The Last Library

by Freya Sampson

  ‘There’s something I’ve been trying to tell you for a while, and I need to say it now.’

  June’s heart sank. As if today couldn’t get any worse, now this. ‘Please, you don’t need to explain anything. I understand.’

  ‘I’m not sure you do, June.’

  ‘But I do, Alex. I know about Ellie.’

  His head swivelled to look at her. ‘Ellie? How?’

  ‘I’ve known for months.’

  ‘Who told you about her? Was it Stanley?’

  ‘No, I saw a message from her on your phone and I know you were together when I called you in London. Why didn’t you just tell me you had a girlfriend?’

  ‘Hang on, Ellie is my—’

  ‘Does she know I tried to kiss you?’ June asked, cringing. ‘I’m so sorry I did that, Alex, it was totally out of order. I was drunk and it was a huge mistake.’

  There were a few seconds of silence. ‘A mistake?’

  ‘Of course. I don’t see you in that way. I mean, you’re a friend but I don’t fancy you or anything.’ June forced a laugh and then wished she hadn’t. It didn’t sound remotely real.

  She looked over to Alex, expecting him to look relieved now it was all out in the open. But instead he was staring at his pint, looking utterly defeated. When he spoke again, he didn’t look at her.

  ‘June, the thing I need to tell you is that I’m moving back to London.’

  She felt as if someone had given her a karate kick to the chest, knocking all the wind out of her.

  ‘Dad’s better now and doesn’t need my help at the restaurant, and I need to get back to my job.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said, trying to keep her voice level.

  ‘My sabbatical’s over and I start work again on Monday, so I’m leaving tomorrow. I’m sorry to just spring this on you, but when I tried to tell you before, you changed the subject.’

  ‘I’m happy for you, Alex. I bet you can’t wait to get back to your normal life.’

  June couldn’t bear to look at him, so she stared across the road towards the library. She’d always known Alex would leave at some point, but she’d never expected the news to hurt like this. She closed her eyes, willing herself not to cry in front of him.

  When she opened them again, she saw a figure running past the front of the library, a large handbag swinging from her side.

  ‘Wait, isn’t that Marjorie?’ June stood up and waved at her. ‘Marjorie. Marjorie! She’s going into the pub.’

  June rushed inside, leaving Alex sitting at the table. She arrived at the group as Marjorie came bursting in. Everyone stopped talking.

  ‘What’s the news?’ June said.

  Marjorie was bent over, panting from the running.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, spit it out,’ Mrs B said.

  Marjorie straightened up. ‘The meeting just finished. They’ve made their decision.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘They’re closing all six libraries, including Chalcot.’

  June stared. ‘What?’

  ‘They’re closing it in eight weeks’ time. We’re getting a mobile library instead, once a fortnight.’

  ‘We lost,’ Chantal said.

  ‘After June got taken away, the place was in uproar. They debated Chalcot for another half an hour, but in the end, the vote went twenty-five to twenty-four in favour of closing it.’

  ‘My god,’ said Vera.

  ‘That’s not all. At the end they said the council will be entering into discussions with private buyers about the Chalcot Library premises, with the aim to sell it off in order to make up some of the budget deficit. It looks like Cuppa Coffee will get the building.’

  June felt something inside her crumble. ‘It’s over.’

  They all stared at each other in stunned silence. Jackson was sitting with his head in his hands, and tears were running down Chantal’s cheeks.

  ‘I’m just glad Stanley wasn’t around to see this,’ Mrs B said, quietly.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Two months later

  WHEN JUNE ARRIVED AT THE LIBRARY, there was a council van parked outside, two men in overalls leaning against it, their breath misty in the November cold. She walked into the building and found Marjorie shouting into the phone.

  ‘But this is ridiculous, I told you yesterday that we can’t manage without them . . . I don’t care if they need them in New Cowley, we still have a library to run here.’ Marjorie slammed the phone down with force.

  ‘What is it today?’ June said.

