The Librarian

by Christy Sloat

  “He was awful, Tar. He is so different. How can a person change that much in a year’s time?” I whispered.

  She shook her head. “I only know I have been there before. I recognize that look, that feeling. It’s something I can tell you I don’t ever want to feel again.”

  I sank into the water, wanting to drown.

  I would never be happy again. I hated this life and wanted to leave this place. It was him. This whole town was Jack. It was his history, and I would never escape it.

  I knew what I needed to do. I wouldn’t tell Tarryn yet. She would talk me out of it, and I would never follow through with it.

  “You know he didn’t mean what he said to you,” Tarryn tried. “He is probably just saying that to you to protect himself.”

  I sighed. “Maybe, so. But you weren’t there to see his face. The anger was written all over it.”

  Maybe he was just trying to protect his heart. I’ll never know because I’ll never go back.

  I had plans and I had to get started on them right away.

  ****

  Over the next few weeks I made preparations to leave the whole library and all the books inside of it, including the ones belonging to The Librarians, to Tarryn. It didn’t feel strange at all to leave everything to a person I hadn’t known for very long. Tarryn was my protector, and as such, she was trusted beyond compare.

  I was finished with school and passed my exams with flying colors. I wasn’t surprised since I had nothing but school to focus on. There was no Jack anymore and no traveling either.

  Tarryn was doing great running the library on her own. I told her that I needed time to heal, and she took the reins under the pretense that I was taking a break.

  Rose would be fine because she had a solid idea to build her own office and to take hold of her career.

  Becca was busy with her coffee shop and started dating a new guy. I honestly do not know where she found him because he was great to her. But being around them in their happiness made me a bitter person, and I wasn’t happy about that.

  So I took my time and I buried myself in the prospects of moving to England. I searched for a job and awaited a response. It wouldn’t take long to find something for work while I made plans for leaving.

  Sure I was running away again, but there was nothing left for me here. Every part of Maine reminded me of Jack, and that simply would not do. Besides, I was young and I needed to act my age a little bit. I had lost myself somewhere along the line, and I wanted to find her again. I wanted to be a little reckless and a little less responsible. I wanted to go to nightclubs and party. I wanted to kiss boys and not have to get their phone number after. I wanted to be young.

  I wanted to see beautiful things again, outside of this town. I had run away before, and I would survive it now, like I had then.

  I was taking care of my end of that bargain. The books were going to a fellow preserver just outside of Northern Maine. She agreed to take over my books and preserve them since I couldn’t. I would never again time-travel, nor would I be part of The Librarians. Once I did this, I was done.

  It was late one Friday night that I stepped inside the hidden room to take inventory. It was important that I do this so I knew exactly how many books were done and how many still needed attending for the library up north.

  Lockhart said in his book that once a book has been preserved, the Librarian was to seal it with wax along the outside of it. Whoever had done so with these books has pressed Gram’s ring into it as proof that it was done.

  There weren’t many books that still needed to be preserved, but just enough to keep the new girl busy.

  I sat down in the chair with a thump and looked around the room. All The Librarians stared back at me from their photos. Guilt overcame me for the first time since this decision. I had been feeling so confident that I was doing the right thing up until then. These women were not doing me any favors.

  I hadn’t told any of my friends what I was planning, yet. They simply wouldn’t understand. It was easy to think that owning my own library was fun, but they didn’t comprehend what pain it had caused me. I wouldn’t be a Jenny; I wouldn’t go into the book and hurt Jack’s future all for my own selfish feelings. And I wasn’t going to be like Grace and treat my duty as a simple job that needed to be done. For me it was something magical, and it should be done by someone who would respect it and cherish it. I always saw it as a burden and a blessing. I couldn’t see it as just one without the other.

  It brought me into Jack’s life, and as amazing as that had been, look how it ended. Jack hated me, and I was hurting more than I have ever before. This was like a death. It felt the same as it did when Gram died. The only difference this time was that Gram was really gone forever. Jack, however, was reachable by book at any time, but he didn’t want me around.

  No matter how much I thought about it, I always arrived at the same point; Jack asked me not to come back. How could I go back without him knowing? I stuck out like a sore-thumb.

  So the choice to throw in the towel was simple.

  “Hello? Is there anyone here?”

  I jumped at the sound of a man’s voice coming from the library. Surely I had locked the doors. How did he get in here?

  I looked at the time, six o’clock. We had been closed for an hour.

  “Be right with you,” I called out, before shutting off the lights and picking up my papers. I exited the room and tried to compose myself. I wasn’t prepared to help anyone check out books, and I simply felt irritated to have to do so.

  “We’re closed,” I said as I approached the man. He had his back to me as he ran his fingers over the books in the new arrivals section.

  “I won’t be long. I’m just looking for something new to read this weekend,” he said, with an air of confidence.

  He did hear me say we were closed, right?

  “We are closed, sir. You can come back Monday and check out a book. I shut down the computers an hour ago.”

  It was stupid of me to not properly lock the doors, but closed was closed.

