I never dated.
I never fell in love.
I absolutely never drank at a bar while thinking about a guy.
There were lots of times the girls in school would tease me and tell me I must be gay if I never had a boyfriend. What could I say? I never met the one who made my knees weak or made me want to commit. I had tons of friends who I would hang out with from time to time or go to school dances with, but never a commitment.
They all tried to make me their girlfriend; I think it was a challenge for most of them. Who would be the guy to make Emme Bailey fall head over heels for them? None of them would win that title, until now.
Of course, it was a guy in a book. A dead guy, who I had to time-travel to see. I put my drink down and leaned over toward the girls.
“I’m feeling a little tired. I’m gonna head back.”
“I’ll drive you,” Tarryn said as she grabbed her purse.
I put my hand on hers. I needed to be alone and she didn’t need to be driving.
“I’m going to walk,” I said, giving her a reassuring smile. “I’ll be okay. Just don’t drink too much and do not drive. Our big day is tomorrow.”
She gave me a sad smile, and I hugged Rose, who promised to come see me tomorrow at work. I nodded and grabbed my coat. I buttoned it tightly and braced for the cold breeze from the ocean. Once I hit the outside, it didn’t come. The wind was absent from the cold night. I was thankful. The moon lit the street enough for me to see where I was going. I needed to be outside in the crisp air. I had to think of what I was going to do with my responsibility, of not only the library that Gram entrusted me with, but with the books. They truly were special, and I had to keep them safe. I couldn’t let anyone get to them.
I finally got to the library and unlocked the doors. Letters scattered across the floor from the mail. They must have fallen from my stack I carried in yesterday. I picked them up and absently walked, not to the apartment, but to the library.
I looked down at the letter in my hand and saw it was, once again, a letter from JR Builders. These guys were relentless. They wouldn’t stop, would they?
I threw it in the trash and turned on the light above Gram’s desk. I looked at the library and at all the books in each row. So many stories to be told and adventures to be had and an idea came across my mind.
Could I travel through them all if I tried? There was only one way to find out.
Twelve
I picked up the nearest book in the teen section and sat down in the nook; this time without my blanket. I looked at the front cover of the vampire novel that sent young girls into a tizzy, including myself. Who wouldn’t want to be the apple of this vampire’s eye? Who wouldn’t want to be able to put themselves into the book and see him for real?
This was the true test to see if I could really travel into these books or if it was only the other books buried beneath the floorboards. Was it my family heritage that helped me with this talent or merely the library itself?
Gram did say the library was special. Time and time again she would tell anyone who would listen how important this building was; I just never paid any attention until now. Now, it was too late.
I opened the book, my heart pounding, and read the first line of the book. I read about a girl who was moving from her home in Arizona and nothing happened. I was feeling like this was all a waste of time and almost tossed the book down when I felt that familiar feeling.
I was standing in a forest of trees watching cars drive by me and a girl, the girl from the book, driving with her dad to their home. I was inside this book!
I followed them as easily as walking, but I wasn’t doing that. I was floating alongside them and as each word of the story was read, it played out in front of me more up close and personal than any movie could. I was really in it.
I watched as she met the vampire boy with the dark eyes and the fabulous hair. But there was such a difference this time; I could not talk to these characters. They didn’t see me like Jack did. I realized that it was because this was a work of fiction. These characters, while they looked real to me, were not.
It didn’t mean that I wasn’t happy about being inside the book like this, but it was not the same.
I felt a pulling on my arm, and I looked around me as I stood once again in a beautiful forest full of trees. I looked around and saw nothing. But dang it, there was that pulling again.
Out of nowhere a hand reached through the trees and pulled me right out. I was sitting in my nook staring at Tarryn’s worried face.
“What happened to you?” she asked, barely a whisper. “It was like you were asleep, but with your eyes open.”
Her face was pale, and she looked terrified. I felt awful for scaring her like that, and I didn’t do it intentionally. How could I explain what I was doing without sounding like a liar?
“I’m so sorry if I frightened you, Tarryn.”
She shook her head and stood fast. Now anger was fully displayed on her face.
“You’re hiding something from me; I know it.”
I began fumbling for words. My mouth opened and closed like a dying fish, except I wasn’t gasping for air, I was trying to find an excuse. Tarryn deserved more than lies and cover ups, but I couldn’t give them to her right now. I didn’t know anything myself. I had no idea how I could enter these books or what power I possessed that gave me this gift.
Dammit, Gram! How dare you do this to me?
How could Gram go all this year without me and never, not once, tell me about this? We lived in this library together and not once did it come up. Why did she wait until the last possible second to inform me about this rare gift?
“I can’t tell you what happened because I don’t know,” I explained. “I found out that my Gram needed my help on her death bed, Tarryn. She made me promise to stay here because she said the library held magic. She gave me this ring and a whole speech.” I told her as I held up my finger to show her the ring. “She also told me to watch over a set of books. So maybe that’s what I’m hiding.”