  ‘The carousels. Can you believe the cheek of it? I told those two clowns, if they touch anything from my library then I’m liable to use violence against them, so help me god.’

  ‘They’re only doing their job, Marjorie.’

  ‘But we’re open until five o’clock tomorrow. How am I supposed to run a library with half my equipment missing?’

  June walked through to the back and hung her coat up. It had been like this all week. On Monday they’d taken the sofa from the Children’s Room, and June had hidden in the toilets so no one would see her cry, and on Tuesday they’d carried out several of the racks. On Wednesday they’d come back for the returns trolley, and June and Marjorie had watched from the window as the men tried to load it onto the back of the van. But the trolley had other ideas and kept veering off towards the pub, causing the men to curse in frustration. It had been the first time June had laughed in weeks.

  She made two cups of tea and took one out to Marjorie. ‘Do you remember I’m going at lunchtime today?’

  ‘Sure.’ Marjorie was still glaring out of the window at the van.

  June went to switch the computers on. She felt bad leaving Marjorie on her own when there was so much work still to be done, but she had no option. This afternoon, for the first time in her life, June had a job interview. It was for a library assistant role in Kent, and June had been preparing for it all week – a welcome distraction from the pain she felt every time she thought about the library closing tomorrow.

  ‘It’s ten o’clock,’ Marjorie called across to her. ‘Open up, will you?’

  June walked to the front door and unlocked it. Jackson had now replaced Stanley as the first to arrive each morning, and as she opened the door she found him standing on the front step, wrapped up in a duffel coat and scarf against the cold.

  ‘Morning,’ he said, as he strolled towards the desk.

  ‘Morning, Jackson. Chilly today, isn’t it?’

  The boy heaved the satchel off his shoulder, and it hit the ground with an audible thud. Opening it up, he counted out twelve books and placed them on the desk. ‘I want to return these, please.’

  ‘Of course. Did you enjoy Catcher in the Rye? What did you make of Holden Caulfield?’

  ‘It was good, thanks.’ Jackson reached into his coat pocket and pulled something out, placing it on top of the books. ‘You should have this as well.’

  June looked down and saw it was Jackson’s library card, the edges creased and battered, so well-used that most of the print had worn off.

  ‘You don’t have to give this back – you’ll need it for the mobile library.’

  ‘Thanks, but I’m not sure I will.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ June tried to keep the panic from her voice. ‘You know you can still order books and the mobile library will bring them every fortnight.’

  ‘I’m just not sure I’ll really want to use the library bus,’ he said with a shrug. ‘It won’t be the same, will it?’

  ‘No, not exactly the same. But you can still—’

  ‘I’d better go now. We’re going to visit my Great-Aunt Pauline; she has osteoporosis. Did you know it weakens bones and means they can break really easily?’

  ‘Is that right?’

  ‘I looked it up here in the encyclopaedia,’ he said, and then he turned and walked out of the front door.

  June watched him go and bit her lip; she’d promised herself she wouldn’t cry again this week, whatever happened. />
  The morning passed quickly. Now that the library was about to close it seemed everyone in the village wanted to use it, and June was rushed off her feet helping people with their enquiries. At midday, she was re-shelving when she heard her name being hollered across the room. She looked up to see Mrs Bransworth and Chantal bowling towards her.

  ‘There you are!’

  ‘Hi guys,’ June said, alarmed at the determined look in their eyes.

  ‘When are you leaving?’ Mrs B said.

  ‘At twelve thirty, why?’

  Chantal checked her watch. ‘That only gives us half an hour, we’d better get going.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘What are you wearing to your job interview?’ Mrs B asked.

  ‘Er, this.’ June indicated her work trousers and white shirt.

  ‘What did I tell you?’ Chantal said to Mrs B, rolling her eyes.

  June looked between them. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘You can’t go to a job interview looking like that,’ Chantal said. ‘I’m going to give you a mini makeover while Mrs B gives you some last-minute interview prep.’

