Dilapidated Mystery Book

“Hey.”

Libraries are always quiet. That’s their typical state of being. But as the hours get later and closing time gets closer, and one by one patrons leave for their final destinations of the night, that quiet takes on an even bigger presence. So big in fact, that even a soft voice from my coworker sounds like an airhorn to my ears, and I jolt sending my cell phone tumbling out of my fingers and thudding against the wellworn, industrial strength carpet that’s sitting under the reference desk on the fifth floor.

“Sorry,” Max apologizes without sounding particularly apologetic, “but you probably shouldn’t have been on your phone.”

I can hear his grin long before I actually straighten up and see it, shoving my phone in my back pocket and pulling the heavy book cart behind me as I turn away from him and round the corner of shelves.

“I was checking the time,” I tell him.

“You needed to open Instagram to do that did you?” he says. Sounding almost gleeful as he calls me on my fib.

I sigh and grab a wildly colorful paper bound book on crochet patterns off the metal carts top shelf. Flipping it to see the call number on the spine, I then scan the shelf in front of me to see where its home is.

“So, since you kinda owe me a favor now...” Max continues with a slow cadence that amps up my irritation which I force back down with limited success.

“A favor?” I ask. I meet his eyes through the metal shelving, over the tops of shorter paperback books. The look he gives me is pointed and his eyebrow raises. I don’t growl. But it’s a near miss swallowing it down.

“I was checking the time,” I tell him again, shoving the thin book in my hand back where it belongs before grabbing the next one from my cart. This one is a drab solid green covered book about painting techniques, and I drag my cart to the next location.

He grabs his own cart; the squeaking wheel on his echoes and grows louder as he rounds the corner and comes to stand next to me.

“Please. I gotta get outta here early tonight. It’s open mic at Changing Hands. If I don’t get down there early, the signup sheet fills in.” I sigh. Letting the weight of the day droop my head over like my neck is made of Jello before turning to his eager stupid face. I never say no to things when I should.

“Fine, but then you owe me,” I say.

“Oh, please it’s four books. I was almost done. That’s hardly favor material, Charlie, but thank you I’ll see you Tuesday!” He skips—grown man, going slightly grey above each ear—actually, physically, skips backwards away from me like he’s five years old, then spins, and takes off towards the bank of elevators.

I sigh—again, and this time I actually do take out my phone to check the time.

Ten more minutes.

Okay, I can manage both my job and the last bit of his.

I consolidate his five books—he lied it’s five NOT four—off his squeaking cart, and onto my merely rattling one. I store his cart at the end of the aisle before picking up the next book to head off to the art history section.

I categorize and put away—book by book.

I am almost done with my re-shelving for the day when I hear the announcement from the security desk over the loudspeakers set high above me in the ceiling that the Central Library will be closing in five minutes.

I look at my cart. Two books left. I can do that in five.

I reach to grab the next book. Not one from my original cart but one of Max’s abandoned five, only to frown when I get a good look at it. It is quite possibly the most battered book I have ever seen.

This should have been weeded and destroyed ages ago, I think, as I flip it over to scrutinize it. I wonder how the check-in guys even let it get past them. This is not a book that still belongs on our shelves.

Several generations of literal duct tape are valiantly but poorly keeping its spine alive; taped at every angle that is humanly possible. To spite this, it seems like every few pages are trying their best to break themselves free so they can escape from their tape-bound prison and run. They no longer line up smoothly on the edges at all but lie at varying lengths and states of disrepair. The bits of curling tape under my hand stick to my fingers and my palm as I touch it and the urge to run and wash my hands right now is visceral. But I only have five more minutes. And this is the last of two books.

I can wait. But, I, have no idea how to shelve this.

There is no title on the cracked and worn leather front of the book. And if the title was on the spine it’s long been covered by tape.

A sticker that is yellow with sun damage and so brittle the edges flake off without so much as a touch, sits at the base of the spine where call number stickers usually are.

But this, this isn’t…a call number...I don’t think.

At first, I think it’s Cyrillic and that’s why it looks so out of place to my eyes—but, no. I don’t speak or read Russian, but the closer I look at the label, the less like an actual language or numbers it seems.

