Birdie (5 page)

Birdie

My first day at
the library has my arms sore and my lower back grumbling at me in the form of shooting pains. On my break I amble next door to the diner where my mother and I stopped on my first day in town, ordered breakfast, and didn't eat it. In truth, the food smelled pretty good and Tim told me there were a couple
Raleigh’s
coupons in the top drawer for free meals so it's where my stomach leads me as soon as the clock hits four.

I push into the restaurant's glass door and take a quick glance around. All the booths are taken and for some reason sitting at a square table with four chairs makes me feel more alone than a booth would so I choose the last stool at the bar, opting for that eat-and-go look those people always have.

The same guy I saw my first morning in Shenoah is here again behind the counter and he slides me a menu wordlessly but shoots a small smile my way. For some reason I can read that smile. It says something along the lines of,
I remember you but we'll pretend I don't.

I wrinkle my eyebrows at him for a moment, not sure if I'm right. But his expression changes. The light smile on his face reaches his eyes and he nods slightly so I nod slightly back and he goes back to wiping the counter and then I'm
sure
we had an exchange. Only now he's indifferent, taking the order of a man in an orange construction vest requesting everything on the menu not found in the salad section.

I return my attention to food. The fact that my hips are wider than the barstool suggests I should order chicken lettuce wraps but there wasn’t much in the trailer for lunch and I had to walk to get here (forty-five minutes) and the bacon cheeseburger promises meat on meat action and my appetite is begging for meat on meat action.

I'm tapping my foot impatiently because the guy moved on from the construction worker to a couple guys that look about the same age as me and by the way they're talking instead of placing orders, I'm pretty sure they're friends with the waiter.

I crane my neck down the counter but, nope. Just the one waiter.
I sigh loudly, but that doesn't slow their conversation. Which sounds like an old school gaming system debate.

"Dude, the original Nintendo beats the original Sega. Two words: Duck Hunt." The words are spoken by a blonde haired, blue-eyed, polo-shirted teen looking intent as if convincing his curly-headed friend of this fact is akin to negotiating world peace.

"Come on! Sega rolls into a ball and goes ape shit on the coinage, man!" Curly argues. Wasn't convinced apparently.

"No,
Donkey Kong
goes apeshit," Blondie laughs heartily at his own joke. The waiter chuckles and shakes his head but I can tell his chuckle wasn't joke-induced. He's laughing at his friend's absurdity.

Blondie doesn't realize it and claps a hand on the waiter's shoulder, grinning.  "See? He gets it," he said.

Curly purses his lips and shakes his head back and forth. "Nope. Sega all the way."

I sigh again because I'm still waiting and this pointless debate is eating up my break.

"Hey, yo. Guys," I interrupt, waving my menu. "Not that this argument needs to go any further, but for the sake of my starving stomach, the curly-headed kid is right. Sega. But not because of that hedgehog that rolls around. Big whoop. But the Shining Force series was awesome. That alone means Sega wins."

The two friends give me dumbfounded looks but the waiter looks thoughtful.

I slap my menu on the counter. "Bacon cheeseburger please, sweet potato fries for the side, and a diet coke. I work next door at the library and don't have much time left and your menu says you deliver..." I gather my things. "So. Ok." I leave hastily, as their looks turn from astonishment to indignation that I'd intrude on their discussion.

Ten minutes later, sitting in a blue plastic chair in the break room with my feet propped on the identical chair next to it and deep into a Sharon Shinn fantasy that someone returned to the book drop this morning, my cheeseburger and fries arrive. An older woman with gray fringe around her forehead and a name badge labeled Nadine smiles at me and gives me the total and I reach into a couple jean pockets, forgetting where I stashed the coupon. I’m surprised at the slight pang of disappointment I feel that it’s not the waiter from behind the counter.

I only get in a few bites because my break is almost up. Before heading back out onto the main floor, my eyes flick to the phone on the wall. The library’s phones have long distance so we can place calls to other libraries outside of Shenoah. The urge to call Darla is strong. I haven’t spoken to anyone in over a week and I don’t even know if she knows Tim exists, much less his number.

