Books' problems

‘Come on, you! Come back!’

‘No!’

‘I said come back! I haven’t finished yet!’ the old man cried infirmly balancing on the chair.

‘I am not coming back, sir! Not after all that disrespect I’ve received from you!’ someone answered.

The second person must have been short. One wouldn’t have noticed who was speaking, yet the fact that the voice was coming from the top of the bookcase was inarguable. This ancient, huge, wooden bookcase was standing in the room, covered by Persian carpets and warmed by a fireplace that seemed to breathe with fire.

‘I skipped only a few sentences, you capricious notebook!’

‘What? A Notebook? I would better jump into the fire than listen to this.’

Finally, the man reached the chatty book, which was hiding right under the ceiling. The gentleman in an old British suit stroked the book softly.

‘Not so mad anymore?’ the librarian wondered.

‘Never ever skip my paragraphs.’ the book’s response was cold but calm.

‘Those were describing nature and…’

‘If the author wrote it - he meant it. What time is it by the way?’

‘It’s about half past five’ the man answered.

‘Jesus Christ, Jack! We have the meeting at six o’clock! We have it in minutes and I am terribly unready! Where’s my new cover?’

While the 400-paged coffee-colored book was trying fumblingly to get rid of the dust that stuck to her pages, grunting something like ‘What a disregard, skipping paragraphs! Unbelievable!’ the librarian opened his chest and took out a beautiful glossy beige cover.

‘Now that’s an outfit!’ the book said putting on the new cover.

While the brown volume was dressing up, the librarian was cleaning the house. His modest accommodation consisted of a warm and cozy kitchen, a living room with a small fireplace, a dining room, two bedrooms one of which was not heated due to being uninhabited for years. Yet the master seemed to care about this small, empty room with slightly faded raspberry walls and a small bed. The bedroom was clean, dustless with a small bed covered with fresh linens. A small oak nightstand stood next to the bed. There was a book on it. This book was small but very bright and full of pictures. There were animals, dancing on the cover of this tiny book, lying calmly on the nightstand.

The old man was a librarian. His library was the only one in the town and it was separated from the rest of his housing. The gentleman could only get into his beloved workplace via a small door in his bedroom. Customers used the outer entrance.

The librarian had many books: hundreds, maybe thousands of them. And yet the small book lying on the oak nightstand in the abandoned raspberry bedroom was the only one, that was unable to talk.

This winter evening was freezing, but the sight of moonlight glistening in the fresh thick snow was truly mesmerizing. The full moon seemed to be bypassing the clouds and little snowflakes kept falling from the sky.

While cleaning the living room the old librarian threw more wood into the fireplace and was keeping his eye on the huge wooden clock, standing by the wall. Its minute hand was steadily approaching the number twelve. Suddenly, the bell rang. It was the bell from the library. At the same second the kettle whistled in the kitchen and the old man, being confused, went to the library first, but having figured it out decided to start with the kitchen. After he dealt with the kettle the librarian rushed to meet the guests.

‘Ah! Mr. Page! Nice to see you! What a cold weather? Huh?’ the first guest noticed. He was a huge man in his forties.

‘We came as you asked, Mr. Page, here are the books.’ The second person was a young lady of about 30-32.

‘Did you enjoy them?’

‘Indeed! Thank you, Mr. Page, they were exactly what I love about books!’ the young lady rushed to answer. She put four books on the desk.

‘Very interesting’ the fat man agreed, giving his book to the librarian.

On short conversation, the guests left and the old man, having grabbed their five books and a couple more from the shelf returned to the living room. He put all the books onto the huge dining table. The capricious book in her new beige cover was greeting her friends.

‘Hi, besties! Long time no see!’

The books started a lively conversation and the old man went to the kitchen:

‘I will fetch drinks and snacks!’ he said.

Due to the fireplace and a dozen gas lamps, the living room was light, warm, and cozy. There was already a bunch of napkins on the table, they were put here for the reading club members. The room had green walls with a couple of pictures hanging on them. There was a girl in two of these pictures. It was the same little girl, but the age was different: approximately 3 and 5 years old. In the other pictures, this girl was standing next to the librarian at his younger age with both smiling. In all of the pictures, she wasn’t older than six.

Soon the librarian brought tea and the snacks: glue cakes, ink eclairs, and sweet rubbers.

‘Thank you, Mr. Page!’ the books said with one voice.

‘Enjoy, girls.’

‘I declare the weekly reading club meeting open!’ stated the book in a new beige cover, ‘So, ladies, who read you this week? Monica, you go first!’

‘My guy was terrible! I will probably be getting bread crumbs from my pages for the rest of my life!’