Sweet Dreams

Paper Memories

Splash. Splash. Splash.

The sound of my muddy boots against the cold, wet ground amplified against the soft clatter of rain.

Today was the first Saturday of April, April 6.

Every resident who knew even a tad bit about the area would know that today marked a rather important day in the calendar.

Every first Saturday of a month, the papers would come.

Mail, letters, postcards, newspapers–word from outside our meager woods would come.

But most importantly, people would come.

People who have glimpsed outside the small world of trade.

It was always rather exciting to see people outside the borders of the coniferous spruce.

The publishing company lied ahead. I reached my hand out and leaned on the white gloss frame, noticing the subtle pattern of the raindrops that came and dried. Inside the shop, ink spilled across work tables, barely reaching the books that lay beside. Small pictures littered through the walls, waiting to be captured in new stories. The workers there worked with their shoulders hunched. Their eyes drooped over the thin film of glass, squinting hard. Not that any amount of squinting would clear out the words that were blotted in ink.

I smiled at the scene. One day, I would work here—as a journalist this time.

I pushed hard on the door, and the rattling of the bell that answered back was sweet to my senses. For a moment, the crooked backs straightened, and heads turned towards me, but it was only for a short moment, and they all turned back, disinterested once again.

It was hard to navigate through all the piles of paper, but I managed to find him in a few seconds. Ol' Stevens. He was a short man of a stocky build, and he blended right into the collection of books that laid on the side to be proofread.

He grinned at me when he saw me, "Young man, you're here for the daily print, aren't you?"—he nodded towards an open door at the back end of the room—"Scurry along and find them down in Gerard's desk."

I found them soon enough and was about to leave when I had stepped on something sodden. I stomped my foot down to the floor, trying to rid my boots of the wet feeling, but it was to no avail.

It was only then I noticed the bold, black lines that stretched over flimsy sheets of paper. A page was roughly torn out, and day-old milk had soaked its corners.

I wrinkled my nose in disgust. Since when were we so under money—that we could not even hire a proper cleaner? It was not much work, to be honest. I don't have the slightest idea as to why the manager finds it so hard to just do it himself.

I sighed to myself whilst bending down to pick it up myself. I was startled at the sight of the latest propaganda. It was nothing of the usual papers. The decorated women in camouflage were nowhere to be seen. It was an advertisement—but for school.

I thought it was my imagination, but I vaguely noticed papers of the same cut as I walked past the town. The usual crowd would buy a piece for a nickel, but it was not the same. I could see how their eyes passed through the contents of the daily print, but they could see just as much if the print was flipped to the other side.

I admit. It has crossed my mind maybe once or twice that this could be an opportunity for me to go to school, but we really didn't have the money, and boarding school was a pipedream for a country bumpkin like me.

That afterthought left a dent on my mood. I tried to forget about it, but it would somehow creep into the back of my head. I did end up scaring a few dainty old ladies who were trying to buy papers.