  I checked the sign, and it was indeed flipped. At least I did that right.

  “I really need a book,” he called out to me. “I won’t be long. I just want to get something real quick and then I’ll leave. Surely, you will understand, right? You know when you need a good book, you just can’t wait to get it in your hands. It’s like a drug.”

  Would I understand? Yeah, I understood he was an ass who probably was used to getting his way. Looking at how he was dressed told me he had money. He wore dark denim jeans that looked freshly ironed and a pressed blue shirt. No one in this town dressed that nicely, especially to go to the library.

  “Look, I meant what I said. We are closed. And you gotta leave,” I said, firmly. “Sorry, but I have plans.”

  He turned around, chuckling at me as he did. He had looked over the new arrivals and chose a teen romance. I tried to read the title, but his hands blocked it from view.

  “I just want to get this one book, and oh…if you have a copy of the dictionary too, please,” he said completely serious.

  The dictionary? This guy was severely strange.

  “Look, I said no. We are closed, and if you don’t—” I didn’t finished my sarcastic comment because my eyes landed on his face. My breath caught and my body froze.

  His smile reached his blue eyes and he stood there waiting for me to go on, but I couldn’t.

  “If I don’t, what?” he asked, as he leaned forward on the counter, bringing that familiar face just a little closer.

  Surely, I wasn’t seeing this correctly. Was I going mad? I must have been because when I looked at this stranger I saw a face I knew so well.

  No. That wasn’t it, because when I blinked my eyes and pinched myself, I still saw the face I had
grown to love and know so well. It was the face of Jackson Ridgewell Jr.

  Twenty-Seven

  “Well? Can I get this book or not?” he asked teasingly.

  My mind willed me to speak, but my mouth wasn’t cooperating. I just nodded and took the book and scanned it. The beep didn’t sound like normal, so I looked down. Duh, the computers weren’t up, because we were freaking closed!

  I just handed him the book, all while staring at him like a freak would. Was he Jack? Did he find a way to come to me? Was he just playing with me until I said something to him?

  I was too scared I was going crazy to ask him anything. Besides, my question would scare him off, and I’d get no answers. I could see it now. “Excuse me, do you know you look like a guy I know. He lives in the past and I time-travel to see him.” Yeah, that won’t go over well.

  So, I decided to be silent.

  “And, my dictionary?”

  I shook my head. What was up with this guy and his need for a dictionary?

  “Why? Why do you need that?” I asked, giving in.

  He laughed a throaty laugh that was nothing like Jack’s. In fact he sounded nothing like Jack, but his voice was familiar. He may look just like my Jack, but he wasn’t him. I wasn’t sure how I knew then, but I did.

  “I was told I needed to study it,” he said simply.

  I shook my head slowly again, trying to clear my blurry and frazzled brain.

  “How do I know you?” I dared to ask. It was the only thing I could ask that would give me some idea as to why he looked like Jack’s twin.

  “We have yet to meet in person, but we’ve talked on the phone many times, Miss. Bailey,” he said as he stuck his hand out in front of me to shake. I looked down at it and back at his face.

  No. Just no.

  This was the guy from JR Builders: Jason something. The asshole who wanted to rip down the very building he was standing in.

  At that moment my mind was reeling. I was going through many emotions, but the biggest one was shock because I realized that Jason, the phone stalker, was related to Jack.

  Our last phone conversation, if you would call it that, he told me that his great-great-grandfather founded Bay Ridge. At the time I couldn’t put two and two together, but now I knew. I had found out that Jack was the founder and he was the one who made our town what it was, and this jerk-wad in front of me was tearing down Jack’s memory.

  He might as well be stomping on his grave. He was ruining everything that Jack did to become who he was and that made me angry.

  “You have some nerve coming in here, you know that?” It was a rhetorical question, of course, but he answered anyway.

  “I didn’t know that, actually. But you seem to like telling me things that I don’t know about myself. Please do continue; I love learning new things,” he said with a smirk.

  This guy was nothing like Jack. He may have his face and be his freaking doppelganger, but he was classless.

  “You came in here just to be an ass, didn’t you? Wait, do not answer that,” I spat. “You aren’t quite sure what ass means yet.” I handed him the dictionary on my desk and it landed with a thump on the counter in front of him. “You can get the hell out of my library now.”

  He didn’t leave. He didn’t apologize. No, this guy laughed. He laughed at me. It was time to give him a full lesson on how awful he was for trying to take all that was left of my past.

  “You could have been doing good things, but you’re ruining the history of our town. And I will never sell to you or your company, Mr. Whatever-your-name-is. So you can go now, and you can bet that I will not let you tear down one more building in this this town.”

  They were just words that I said. Idle threats to a man who needed to hear them at the time. I wasn’t going to be able to follow through with them when all I was planning on doing was running away from this town anyway.

  How could I stop him when I wouldn’t even be here?

  “My name is Mr. Ridgewell. Jason Ridgewell.”

  “Wait, what?” I asked, as I shook my head.

