Between the Stacks

Chapter 21

When I was a kid I'd been walking in a park, minding my own business, when a Canada goose came out of nowhere and actively wanted my blood. That's the thing about geese - they look surprisingly innocent until they snap, and at that point they become aggressive hell monsters. This goose spread his wings, furiously beat them, and honked before he started to chase me with his neck outstretched. Canada geese know no fear. This is a fact.

Up until today, my foray with the goose was one of the only times I'd been truly terrified. But as Ms. Linaberry approached me, I felt a familiar stomach-dropping sensation.

Matteo had melted away into the background. It was just the two of us.

Instead of sitting in the chair opposite the desk, she stayed standing. Her cane trembled in one hand, and she grasped onto the back of the chair with the other. "I'd like to pick up one of my holds," she said, toneless.

The Facebook post had been taken down. Yet that didn't feel good enough; her privacy had been violated, and privacy was a huge deal in libraries.

Her hair today was dyed a light shade of green. This would normally have been something for us to cackle over. This absence of laughter, the lack of conversation, felt like a splinter in my throat.

"Ms. Linaberry," I said. "I'm so sorry about everything, I can explain-"

"I'd like to pick up a hold," she repeated. She pushed her glasses up her nose with one shaking hand.

We looked at each other. It was obvious that she was hurt, that she was angry. I could read it in the way her body was clenched, the way she tightly held onto her cane. There would be no jokes about Tinder today.

"Of course," I said, and went to grab the two books with her name. Both of them had scantily-clad men on the cover. Yet another thing we couldn't discuss.

By the time I came back she was leaning on the desk; she still hadn't sat down. 

I checked out the books and handed them over. "Due in three weeks," I said automatically.

She nodded, put the books into a bag, and left without saying anything else. I followed the tap-tap-tap of her cane on the linoleum until she disappeared into the atrium.

That had been worse than I ever could have imagined. I could have handled anger or frustration - at least then we would be talking. This quiet acceptance was much worse.

Matteo seemed to materialize out of thin air. "I was spying on you," he admitted. He chewed on his bottom lip, a sign of nervousness I had noticed over the past months. "That seemed, um, bad."

As always, you never knew who was nearby when you were at the reference desk - kids could really sneak up on you - so I had to be careful with my words. I couldn't go on a massive rant if five-year-old Debbie could overhear me. "I feel like I'm messing everything up lately," I said. "Nothing's going right."

Matteo gently punched my shoulder. "That's not true. I saw your lunch in the fridge. You brought some nice pasta."

I laughed. I had probably been inspired by Mr. Oodles of Noodles - and that thought made me more upset, knowing that Wesley had still gone ahead to book him, even though Jack was a jerk.

"You'll fix things," Matteo said. "Just give it time. I thought Rob and I would never get together, and lo and behold, we finally did."

I was desperate to talk about something fun. "I can't believe I didn't follow up on that! How did that actually happen?" We'd both dropped our voices to whispers, aware that the Cherryhill Puzzle Club might not want the deets on our dating lives.