Entitled

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a Reader in possession of a full wallet, must be in want of a Book, or so says a Pride and Prejudice friend of mine, two aisles away. Sitting on a Bookstore shelf, day after day, waiting to find my forever home, I hang my hopes on her belief, so when this woman picks me up and starts to read my page 1, I’m ready to close the sale.

Agnes Lundberg took the shaft of wood that she had hidden beside the outhouse, then slowly and silently inserted it through the two semi-circles of metal that formed the doors’ handles. Smiling at her achievement, she lifted the hem of her plaid dress and stepped quietly, her boots retracing their steps in the snow. As the sound would travel on such a cold night, she held her laughter and her breath.

At the back of her house, Agnes slowly opened the door, entered the kitchen and with both hands, gently closed the door behind her. Only then did she breathe. She removed her gloves, untied the laces on her boots and put them in a far corner where no one would notice the snow clinging to their soles. Grabbing a cookie from the glass jar, she entered the living room where her mother was playing the piano, her father was reading, and neither had noticed her departure, or her return with chilled, red cheeks.

Henry’s scream interrupted the tranquility. Agnes thought of him trapped in the outhouse in the cold of a winter’s night and smiled, knowing that he would never push her down in front of Erik Svenson, or anyone, ever again.

The woman doesn’t turn my page. Instead she shuts me.

Come on, that’s a great opening. Gives you a glimpse into Agnes, places her in an historic time, shows how strong a protagonist she is. Agnes the protagonist. It even rhymes. What more could she want?

But instead of realizing the value of my story, this Reader walks four feet down the aisle then discards me atop a stack of Books I’ve never met. I’m now stuck in an awkward social situation, waiting for a Staffer to notice that one of their charges, that would be me, is in need of their services. Balancing above my colleagues, I demonstrate my infinite patience. Until it becomes finite and I consider throwing myself onto the carpeted aisle. They’d notice me then.

When you’re a Book on a shelf, waiting for a Human to buy you and take you home, you have a lot of time on your hands. Even when you don’t have hands. The romance novels contemplate love. The war novels obsess about military maneuvers. My story is about a young woman in the middle of nowhere, dreaming about a life beyond the horizon. I guess I’m the same, dreaming about a life beyond this aisle. But that’s where the similarity ends. I’m sure of it.

Shannon, a Staffer passes and notices I’m out of place. “Tessa MacDonald,” she reads and follows the Author-based alphabet until she discovers the singular inch of space I left behind. I’m entitled The Serendipity of Snow and the only copy of my author’s only novel, which means I sit here, alone, without any family to talk to, and just the width of my spine to capture a Reader’s attention. I’ve been here all summer and have had zero success. Had I been about The Serendipity of Sunshine, I might have a home by now. But no, my Author had to set me in Minnesota, in the dead of winter. Life isn’t fair. Even for novels.

The lights in the store turn off then on again. It’s the end of another day. Older titles have nodded off the shelf, falling to the floor. The Staffers spend their last hour tripping over these exhausted Books, brushing them off and putting them back on the shelf to await their fate another day. These aging Books, with their marks and creases and broken spines, are also the first to be returned to their publisher. Like I said, life isn’t fair.

Most Books have 120 days to attract a Reader or else we’re sent back to be redistributed, or worse, recycled and pulped. There’s a reason we give paper cuts.

The classics operate in a different world. My Pride and Prejudice friend displays her gilt edges, knowing she’s safe. The Hemingways and The Fitzgeralds are protected by their lineage. They’ve inherited their relevance, so can sit for a year with no one questioning their value. It’s different for the rest of us. I’m here with no family name or marketing campaign to help me. I’ve got to make it on my own. Like Agnes in my story.

“Psst,” my shelf-mate whispers. “I hear something.”

I open my fibers, straining to take in sound, but get nothing.

“Here they come,” he says.

It’s after hours, which is usually the time for Books to relax, but not this night. Instead, it’s the evening we all dread.