I skidded to a halt and said no more as I remembered what else she said. Gram told me that no one else could touch the books.
“I get it, Emme. It’s your family duty to own this library. Why do you think my sister runs the coffee shop? My mom practically made her do it.”
“I can understand how she must feel,” I said sadly. I did understand, but this was way different. This duty of mine was more than running the library, but I couldn’t find the words to explain this to Tarryn.
“Let’s go to sleep. We have an early day tomorrow. I will tell you all you want to know, but it can’t be tonight. Okay?”
“Okay.” She nodded and I put the book back on the shelf.
She didn’t ask more questions or intrude. She simply gave up. I just had to hope that she wouldn’t bring it up again. I wouldn’t leave Tarryn in the dark forever. She needed to know, and no matter how scared I was, I would tell her the truth. Eventually.
****
The library’s grand opening was a success. All the children who came for story time were eager if not desperate for more stories. Tarryn ran the counter as I helped Mr. Gentry find a good stack of western novels that he could read. Most people told me how badly they missed my Gram and all of the books. Most of them were trapped in their homes for weeks on end due to the ice and snow. They needed their stories to help them escape from the harsh Maine winter. The children needed the story time and the indoor playground that Tarryn and I had put together.
I used some of the extra funds, that somehow my Gram had set aside, to order plastic slides and foam mats. We set them up inside the largest room in the library. It was previously used for studying, but I decided that the kids needed it more. Those who wished to study could do so in the smaller room.
Watching
the kids play put a smile on my face. If Gram could be here now and see this, I think that she would have been proud.
I looked at the many gifts the library patrons brought in to me as they visited and felt that they really missed Gram. I was confident that Tarryn and I were doing a pretty good job helping them enjoy the library once more. The money was not an issue and funds were coming in steadily from all over the place. It was like Gram either had a money tree at one time, or she was helping me as a ghost. I was getting checks from a library in Rhode Island on a weekly basis and it was all in Gram’s name. I didn’t ask questions; I just cashed the checks and put it into the library. Who was I to tell someone to stop paying Gram? I surely wasn’t stupid. We needed the money, and it came.
We closed the doors at five ‘o clock on the dot. I locked it and flipped the sign, and Tarryn drew the curtains.
“Well, I am going to just say that was pretty successful,” Tarryn exclaimed after she was finished stocking the last book.
“I agree.”
I shut down the last computer and flopped down in Gram’s chair. Exhaustion was not the word for how tired I was.
“I’m going to run upstairs and take a shower. Then I’m going to bed. I never knew a day at work would be so exhausting,” Tarryn told me after she shut off the reading lamps. “Coming?”
I shook my head. “I’m going to clean up the play room and read for a little while.”
She smiled and nodded slightly.
Our awkward exchange from last night was never brought up again. She seemed to have forgotten all about it, and I wasn’t bringing it up.
“Good night,” I called as she left.
I leaned back in the chair and stared outside the window. The snow was starting to fall slowly, and I wondered when spring would arrive again. Would we be stuck in an eternal winter?
I tried to ignore the nagging feeling of the books below my feet. They were almost calling to me, begging for me to travel within them.
My skin longed to feel the sunshine of Jack’s English home. I couldn’t resist the temptation, so I clumsily dug them out of the floorboard. Instead of sitting in my nook, I entered the secret room.
I pulled the book open so fast I didn’t have time to see if the title had changed since the last time I traveled. I began the chapter and felt the familiar feeling.
When I found myself staring at, not Jack, but a beautiful woman with the same eyes as me, I knew I had grabbed the wrong book.
Thirteen
Staring at me was Grace Bailey, my great-grandmother. She looked elegant and ethereal in a white lace gown that looked to meet the era exactly. Her curly hair was pinned up in a bun and she wore very little make-up. She looked so much like Gram it shook me to my soul.
Her smile was just like Gram’s, and I smiled back. I mentally took a snapshot at that moment, hoping to capture a woman I had never met. This was so strange it was beyond any and all weirdness that traveling through the books had ever brought me before.
Meeting Nancy in the kitchen didn’t compare to this. This was bizarro-land.
“Hello, child. I’m Grace. It’s nice to meet you,” she said with a smile. I noticed her lipstick had attached itself to her teeth just like my Gram’s used to do. “You’re a Bailey. There’s no doubt about that. You have that Bailey look to you.”
Her New England accent was as strong as Gram’s, and it made me smile to hear it.
I tried to speak, but found that my damn voice wouldn’t work.
“I know, child. It’s a bit shocking to stare at your relative that should be…dead by the looks of your clothes. You’re no doubt from the future. No way would any woman before me wear something so ugly.”
