The Golden Library

Alisha pushed herself but it was no use. Running as fast as she could, lungs aflame, she couldn't reach the #7 bus, a block ahead of her and picking up speed. She had missed it. 45 minutes until the next one.

She slowed down and bent over to catch her breath. That bus was early, which really shouldn't be allowed. Just as she started to regain her equilibrium, she felt the next indignity of the day. A fat raindrop hit the back of her head and slid forward to her cheek. She groaned and looked up at her refuge options across the street. Coffee shop or library? She hadn’t had time to count her tips in her haste to make it to the bus, but it certainly didn't feel like a coffee shop sort of day. The second raindrop came, then the third and fourth and suddenly she was running again, hoping that her shoes would stay dry. There was nothing worse than a swollen foot in a wet shoe.

The library lobby was windows on 3 sides. As she sat on the wooden bench, the rain began in earnest, soaking the windows like a hose had been turned on. The noise was deafening. As her heart rate returned to normal, Alisha stood up. A groan slipped out as her back struggled to overcome gravity. She never hurt at work. She was too busy. She'd never understood the phrase "run off her feet" until she started waiting tables. Now she felt every bone in those feet. She imagined her vertebrae scraping and grinding into alignment as she stood. Oxidized was a word that sprang into her mind occasionally, like a bad penny from high school chemistry. She was oxidizing.

As she passed through the doors into the main body of the library, the smell of childhood afternoons and book dust rushed forward to meet her. Her lungs expanded almost painfully. Her shoulders fell.

The library was almost empty. There were a few men on the computers and a librarian spoke with an old woman at the desk, but the sound was drowned out by the rain falling in sheets on the roof. The edgeless roar of the storm had the effect of silencing the space; nothing could be heard. Alisha grabbed her phone to check the weather. Would she ultimately need to stand in the storm, waiting on the next #7? She stared and stared, dragging her finger down the screen mindlessly, but the radar image never appeared. I guess it'll end when it ends. The same thing happened when she tried to check the bus schedules.

She browsed the shelves passively. The library closed in 3 hours and she had nowhere to be. Maybe a novel would grab her attention. She passed up and down the aisles. As she turned a corner, she found herself in a darker wing of the library, somewhere between fiction and self-help. Normally, the little nook would have been awash with sunlight from the massive window to her right, but the storm had reversed day and night. Alisha didn't mind. The dim, quiet space felt like a balm or a cool drink when thirsty. She turned down an even darker aisle and began to run her fingertips along the spines, the little thib, thib sounds pulling her mouth into a little smile.

She began to look at the titles and tried to imagine the books inside. The Baron stood. Chemical and then south. Sugar is not a war. The Dewey decimal system seemed to be missing from this aisle and the titles were obtuse. Every time she thought she understood where she was, the next title led her down a different path. Her fingertips continued along until they hit a thin black volume with no title on the spine. The moment they touched the book, the smells of the library- the dust, the familiar industrial cleaning solution, the recycled air- exploded forward and mingled strongly with a blast of ozone, like lightning had struck somewhere nearby.

Alisha sat down a bit like a marionette without strings. She opened the book and found it was more like a diary. She searched the front page for an owner's name but saw nothing. In the beginning, she only skimmed the pages. It felt intrusive to look at a journal, even if it was left in the library to be found. But she couldn't stop. The book was filled with the intimate and the mundane. Sketches, the beginnings of poems and song lyrics written next to to-do lists and gift ideas. As she went back over the earlier pages, her growing feeling of intimacy sharpened and twisted. She felt certain that was her grocery list. The wry observations about people on public transit seemed familiar and as she read them, grey little pictures of the people flickered in her mind like old photographs of events only dimly remembered. The concept of the owner of the diary melted with every page until it saturated her. Her heart raced. Whose diary was this if it wasn't hers? Or how did she have a diary without ever writing one?

She turned a page and all doubt ended. Alisha had, in high school, gone on a youth group trip to Italy. She had spent most of the trip wishing they would stop moving so she could spend some time drawing or at least committing images to memory instead of rushing pointlessly from landmark to landmark. Splashed across two pages was a sketch of the Duomo, started in hesitant pencil and edged in with pen. It was a style she used in high school and the errors of perspective were the same frustrating ones that she had never been able to overcome. It was, down to its imperfections, the image that a 15 year-old her would have drawn.

Was there another Alisha, one that got separated from the group in Italy, who stayed behind to draw? Where was this Alisha now? She flipped to the front again, hoping for and fearing contact info, but it was still blank. She searched for other clues. The pages, if they were retellings of her own life, were non sequential. There were no addresses. She saw no narrative. If there was no other Alisha, did the book just collect her ideas? If she looked at it tomorrow, would she see some reference to oxidation or libraries or rain?

She held it in her hand, turning it one way then the other. Her finger noticed one of the pages near the back was folded and she turned to it anxiously. The corners were turned in and the resulting pointed edge was turned in several times as well so the result was a small trapezoid of paper. At the blunted apex, almost fully hidden, was a glossy bit of brightly colored paper. Alisha unfolded deliberately. It is giving me something. As her fingers finished unwrapping, she recognized the slip as a lottery ticket.

For the first time since her hands touched the book, she sat up and looked ahead. The rain had stopped. The lights were now all artificial, since night had fallen. The library was silent. She grabbed her phone to check the numbers and realized that her hands were shaking. She needed her phone to work. It was late, much later than she realized but she had 25 minutes until the library closed. Maybe she could use the computer if the phone service was still bad. Then instantly, the lottery numbers were there. She checked the first number and it matched. She checked the next one and the next. They were matches. The fourth matched. Two left to go. Alisha closed her eyes and hunched over, nauseated with hunger and excitement. She opened a single eye and compared. The fifth number matched but the final number did not. A million dollars would have to do. Can't be greedy with the universe. The universe had helpfully played the multiplier so she would even be a millionaire after taxes.

Her body rebelled against the sudden joy and relaxation. It wanted to get up, get moving, push forward. It had accustomed itself to fight, flight, stress, shock. But this was a shock that needed no panic. She sat and made herself take three long breaths.

The old woman appeared at the end of the aisle.

"We are closing up dear."

Alisha stood shakily, blood trying to regain its course in her legs. As she did, the book fell to the floor.

"Oh, don't forget your journal. You'd never find it again if it got tossed on the return cart."

"It's not-" Alisha almost finished her sentence but stopped short.

"Did you draw that yourself?" The old woman gestured to the front cover. "It's beautiful."

Alisha turned the book over and looked at the newly appeared letter A, ornately lined in gold on the cover. It shimmered slightly in the cold, artificial light.

Alisha smiled and put the journal, phone and ticket carefully in her purse.

"Yes, I did. Thank you."

Alisha walked out of the library, requested a ride share with self conscious indulgence and flipped open her journal again. Looking at it altogether, her life seemed artful even if it felt dull as it happened. Her thoughts, sensations, messy weekends and quotidian shopping lists added up to something golden. It was something she could treasure, add to, curate. It would not all be a race. She felt the night air rush into her lungs and sat back to enjoy her wait.