the mouse squeaks (1)

The mouse squeaks. A faint, high-pitched note escapes the shadows of the old library, where dust motes hang suspended in the air like tiny stars in a forgotten galaxy. Beneath an oak desk, its legs carved with curling vines, the mouse—a common gray thing with a twitching nose—pauses.

Its small black eyes dart toward the heavy, leather-bound tome lying open on the floor. The book’s yellowed pages whisper as a breeze from an unseen crack flips them forward, one by one, as though an impatient hand were searching for a particular passage.

The mouse’s squeak is answered, not by another mouse, but by a rustling sound deeper in the shadows. The floorboards creak.