West 76th Street - H.S

Chapter 2.

A/N: I'm so happy you guys love this story... I love it more than you guys will know.. Well you'll know, just not yet... Hehehehe.

Cadence:

I stare at myself in the mirror this morning. Another weekend past. Another useless weekend. Book store, record shop, gym, walk through central park. People watch, and people watch some more. After all of that. After the past seven months of moving to this city I feel like there should be more life in my face. More life in my eyes, in my look.. You'd think I would look like I fit in here more but here we are. Here I am, contemplating if there's anywhere I will truly fit into.

I sigh, knowing my sleep schedule is still off and always will be.. Sometimes I feel as though I might never sleep through another night again. I don't wake up screaming, or uncomfortable. I don't wake up sweating and shaking. I just wake up, I remember, and then I can't go back to sleep. I'm used to sleeping five hours a night. I'm used to it now.

My eyes have deep bags, and despite me adding highlights to my hair, trying to add some life to the flat strawberry color I still feel as though I look lifeless. I am. Lifeless I mean. I feel like that may be the only explanation to this. When he did what he did, he pulled the plug on me, and that was that. When he pulled the plug on our relationship I pulled the plug as well.. And it wasn't painless.. Not for either of us, and right now all I feel is pain considering I'm still thinking about him.

    Did I love him? Of course I did. I just don't know if I can say the same for him. I loved his mother. I loved his brothers. I loved his father, even treated him as my own. I loved everything about the life we had... In the end it didn't really truly matter.. Right now it doesn't matter. What matters is getting dressed, and leaving.

    I pull on a pair of cream colored straight jeans and a white button up. I don't button it all the way, leaving the top buttons open, but covering my torso with a light green sweater vest. I sit on my floor, pulling my white tennis shoes from the floor, and slip them over my sock covered feet. I stand up, twisting my hair into a clip, and then move towards the door, grabbing my keys, and my purse. It's a bit windy today despite the fact that it's july.. The sun is out so it should even itself out, but I never know if I'll be shivering on my way home, or sweating my ass off.

    I only stop once on the way to the bookshop. I get a coffee. Caramel syrup, and a little bit of cream. Then I sip, and walk, pretending as though I'm minding my own, just like the others but casually keeping my eyes open, watching those around me. The sun is up, and it's bright, and it's enjoyable right now, but I do feel the wind just like I suspected. I keep my hand in one of my pockets as I walk, feeling casual, and cool. Once I approach the shop I unlock the front doors, and smell the books. I always take a deep breath when I walk into the store because it truly does smell like a library. It smells like a home.

    "Hello Cady." I turn to see another employee, the man in his early thirties, already greying hair, and warm eyes.

    "Hello Brian." I smile at him, and leave the door open. Brian is always covering the downstairs, I take upstairs.. Upstairs has more of my favorite titles. It's not filled with classics, and books we all know, it's filled with new names. New voices, and that's what I want, what I love, what I devour. It's what I wanted to be for so long. I head up the stairs, and set my things behind the counter, leaving them on a shelf there. I go through the shelves, knowing that yesterday I left the store to my employees, my key manager. Though they know what they're doing they always seem to miss a few steps. I stop by the window, putting books back up on the window sill, and the balcony looks as peaceful as ever.

    The store is peaceful too, jazzy music playing as a background track to the soft murmurs. This isn't a library, but people treat it like one when they shop for some reason. Maybe it's the fact that it resembles one with the way it feels or maybe it's because it's so quiet here. I move behind the counter, letting our first customers of the day browse the shelves, finding their next escape, and I open my own, reading another new title. The best part is that I never have to buy them, I can just read them, and put them right back.. It may not be a library to them, but it is to me.