A librarians knockout love

Chapter Five

I sat at the circulation desk of the library, trying to ignore the icy stares from my coworker Lex, from the moment she stepped foot inside the building, she had been nothing but cold and condescending towards me. The sound of her tapping nails on the desk echoed, It was clear she had something against me, but I couldn't figure out what. Was it because I was new? Did I do something wrong? I had always tried to be friendly with her, but today she seemed determined to make my day a living hell.

I sighed and rubbed my temples, trying to ease the headache that was forming. Just then, a patron approached the desk, asking for help finding a book. I put on a fake smile and tried to sound as helpful as possible, but the whole time I could feel Lex's eyes drilling into me.

Every time I made a mistake, no matter how small, Lex would pounce on it. I was sitting, trying to focus on the piled-up emails when Lex stormed over to me. "Autumn, what is this?" she demanded, slamming a book down on the desk in front of me,

I looked up, startled. "What's what?" I asked, confused.

"This!" she said, pointing to the book, her red acrylic nails tapping the cover. "It's not in the right place on the shelf. Do you know how important it is to keep our shelves organized? We can't have books out of place like this!"

I felt myself shrinking under her gaze, embarrassed by the mistake. "I'm sorry, Lex," I said, trying to keep my voice steady. "I must have missed it."

"Well, you need to pay more attention," she snapped "This is a library, not a playground. We have standards to uphold here."

I nodded, feeling like a scolded child. "I'll make sure it doesn't happen again," I promised.

"You'd better," Lex said, shaking her head in disgust, "We can't have people thinking we don't take our jobs seriously."

She quickly stormed off, her blonde hair swaying, I slumped back in my chair, feeling miserable. I knew I had made a mistake, in fact, she makes the same mistake every shift, but the way Lex was talking to me made it seem like I had committed a crime. I felt frustrated, I had no idea what crawled up her rear end and died.

At first, I tried to brush it off, telling myself that she was probably just having a bad day. But as the insults turned into full-blown hatred, it became clear that Lex's behavior toward me was not going to change.

It was like she had some kind of personal vendetta against me, and no matter what I did, I couldn't seem to win her over. I tried to be friendly and engage her in conversation, but every time I approached her, she would either ignore me or snap at me with even more venomous words.

Later in the day, I was sitting at my desk, stamping due dates onto a stack of books when Lex sauntered over, a sly grin on her makeup-caked face.

"Hey, Autumn," her voice dripped with sarcasm. "Well, I just remembered that a certain someone was looking for you the other day," Lex said, raising an eyebrow suggestively.

I felt a flush rise to my cheeks as Lex's words hit me like a punch in the gut. My heart started pounding in my chest. I had no idea what she was talking about, but the way she was looking at me made me feel like I had done something wrong. "Who was looking for me?" I asked, trying to keep the fear out of my voice.

Lex leaned in closer, her lips curling into a sneer. "Oh, just some tall, brooding, and handsome guy, just my type but he was looking for you. I told him you weren't here, of course. We can't have random guys wandering around the library, can we?"

I felt like the ground had dropped out from under me. I had realized who this guy could be but why he was looking for me. The way Lex was talking about him made me feel like I had done something scandalous. "I don't know who you're talking about," I said, my voice trembling slightly.