Turn the Page
by
Michael D. Britton
* * * *
Copyright 2012 by Michael D. Britton
Virginia Ward pulled open the heavy wooden door of the Bedminster Library, struggling against the gusting wind, a pile of books under one arm. The brass handle was so cold on her bare white hand it felt like a burn.
Her eye caught the deep, smooth carvings in the door that were caked with grime from years of diesel exhaust spewed by buses that rumbled by on busy East Street. She took a little personal offense on behalf of the stately old building that predated the polluting internal combustion engines.
As the outside door whooshed shut, the soft bristles lining the edge sealing off the wind and the traffic noise, Virginia inhaled deeply her favorite aroma – old books – a cue that she’d soon be transported away from the loneliness, monotony and emptiness of post-school life in twenty-first century Bristol.
She caught her reflection in the glass door that led to the main lobby, and stood in the little airlock for a moment, gently shuffling her brown leather heeled boots on the worn mat that reminded her of dog hair. She briskly ran her free hand through her own hair, several long auburn strands having been ripped from her loose bun by the gale outside.
One more deep breath, and into the main lobby with its mouse sounds – shuffling of papers, soft breathing, a few gentle taps on a computer keyboard behind the massive mahogany reference desk.
Heaven.
She’d been out of school for six months now, and she didn’t miss the snotty empty-headed girls, shabby blue and gray uniforms, or clueless teachers who spent more time fecklessly attempting to discipline the riotous teens than actually instructing. But she did miss the slow trickle of information into her brain, and the opportunity to devour literature in English class. Since June, she’d spent an enormous amount of time at the Bemmie library (as the locals called it) – especially since her parents were killed on the M5, leaving her alone and in a state of shock for weeks after.
Virginia timidly placed her stack of novels on the returns desk and unbuttoned her navy wool coat as she strolled up the stairs to her favorite section: historical romance.
She intentionally walked slowly, casually – to draw out the experience. She could feel her heart beating faster in anticipation – there was an obscure book she knew she had to have – she’d seen a brief review of it online, but had been waiting to read it until after finishing another series.
She meandered past the aisles, gazing down each at the rows of odd-sized spines, though she knew exactly where her book was.
At the far end, left side, bottom shelf, middle of the shelf.
Westerbury, Carrie.
No Time for This.
The tale of a Victorian schoolteacher, and her conflict, pain, mistaken identity, true love, heartbreak, salvation – written in 1982 and set in 1901 Bristol – in the very streets Virginia walked to get to this library, but without the buses and cars and endless retail storefronts.
She could feel the stories that lived as ghosts on the filthy narrow streets of Bristol – the centuries of history, the thousands of lives, with their struggles, joys, and meaning.
This book would suck her back to a simpler era, but would provide a complex world of the heart, allow her to focus on the things that really matter in any era – even if the stories of these characters were not as real as those that haunted her aged city – they were still written by a real person, pulled from some real person’s heart, drawn from a reality that Virginia wanted to drink in and savor the taste of.
She slid the book out of its place in the shadows on the thick, dark wooden shelf, hefted it to a little round table in the corner under one of the narrow windows set deep in the gray stonework, sat in the dark brown round-backed leather chair, and turned back the thick black hardcover with its gold embossed lettering.
The library sleeve inside indicated it had not been checked out in over seven years. Another turn of the page and she pushed the spine flat, the pages of the book jumping open like a lazy fan and breathing their unique musty book odor directly into her nostrils. Lodged between pages 102 and 103 was a makeshift bookmark made from a handwritten shopping list:
eggs
milk
romaine lettuce (2)
tomatoes
vanilla crème biscuits
cat food (5)
Virginia’s brain swam in déjà vu for a few moments, then she picked up the note, the paper thin like tracing paper, and squinted at the handwriting.
It was not her own.
But these were the same items from yesterday’s shopping list. Her items. In the same order.
Seven years ago, when this book was last checked out, someone bought the same set of items as her.
Exactly.
Virginia was intrigued, but decided to dismiss the incident as coincidence, eager to begin reading this novel.
She read the first chapter and decided this one required hot chocolate and a roaring fire. She picked it up and headed for the gray marble stairs to check it out.
She passed a twenty-something man with bright eyes under a brooding frown with trim brown beard, wearing a flat cap and trench coat, who was trying unsuccessfully to hide the fact that he was checking her out. She’d seen him before somewhere – perhaps here – but couldn’t quite place him.
Looking away quickly, she took her book and headed home through the increasing wind under a darkening gray sky. The first rain – big dirty splashing drops – started to hit the pavement as she turned her key in the front door of number five Clift House Road.
Squeezed into a row of seven narrow terraced Victorian homes on what had become a major thoroughfare over the last century, the rough-hewn façade of her home was blackened from exhaust and the tiny balconies on the second and third story were rotting away, unused for decades.
She stepped inside and slammed the burgundy painted metal door, the brass knocker bouncing on the other side, and slid the bolt behind her with a shunk sound, opened the frosted glass inner door and walked the long narrow corridor to the tiny kitchen in the back, turning lights on as she went. She immediately set to putting the kettle on, before even taking her coat off.
