"What are these books?" I ask pulling one of them from the shelf. "I've never seen them." the covers shone like it's been made of diamond dust.
"This is my personal collection." She grins with pride. "I don't usually bring customers here, only a few special ones, but I think this place is all you need. I have a perfect book for you." she walks to the corner to grab a stair dragged it to the middle of the floor. She raised her brown-orange skirt that dragged with the floor up and began raising up the stairs. The staircase tall enough to reach the ceiling. I'm watching her fetching me the one from right in the middle. It's too far to point out the exact colour of the book, or even see any familiarities, but it was definitely in the hardest place to fetch.
Before I know she was off the stairs. "Read this."
"Love, Revenge?" I read the title in the cover. "I've never heard of it before."
"It's because it doesn't exist."
"What?" she laughed like I'm the crazy one here to find the logic in her comment.
"Don't worry, I'm just kidding. All the books here are different from the books you will see ever again. My father collected them. some of them are modern, some are old, and some are long forgotten. But all the kinds of book you will find nowhere, you will find them here. Okay?"
"Okay! I guess." I have a feeling that she is drunk. "Thanks, I'll read it." there is something about it, whenever anyone recommend me something, it completely falls off my wishlist. She is pressuring me too much to ever want to read this weird book. She is weirder. Torture chamber of that hotel sounds better suddenly.
"Do you need a glass?" she pointed at the bottle.
"Oh! No, I'm fine. Thanks. Actually, I was wondering if I can borrow this book and come back to return you later."
"No," she almost screamed, or held back her full scream from fear of me freaking out. Too bad I'm freaking out. "I mean, I was going to ask you a favor. Please watch the shop for me, I'll be back in an hour just until then stay here, and then you can go."
"An hour?"
"Just as hour."
She is the one who creeps me out. If she is gone, I think it will be fine for me. "Alright."
"Oh! You're such a darling."
Thank god, she left. After she was gone, I find myself a safe place to sit on a perfect stop so I can watch if anyone's coming inside without having to move an inch. That only person I'm watching out for is the owner herself.
**
I've been turning pages after pages, tears dripping on the pages. How can something that is so beautiful can also be so heart-breaking? Here, I've been trying to run away, to forget Jake and there are people like Jake even in this book. I can't imagine marrying someone who only loves you for your money. I would've been Ed, I would've married Jake just how Ed was ready to marry Camille. Both of us are just fools, or maybe both of them are too great of an actress. They definitely belong together in a world.
I unscrewed the cork and chugged think gulps of the liquid I refused to familiar myself with. I don't know how much I've had, I don't know how I was able to stop myself but I began to feel these weird tingles creeping up my feet. Up and up, to my calves, to my knees, my thigh, my stomach. Up and up until I'm drenched with it. completely drenched and soaked and on the floor.