  He leaned closer, his scent drifting my way. He smelled good, like the damn Devil, and I fought my attraction to him. He was cute, but that was because he wore the face of the guy I was in love with.

  I shook my head and cleared my thoughts. “Well, Mr. Ridgewell, tell me how you are honoring your family’s name by tearing down my library? Jack would be so disappointed in what you were doing to his dream.”

  His cocky grin faded and he pushed off of the counter. His face turned confused.

  “How did you know that name?”

  Oh shit. I was in hot water now. Why did I have to be so short tempered? I was never going to explain this correctly.

  “Uh…I’m a college student,” I said, like it made sense—it didn’t. I mentally smacked myself. Not my finest moment, and he was witnessing the whole thing.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And I’m studying the history of Bay Ridge, for a paper.” My excuse was so lame that I almost felt ashamed. I couldn’t very well tell him I knew Jack. I needed to deflect fast. “That doesn’t matter anyway,” I started. “Why are you so intent on taking this place?”

  This douche-nozzle was a Ridgewell and he wanted my Gram’s property. He wanted to tear down the very library that allowed me to see Jack and learn about his importance in history, and I couldn’t even explain it to him. He wouldn’t understand nor did he deserve to hear it.

  He chuckled again, and I wanted to slap him. He had a habit of making me feel like an idiot, and I just met him. He must be a delightful person to be around.

  “You don’t have many friends, do you, Jason?”

  He stopped laughing, like I struck a chord. “What makes you say that?”

  I got him right where it hurt.

  “I can tell that a guy like you is lonely, because firstly, you call me a lot, which indicates you make your work your life. And most people like that do not have time for friends. Secondly, you’re here on a Friday evening, when most people are out somewhere more exciting. You are one lonely guy.”

  I uncrossed my arms and took the teen book he had put on the counter and put it back onto the shelf. I could feel his eyes on me, but I didn’t let it bother me.

  “May I point out that you’re here as well on a Friday night, after closing hours,” he said with venom in his voice. I didn’t even turn around. Of course I was here, I owned the joint!

  “You can go now, Jason. We’re done here,” I said as I opened the outside door real wide for him and his ego to fit through.

  He took the bait and walked out of the library, stopping just before leaving the building entirely. He leaned closely to me and said, “You’re wrong, Emmeline Bailey. You don’t know a thing about me or what I do for this town. I would explain it to you, but it seems I would be wasting my time with you. You don’t trust people or let anyone into your life.”

  I took a deep, sharp intake of breath. That hurt. A lot.

  He was right, though. I never let anyone into my life. I constantly ran away from all of my problems. How the hell did he know that?

  I didn’t inhale until he was pulling out of the driveway. Jason Ridgewell was not nice.

  Twenty-Eight

  The next day wasn’t so easy for me. Due to many things, really, but the biggest one was lack of sleep. I was up most of the night tossing and turning. Regret over my decision to leave kept me awake like a wide-eyed owl. I hated that Jason Ridgewell had disrupted my plans. Actually I hated him.

  I sat at my Gram’s oak kitchen table and sipped my second cup of coffee when Tarryn and Becca strolled through the door. Both girls looked fresh-faced and beautiful. I was jealous.

  Becca took one look at me and cringed, without meaning to I’m sure.

  �
�Thanks, a lot, Becca,” I snapped. Closing my eyes I realized I was way too harsh. “Sorry. Bad morning.”

  She sat down with me and said, “I can tell. Can I be of any help?”

  I shook my head. “No. Thank you, though. I had a run in with that guy that wants to buy the library.”

  Tarryn joined us with a fresh cup of coffee in her hand.

  “What! You actually met him?”

  I nodded. “He came in here last night, saying he wanted a book. Long story short, he’s related to Jack.”

  Both girls gave me shocked looks that made me almost laugh. Almost.

  “How is that possible?” Tarryn asked as she sipped her coffee.

  “Jack founded Bay Ridge, and Jason is his relation. I know it sounds weirdly coincidental, but it is really just tough luck.”

  Becca laughed, “Sounds more like fate to me. Is he cute?”

  Leave it to happy-relationship-Becca to think that meeting Jason was fate.

  “Well,” I started. “He actually looks just like Jack. I mean, they could be twins. So yeah, he’s very cute. But his attitude is deplorable.”

  Tarryn’s smile grew and she nudged Becca in the arm. “It’s gotta be fate. I agree with Bec.”

  I didn’t agree. I told the girls how he came into the library all suave and asked for his dictionary. I didn’t however explain to them my plans to leave. I could do that later. It was for the best that I didn’t tell them while I was so tired. Seeing them so happy kept my spirits high and woke me up a little. If I told them my plans, it would make me feel like crap again.

  “Well, I have to go to work,” Becca announced, as she stood up. “I hate to leave though. All this good gossip and all.” She leaned down and gave me a huge hug. “Tonight, there is a bon-fire on the beach. Will you come?”

  I could use a night out of this place; a break from all that was on my mind.

  “Yeah, I’ll be there.”