  ‘Really?’ June hadn’t even realised they knew she had an interview today.

  ‘Yes, really,’ Mrs B said. ‘Now come on, we’ve got a hell of a lot to do.’

  They frogmarched her to the toilets, and for the next twenty minutes June allowed herself to be prodded, poked and squeezed as Chantal attacked her hair and face with a variety of tools. All the while Mrs Bransworth fired fiendish questions at her. By the time they’d finished, June felt exhausted – and she hadn’t even had the interview yet. She stood facing the two of them as they surveyed her.

  ‘Not bad at all,’ Chantal said.

  ‘We’ve done a pretty good job, if I say so myself,’ Mrs B said, with a satisfied nod. ‘Have a look at yourself in the mirror then.’

  June turned around to face the toilet mirror and let out a gasp. Her usual plain, sensible outfit been replaced by a bright floral dress, cinched at the waist with a belt. Her hair had been released from its bun and Chantal had somehow tamed the frizz, so that now it hung in lovely loose curls over one shoulder. Her skin was no longer deathly pale, but she had a pink tinge in her cheeks, and her eyes looked like they were sparkling.

  ‘Wow, I look—’

  ‘You look bloody gorgeous,’ Mrs B said.

  June turned back to them, tears pricking her eyes.

  ‘Don’t cry, you’ll smudge the mascara!’ Chantal said.

  ‘OK,’ June smiled. ‘But thank you both so much. You’ve made me into a different person.’

  ‘You’re not a different person,’ Mrs B said. ‘You’re the same June that the rest of us have always seen. Now you can just see it for yourself.’

  ‘Mrs Bransworth, are you being sentimental?’ June said, laughing.

  ‘No, I was not being sodding sentimental, I was just giving you some . . .’

  Chantal looked at June and raised her eyebrows. ‘She’ll be at it for hours. You’d better go to your interview; good luck!’

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  ‘THANKS SO MUCH FOR COMING, June. We’ll be in touch.’

  The man shook her hand and, as June turned and headed out the front door, she felt a wave of relief. The questions had been a breeze compared to Mrs B’s grilling earlier. And although June was probably not experienced enough for working in such a big library, at least she’d got through the interview without completely humiliating herself.

  She walked to the station and caught the next train, crowding into a carriage for the long journey back home. As the train moved off, June reached into her bag and pulled out her book, staring at the picture on the front cover. It was a portrait of a pale-skinned Regency-style woman, her brown curly hair pulled back into a bun. She was wearing a white empire-line dress, which was splashed with scarlet blood. On her face, where her mouth and chin should have been, the skin was peeled back to reveal sinister, skeletal teeth. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, the title read.

  June had reserved the book from Favering library back in the summer, but it had been out on loan and had never arrived. She’d completely forgotten about it until she opened up the green crate of deliveries yesterday morning and found a copy amongst the pile of books on reserve. June’s first instinct had been to put it straight back, but something had stopped her and instead she’d taken it out. Now, she opened the front cover and started to read the opening page. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains . . .

  June had just got to the scene at Netherfield where zombies eat all the servants during Bingley’s ball when she arrived back at Winton station. She got off and caught the bus to Chalcot, disembarking on The Parade. But instead of turning left at the post office, she carried on and took the next road instead. June had been taking this longer route home for a while now and had replaced her weekly Chinese takeaway with homemade vegetable rice. She told herself this was because she needed to be healthier, but the truth was she felt a sharp ache in her chest every time she walked past the Golden Dragon. Alex was gone. Stanley was gone. And, as of tomorrow, the library would be gone too. As much as June hated to admit it, all she had left in Chalcot was a house full of memories.

  She walked up her front path, unlocked the green door and stepped inside.

  ‘Alan, I’m home,’ she called, as she kicked off her shoes and hung up her coat.

