Sweet Rayne

Part 2

Rayne POV

Rayne drifted out of her bathroom and into the only bedroom of her small, but cozy A-frame home. It was a nightly fight between the cat and the dog to see who got the most space on the comfy mattress. It was usually the human in the scenario that always lost No matter what. Sir Jaccobi was already sprawled across the pillows, while Master Bridges was situated so Rayne had the choice of either the bottom corner or the edge of the headboard.

"Come on, you two," she growled, shooing the dog to the side and eyeballing the cat until it gave up a bit of pillow.

It was typical for her brain to latch onto work right before she would try to close her eyes and dwell for hours. But when she closed her eyes, her mind was frozen on a single image: Jake. Jake sitting next to her, under those stupid twinkle lights that lit the deck. The soft light playing in his hair and bouncing off his skin and setting fire to his eyes. It was so intimate. As if for only her to see.

The alarm blasted her out of bed at 8:40. She could have sworn she had reset her Saturday alarm to 7:30, but that was not the case. She ran herself through her shower, caring for the animals, and dashing outside with sopping wet hair in a bun and took off for the library by 9:22. She figured by the time she reached work, she would have about twenty minutes to get the morning's storytime set up. She mentally checked off the location of each item she was going to need to grab.

Speeding into the parking lot, she was relieved to see Mae's car was already there. She rushed in, her brain slamming across all of the "have to do" list before opening for the day.

"Morning Mae!" she shouted as she rushed into the office.

After tossing her stuff down, she set into grabbing hold of the craft boxes.

"I'd ask how last night went, but no time," Mae called out, setting up the computer on its stand in the story area. "Don't forget your mic!"

"Yeah, yeah," Rayne shouted back.

She quickly set out tubs of scissors, glue, crayons, stickers, and pre-cut shapes. She got the day's stories and other titles by the featured authors to set up. She tossed out the big pillows across the floor space and finished setting up her staging before waving the mic at Mae to prove she had not forgotten it again. Mae officially opened the library at ten sharp, allowing in her regulars. Rayne waved and welcomed them warmly as the families took their places. Mae had started recording. She talked directly to the few families that were remoted in from the branch libraries.

Storytime hour was always the same routine - story one, talk about the story and authors of the day's featured books, craft time, story two, talk about the book, then send everyone out to the stacks to look for books. She could wait an hour for sustenance and coffee. She was a big girl. She'd done it before. She could and would do it again.

She plowed through the first of the summer themed stories, laughing and acting up as the kids played along. The parents chimed in when cued, picking up that their librarian was a bit sluggish.

Craft time was always crazy. It was all she could do to hold herself together as the crazy spun out into chaos, but everyone was having fun, so it didn't matter the kind of chaos. Rayne watched as the volunteers moved through the steps of the craft along with her in the branch libraries. It was a carefully choreographed dance they had nailed down during her tenure as librarian, and most of the time, everything went as planned.

Watching her time carefully, she started moving the families back into place for story number two. That would mean about fifteen minutes and she could make a coffee run. She could smell the wakeup juice already. The thought pushed a delighted smile on her face. Grabbing a hold of the book, she moved back in front of the recording camera.