It starts with a squeak. The sound of the cart’s wheels, like an ambulance siren piercing the tranquility of our rows, causes us to shrink in fear. They have a list and we all pray that our names aren’t on it. Except the Buddhism Books. They accept it as part of their journey or something.

My friend, Diane’s Dream starts to sob. “DD, you don’t know that they’re coming for you. They’re probably just re-arranging the best sellers.”

“Do you think?” she says through her sniffles.

No, I don’t. There hasn’t been a shipment back to the publishers for a month, so tonight could get ugly. “Moby, what do you think?”

“Call me Ishmael,” Moby d**k responds.

“Okay. Ishmael, what do you think?” I ask again.

“There’s a tidal wave coming, and none of us are prepared,” he says. Sorry I asked.

The squeak approaches. Slowly. Determinedly. Ominously. I half expect Myles, the Staffer pushing the cart to cry, “Bring out your dead!” Instead, he shouts to his colleague Jerome, “Let’s be quick. I want to get out of here by 10.”

“Hear that DD?” I say to Diane’s Dream. “They’re going to be fast. Nothing to worry about,” I lie. Clearly there’s a reason I’m classified as fiction.

I edge my spine out slightly to improve my hearing. I’m not worried about my situation. Yet. DD, on the other hand, has quite a bit of dust on her. But I wouldn’t say that to her cover.

The cry of the cart’s wheels lurches between fiction and non-fiction, imagination and reality. “They’re passing self-help and reference!” yells the display of best sellers. “Now they’re in Local Interest.”

“I’m not going to leave my heart tonight,” Tony Bennett’s Biography sings out. He’s stacked next to The History of the Golden Gate Bridge and a photo essay of San Francisco’s cable cars. He’s safe. Tourists love a souvenir Book, even if it’s one they’ll never read.

The squeaking stops. “They’re in Gardening!” screams a title from the cooking section.

With a series of cries blended with goodbyes, Books on bulbs and spring planting are removed. One thud is followed by another as the hardcovers are dropped onto the cart. “They’ve got 20 titles, maybe more,” shouts a cookbook. It’s the end of August, so this purge isn’t a surprise for these Books, but it’s still awful.

“Don’t worry about us,” Spring Planting says. “There’s a season for everything, and this is our season to go.”

I don’t know the Gardening Books personally. They’re too many aisles away, so we’ve never met. But they’ve always answered our questions in a nurturing and patient way. I’m sad to think there will be fewer of them.

The cart moves again. Its cadence casts a hush over us all. “I’d make more money working in a restaurant. Think of the tips,” Jerome says as the squeaking grows louder.

“Yeah, but here we get to take home any Book we want,” Myles says. The cart is turning this way.

“Who buys Books anymore? I download what I want to read,” Jerome blasphemes.

“Downloading! A plague on you,” Romeo and Juliet shrieks, not that any Humans can hear.

“Ow!” Jerome yells, thanks to a precisely timed plunge off the shelf by The History of Diving in hardcover.

From the same Sports Section, Gymnastics for Beginners picks up the commentary. “It was a perfect dismount and he really stuck the landing on the sandal-wearing Jerome. Degree of difficulty: 3.6.” Books that are face-out flap their covers in applause.

The relentless squeaking continues in our direction. Myles and the now-limping Jerome stand in front of the Summer Reading section.

“Oh, no, they’re totally after us,” Beached Love shouts.

High-pitched screams mark the end of holiday romances and sand-filled frolics, as titles with yellow and azure covers are piled on the literary hearse.

“That’s everything on the list,” Myles says. “Let’s take these books to storage and we can get out of here. Leave the cleaning for the morning shift.”

“You never dusted us,” Beached Love says from her place on the cart. “You never gave us a chance.”

The squeak fades. “Bye, everyone,” calls Summer Patio Flowers. “May you all fully bloom.”

The rest of us sit quietly, grateful for our relative good fortune, when a title breaks the silence. “It was the best of days, it was the worst of days, it was the morning of hope and the evening of despair,” says A Tale of Two Cities.

And with those words of Mister Dickens lingering in the air, I close my fibers to rest and contemplate another night of the long sighs.