I found my voice as I began to laugh. I was wearing a cream lace dress and my black tights and boots. I was not dressed ugly, but I guess if you came from the 1930s, you’d think this was hideous. Compared to her, I was the ugly duckling in the family.
I ran a hand over my dress then to my hair, hoping it was tame in my bun.
“You are beautiful, so don’t fret. What’s your name?”
“Emme,” I choked. “Emmeline Bailey. I’m the granddaughter of your daughter, Mavis Bailey-Long.”
Grace’s eyes widened at my words.
“I have a daughter! What year is she born?”
“She’s born in 1939, and she is a wonderful woman.”
I didn’t go into too much detail, but I explained how she met my grandfather and how they had my father. I told her how in love my grandfather was with the sea and how much he loved Gram that he decided to drop his own last name and take on hers.
“Well, Emme, the Bailey name is very important. I see that your father had it as well?”
I nodded. My father was a Bailey, even though his father’s name was Long. Baileys must have been important because there was no talk of that ever happening anymore. When a man and woman married, traditionally, the woman takes his name. But for my grandfather, it wasn’t that way. He loved Gram, and that was all that mattered.
I was proud to have the name. I always was. And I suppose my dad was too. He must have liked it better than Long as he went by Thomas Bailey, instead. I never questioned why he took Gram’s last name; it was just something that never came up.
“If your grandfather was a Long, the family I’m thinking of, they came from a family of…well, misfits would be the right word for it. Maybe your father and grandfather were all right with giving up the name to spare them some embarrassment.”
I shrugged.
I didn’t know much of my grandfather’s family, except that we never saw them. Dad never mentioned them before.
“Misfits, huh?”
She nodded. “The kind that do bad things and go to jail for it, for a long time.”
I was catching on, now. They were bad people. Now I understood why my dad would not want to be associated with them. Dad had a good job—one where his name would be important. He worked at the law firm in the next town. If he was from a bad family, I could see why a name was important to earn people’s trust.
I could hear sounds of talking and music coming from inside the house, and I realized that they were having a party. I also realized that we were standing outside Jack’s home. It looked different to me at first because it was nighttime. The stars were beautiful as they shone down on the big house.
“They’re hosting a little party in our honor,” Grace explained. “You and me, we’re going to go for a walk.”
She took my arm in hers and we walked away from the noise and people.
“You’re quite lucky you arrived when you did, otherwise you’d shock a whole lot of people. They all think we’re visiting from America, which I suppose we are, but they’re clueless we traveled through time, not by boat.”
She laughed at her little joke and I smiled.
“I grabbed the wrong book. That’s why I’m here. I have so many questions,” I explained.
“I’m sure you do, and I will answer them all. But first, sit.”
She ushered me to take a seat at a little white set of chairs that sat in a garden.
“You’re probably confused. I know I was my first couple of times.”
“That’s an understatement. Most first times are awful, but at least we get a little warning. This one wasn’t explained to me at all.”
She frowned.
“You mean my daughter doesn’t explain any of this to you? Not one bit?”
I shook my head, not wanting to tell her that her daughter died at the age of seventy-seven.
“She must not have the gift then. That makes me a bit melancholy, Emme. I’m sorry you’re thrown into this life. But let me tell you, it’s an important task and a huge responsibility that you’ve been granted.”
Great! I need more r
esponsibility on top of owning the library and promising to set aside my career. Let alone the college courses I’ve been taking at night via computer.
“The Bailey women have always had gifts of old magic. Not the kind you think of, Emme, but the kind that protect history. We are part of a secret society of travelers that maintain and protect the histories, which make the world what it is today. History can go back millions of years, and it is our duty to travel through the stories of old and capture every single moment.
“You see, Emme, we travel through books and capture moments that have yet to be told. We are not storytellers, but story-preservers. Many stories have been told of important times in history, and it is our job to travel back into time and live. We meet the people, and in those moments, it’s all recorded.”
I let her words roll around in my mind, just picturing the important moments in history. There were so many moments that happened it was overwhelming to believe that they were part of some of that. The fact that these women were able to see some of it was simply amazing.
“Which moments do you record, and why us?”
“Well,” she paused, thinking, “the stories of influential men and women of history are most important. But we don’t get to choose who or when. The books are handed down from family to family and we enter them at different times. You see, I’m here in this time and I’m capturing the history of a Mr. Jackson Ridgewell Sr. He is a very important man in our nation’s history.”
Jackson Ridgewell Sr. was Jack’s father. I wasn’t sure why he was important. I had never learned about him in our history text books.
I started bouncing my feet up and down, nervously, and biting my fingernails at the facts that swirled around me. I was scared and excited to be a part of something this huge. I had magic and was part of an elite group of story-preservers. This was way more than I thought it would be.
The Librarian Page 9