I flip the book open to innocuous pages of what could be nursery rhymes, I suppose—although not any that I grew up with—interspersed with illustrations, and a lone satin ribbon that forces the book open to a single page. In complete and utter contrast to the rest of the dilapidated state of this book, the ribbon is nothing but brand new. It is red, and so shiny it almost hurts to look at it. And it doesn’t have so much as even a hint of a frayed edge or thread out of place. Pristine.

I don’t consciously choose to rub my thumb against its wide smooth surface, but I do it anyway. It’s even smoother than it looks like it should be. It’s wholly unsettling. I slam the book shut.

The fact that it is even together enough to be considered a book at all is a miracle, and probably speaks to the quality with which it was originally made. I can tell the cover was originally a high-quality leather—although it’s falling apart now—the stitches on the spine were at one time very precise. My first thought is that this is someone’s beloved moleskine journal. But, having worked in the library for four years now, I have never seen a personal journal as one of our official books; and even in as bad a shape as it is, this book still looks official.

Still…the call number isn’t decipherable. It’s in bad shape, with no title or easily recognizable author. So, into the weeding pile it goes to be stamped, discarded, and then thrown away.

Bye-bye dilapidated mystery book.

But after my cart is empty and I am heading to the breakroom to collect my bag to go home, I’m startled to look down and see that the battered book is still clutched painfully in my left hand. My stomach swoops like I’ve missed a step on a staircase, and I set the book down on the nearest table, rubbing at my palm that still feels uncomfortably sticky.

Man, I really need to go to bed early tonight, I think.

I chuckle to myself, pick up the book again by its outer edges to try and avoid the tape all together, and I walk it back up to the fifth floor.

Behind the doors marked ‘Employees Only’ I am met with our parking lot of empty book carts. I weave around them, to the weeding piles and set it on top with heavy intent.

Stay, I irrationally think to the inanimate object, and roll my eyes at myself as I let go and watch as it sits ugly and battered at the top of the pile.

Time to go home. I am beyond ready.

I back away a few steps keeping the book in my eyesight. When I can no longer walk backwards safely, I turn and head to the elevators to go home.

The biggest benefit of working at the largest library branch in my city is that public transit runs literally right outside. Catching my train to my apartment takes as little effort as public transportation can, and I settle into the next one that rolls into the station. It also helps that I don’t work bankers’ hours, so at seven oh eight on Saturday evening the train is nearly empty, and I can actually find a seat.

I pull my phone out of my back pocket and resume my mindless scrolling of Instagram that had been interrupted earlier as we ding-ding through intersections and rattle our way down the street. I’m clicking the ‘heart’ button and bypassing ads that don’t apply to me when my girlfriend actually calls my phone.

That’s unusual. I answer feeling hesitant.

“We have a problem,” she says as I press my palm against my open ear and try to hear her over the noise around me.

“Ok? Can it wait until...”

“We need $20,000.”

I blink.

“Sorry hang on let me get my earbuds I don’t think I heard you right,” I say. I plop my bag on the orange plastic seat to my left and unzip my bag to dig out my headphones, only to touch the sticky duct taped edge of what looks to be a battered little black book.

Shaking, and breathing far too fast to be healthy, I pull it out of my bag and set the book in my lap.

“No, you probably heard me just fine, baby. I said we need $20,000 as soon as we can or we are going to have to file for bankruptcy,” my girlfriend’s frazzled voice says into my ear pressed against my phone.

The wide, red, pristine satin ribbon has settled the book to naturally open in my lap and nestled in neatly against the damaged spine is a stack of brand new 100-dollar bills.

I know without touching them there will be 200 of them there. But I do touch their crisp edges and count just to see.

Sure enough. $20,000 is sitting in my lap.

This money wasn’t there before at the library I’d swear my life on it. But then again I didn’t know I needed it then. I hang the phone up. Maybe I don’t, but it disconnects anyway.

I feel like I am not in my body at all. I feel both hot and cold simultaneously.

Now look, I have read all manner of magical stories before. I’ve watched TV shows about magic. Hell, I’ve seen all The Simpsons Halloween specials. I know how this works. No magic comes to you without cost and consequences. But $20,000 is staring up at me from a book that doesn’t seem to want to leave me alone.

I stare. And I think. And I pick my phone back up again. Somehow managing to dial my girlfriend without looking much at my phone at all. My eyes don’t seem to want to leave my lap.

The phone rings and she immediately picks up.

“I think...we might not need to go bankrupt today,” I say.