The air inside was chill, so she built a fire in the small tiled fireplace in the front room, and lit it with scraps of newspaper, the flames growing in intensity over a few minutes, soon crackling and throwing up glowing embers into the blackness of the flue. Wisps of wood smoke smell cut the cold air.
On her way back to the kitchen she was met by a friend.
“Hello, Claude,” she said perkily as her thin Siamese padded down the steep staircase and lithely rubbed an arched back against her legs.
The cat followed her into the kitchen, weaving between her legs and nearly tripping her up. Virginia popped open a can of Fancy Feast, the aroma of liver and fish escaping like a disembodied soul, and scraped the contents into the Claude’s little baby blue ceramic dish beside the old gas stove. The sound of the fork in the little can had the cat raising up onto his hind legs in anticipation. “There you go, sweetheart.”
Claude wasted no time digging into the mushy paste, a breathy purring sound bouncing out of the dish as he devoured his dinner.
The kettle started to whistle, the sound growing like an air-raid siren in intensity, a stream of steam shooting out of the spout like a train going full-bore. Claude paused for a moment to watch as Virginia lifted the pot from the burner, the sound dying back down in a Doppler-like deflated effect, and Claude quickly returned to licking the bottom of his bowl.
Virginia poured the boiling water into the hot chocolate powder in her big blue mug, grabbed No Time for This, and returned to the glowing fire in the front room, h
eat radiating from the fireplace in a circle of flickering light. The sky was now black and rain was clicking against the window like someone throwing wedding rice in waves.
Claude wasn’t far behind – he jumped up on the deep blue, pillow-laden sofa and quickly settled in with his back to the flickering fire.
Virginia curled up on the couch next to Claude, wrapped in a rainbow-colored crocheted shawl her dad’s cousin has made for her years ago, placed her steaming mug on the little square end table, and ran her finger along the book’s spine.
Time to dig in and be transported away.
She turned to page one, saw the word Prologue and resisted the temptation to begin reading, thinking maybe she’d see what was on page 102, where the mysterious Doppelganger shopping list had been sitting for seven years. Delaying the reading just a few more moments was a game she played with herself – to heighten her excitement and make the payoff more powerful.
As she flipped the pages to page 102 - three terse raps on the front door knocker made her inhale sharply.
She rolled her eyes, irritated at the intrusion.
Since mum and dad had died in May, Virginia had become pretty reclusive. School had just ended. She’s just turned seventeen, had no job, no plans, a small inheritance, and all the time in the world to figure out how to make life make sense.
The little Spar grocery at the end of Duckmoor Road, the NatWest Bank, the Bemmie Library, and that empty three story house – the one that used to be a home – that was the extent of Virginia’s world these days.
That, and, of course, the rich world of her books.
Now someone was trying to invade her world, and interrupt her from entering the story world – both intolerable offenses.
She shuffled past the closed curtains to the hallway, through the inner draft door to the front door, lifted up on her tiptoes to peer out the spy hole.
A stranger. No, she’d seen him before.
The brooding man with bright eyes - from the library.
Why had he followed her? Trying to return something she’d left behind? No – in this city, the self-interested seemed to outnumber the good Samaritans.
She backed away from the peep hole, heart pounding, closed the inner door, and returned to her place on the couch, willing herself to remain calm.
Three more urgent knocks.
She sipped slowly at her cocoa – now cooled to the perfect temperature, but the taste was unsatisfying. She stroked Claude’s back, rubbed her knuckles softly between his twitching ears – more for her own comfort than his.
A last set of knocks.
She knew it was the last set – nobody ever tried more than three times – it was one of those unwritten rules of life.
She got up and moved to the curtains, touching her nose against the rough fabric as she peeked through a tiny crack in them, and saw the man wandering off down the road in the storm. Satisfied the stranger had given up and was not prowling around, she picked up the book once more.
Deep breath.
Page 102.
kept catching the corner of her eye and making her think a dark set of eyes gazed upon her menacingly – but every time she looked directly toward the fireplace, it was clearly just a trick of light, an inanimate set of random objects conflated in the shadows to form an imaginary friend.
“Virginia,” he said, whispering like the rain against her window, “it is imperative that we speak.”
Virginia snapped the book closed, her chest gently heaving as she controlled her breathing.
She opened the book again and started flipping through the pages from the beginning. A cursory review indicated that the Virginia character was not introduced until that chapter.
More curious than concerned, Virginia returned once more to page one and dove into the prologue.
She was hooked immediately, feeling the feelings, seeing, smelling, touching the setting – and hungry to know how it would all turn out for the heroine.
Pages turned, and turned, the room silent except for the regular rustling sound of paper on paper. Claude slept soundly, his tail occasionally curling up at the tip. The fire died down. The rain stopped. The last half inch of cocoa grew cold and a thin skin formed on its surface.
Virginia’s eyes grew heavy and started to sting. She pushed through, repositioning her feet under herself.
The sky outside faded up from black slowly, the long orange streetlights outside blinking off just as Virginia turned the last page.
She closed the cover, still warm in her hands, and laid her stiff neck back on the couch, closed her eyes, and sleepily pondered the tale.
No.
It just wouldn’t do.
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