  June went through to the living room and turned on the light. The room looked exactly the same as it had when she’d left this morning; exactly the same as it had every day for the past eight years. The same old photos on the wall, June and Beverley’s faces smiling down from dozens of frames. The same china ornaments on the mantlepiece, the same books on the shelves. June walked over and ran her hand along a row of spines. She came to her mum’s old copy of War and Peace and pulled it off the shelf, flicking through the pages. There was a bookmark halfway through, left over from her last effort to read it back at the start of the summer. Her mum had loved this book, but as much as June hated to admit it, she was never going to finish it.

  A thought occurred to June and she walked back into the kitchen. On the counter she kept a pile of old leaflets and flyers that came through the door, mainly for takeaways that she would never order. She rummaged through the pile until she found what she was looking for, a crumpled piece of pink paper.

  Do you have any old books you no longer need? Cherry Tree Retirement Home is in desperate need of second-hand books for our residents. All genres welcome.

  June knew the place well; once a fortnight she or Marjorie used to go there to swap library books for the residents. It was a lovely Edwardian building, with big windows overlooking a well-kept garden. Her mum and Linda always used to joke that when they were old they’d live there together, drinking gin and having their pick of the elderly gentlemen. And some Cherry Tree residents had come to the library occupation: June particularly remembered the ninety-four-year-old who had entertained them all with Vera Lynn songs.

  She found an old cardboard box under the sink and carried it through to the living room. June picked up War and Peace again, closing her eyes as she lifted it to her nose and inhaled the dusty, smoky scent. She stayed like that for a moment, the book pressed to her skin, and then without looking, she placed it in the empty box.

  Once she’d started, June found she worked quickly and methodically, the library assistant in her kicking in. The box was soon full, and she went upstairs and found several others, which were soon overflowing as well. With nothing else to put the books in, June started making tall piles on the floor, ordered into genre.

  Next, she turned her attention to the mantlepiece. June picked up the ornament of the girl reading a book, turning it over in her hands. She remembered her mum bringing it home from the white elephant stall when June was seven or eight. No one else wants her, poor thing, Beverley had said. I think she looks a bit l
ike you, Junebug, so let’s give her a new life here.

  June put the girl to one side, then picked up a china model of a London bus and began wrapping it in a page from an old copy of the Gazette. Alan Bennett was sitting on the sofa, watching her with startled curiosity.

  ‘For the next summer fete,’ she told him. ‘Someone else can give these a home now.’

  When June paused to get a glass of water, she was shocked to see that it was past ten and she’d been working for almost four hours. She surveyed the chaos in the living room; piles of books for Cherry Tree House and newspaper parcels for the white elephant stall covered the whole floor. The place had never been such a mess and June suddenly felt exhausted. She hadn’t got round to eating dinner, so she went through to the kitchen and made herself a cheese sandwich. As she ate, she absent-mindedly flicked through today’s post. There was a flyer from a new Chinese restaurant in Favering, which June put on her leaflets pile, feeling guilty. Underneath it was a copy of the Gazette. June was about to put it aside for wrapping purposes when the headline caught her eye: CUPPA COFFEE PULLS OUT OF LIBRARY DEAL AS POLICE CALLED IN. Beneath the headline was the name Ryan Mitchell and a tiny photo of his spotty face.

  The multinational beverage company behind the Cuppa Coffee chain has pulled out of its deal to buy the Chalcot Library building, as Dunningshire Council faces allegations of corruption surrounding the sale.

  As previously reported, an exclusive investigation by this newspaper uncovered bank statements showing Chalcot parish councillor Brian Spencer received payments from Lombart Inc. into his personal account. A council insider, who asked to remain anonymous, told the Gazette that the payments Cllr Spencer received were in exchange for bribing county councillors to support the sale. When contacted by the Gazette, Cllr Spencer refused to comment.

  Last month, Dunningshire Council launched their own internal investigation after being presented with the evidence. Now, sources say police have been called in to help with the inquiry.

  A spokesperson for Lombart Inc. said the company’s decision to withdraw from the purchase of the Chalcot building is unrelated to the ongoing police investigation.