The Book Nook

23

I could feel the atmosphere around us had changed. It was impossible to describe, but it didn't really feel like we were in the library anymore. We were someplace, for lack of a better description, safe. Like we were somewhere where it was okay to be sad, and to talk about why we were sad, and that it was a place for understanding and healing. I didn't know what kind of place that was, but it wasn't how you'd generally describe a place like a library.

I felt very fortunate to be there, being a recipient of trust in the way that Alexandria had been showing to me. It moved me. You can't exactly ask people to trust you enough to share the inner workings of their deep, profound existential feelings, but when they do share them with you, it can feel like a lift to the spirit itself, even if it also feels like you too take on their burdens.

It was now easy to see beyond the mask that she puts on as the cute, quirky book-girl. Easy to see that there was some amount of sadness behind it all; sadness not easily put to rest and broken free of. The way she described the way she'd previously lived her life felt like it came from a place of remorsefulness, like she was deeply repentant of it. And the way she talked about people showed hidden scars that had not healed, or ones whose healing was a long road far from travelled. Those can exist too whether we like it or not.

The more I heard, the more baffled I was as to why she had picked me out of the crowd to bring along on this journey. This journey of..... I really did not know. It was so complicated and daunting. Was I watching someone's personal journey unfold from deep unhappiness into something finally approaching what could be the coming out from the other side of it? What was on the other side of the melancholia I felt in waves coming off of her? I did not know what that looked like, it was too hard to discern.

Or maybe there was nothing I could do. I felt almost helpless in relation to her deep sadness. It was there, visible now, very present. I could say nothing, do nothing, act in no way as to relieve her of its heaviness. That was not a task that any human being was capable of, this much I knew.

I watched her still, staring upwards. I never had any idea what was the right procedure for these moments. I still struggled and it irritated me to no end, thinking that the longer and longer the silence dragged out, the less she thought of me. Maybe it was a strange thing to think but my inability to interpret these situations gave me no confidence to know what was right to say or do.

So I had nothing to do but admit to it.

"I don't know what to do here. I don't know what to say. I just...don't know."

I felt almost foolish for speaking aloud right then, but decided that there was no other way around it. I couldn't just sit there, laying in a bean bag chair and staring up at the ceiling like an idiot.

"There's a lot of sadness," I continued on, "I could read it in between the lines of the pages of your novel. I could see something always hiding behind the words you'd speak, or the actions you'd make. I can understand the struggle of making it known to another person. I wouldn't want to so open either. Actually, right there I'm even hiding something. I just acted like I couldn't personally relate to any of that. But saying that would be a lie. I'm quite often a very melancholic person as I'm sure you've picked up on. I hide myself away from the world, trying my best to not get too invested in anything or anyone because it all seems hardly worth it after awhile. I think I'm scared of disappointment too. It's like I'm trying to board myself up in a house and weather the storm of life by just trying to survive and make it through unscathed, hoping that whatever comes afterward will be better than all of this."

"That's an interesting thought you articulated," she said from her bean bag chair several feet away. "Do you think everyone is as unhappy as us?"

She gave a light giggle. Me, I pondered the question more seriously.