The urge passes and I pack up my food and head back into the stacks. If I get caught abusing long distance, I could get fired. One week and I’ll have my first paycheck. Then I can use a small portion to buy a calling card. Until then, I’ll have to make do living in this cocoon of a small town.

Wes

I stand outside the
library, looking through the glass display window featuring Clifford the Big Red Dog in all his big doggie glory. I don’t see her in there. I only see Miss Shirley, the pruny, white-haired librarian who looks exactly the same as she did when my mom took me here as a kid. Same pruny wrinkles, same white ponytail down the length of her back. She’s suspended in time, that woman.

I also see Yvette Larson. She has cropped honey brown hair and a plain face, but she’s light on her feet, even as she loads herself down with a stack of books that she deposits on the desk. The gracefulness is becoming. She disappears and reappears with more and more stacks of books.

That’s all I see from my vantage point on the sidewalk. The other girl, the new girl must be somewhere in the stacks. She said when she ordered her lunch that she worked here. I haven’t been in this library in years, but surely I would’ve seen her since most of my time is sucked up in the diner next door. She must have just started working here. She looks younger than me but maybe she has one of those Peter Pan faces, never aging. She doesn’t go to my school.

I stand there until it becomes uncomfortable. Until I’ve spent too long at the display window and it’s either enter the building or look like some weird Clifford the Big Red Dog creep.

I go inside.

Miss Shirley gives me a hello nod, but her demeanor is still frosty and she doesn’t look up from the paper she’s scribbling on. Yvette turns from the pile of books on the desk and gives me a warm smile.

“Wesley,” she welcomes me. “I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you in here before.”

Yvette used to come over to our house when I was much younger. She used to date my oldest brother but that was years ago in the past. Yvette and I wave to each other when we pass on the street now, but she’s right. I haven’t so much at glanced at this library and I walk by it on a daily basis.

I shrug like it’s no big deal. “I just got off work. I, uh…need a book.”

“Which book are you looking for?”

I pause. Which book? I don’t answer for a moment because I don’t have a title prepared. I shrug again. “Not sure. I just need something to pass the time when the diner gets slow. Any recommendations?”

Yvette laughs. “You don’t want any from me. I’ve been knee deep in children’s books since I took this job. Side effect from being the Children’s Librarian. Miss Shirley?”

Miss Shirley grunts and peers at me through her small, square glasses. “New girl,” she says, before returning to her scribbling.

Yvette’s eye light up in understanding. “Ah, yes. Birdie is always reading. She can probably find something you’d like. She’s a whiz at that kind of thing.”

Yvette leads me around some shelving to the back of the stacks. The girl from the diner sits there, surrounded by a pile of books. The shelf in front of her is halfway organized. Right now she’s squinting at one of the paperbacks in her pile and shaking her head.

“Just because it’s a Nora Roberts doesn’t mean we should keep it,” she mutters. She glances up and waves the book towards us. “There’s mold on the spine, Yvette.
Mold
.”

Yvette nods in agreement. “This has been something the collection has needed for ages. I’ve been swamped with children’s programming. Miss Shirley was smart to hire you.”

Birdie sighs. “Well I feel like I’ve made zero progress since I started.”

“Why don’t you take a break from this? Miss Shirley asked if you could help him find a book. He needs a recommendation.” Yvette jabs a thumb at me as she says this, then pats me on the shoulder and returns to her task out front.

Birdie cocks a head at me as she studies me. I cock a head back.

So it’s Birdie. Now that I have her name, her odd flighty name, I am shocked at how well it suits her. It wraps around her like a snug blanket so much so that I know if I ever meet anyone else with that name, it would be so jagged and wrong and so out of place on them.

She stands from her work and walks over to me. She is so near I can smell her shampoo. I resist leaning in. Girls smell so good. Her hair smells like rain.

After a short appraisal with her eyes, she turns and beckons me to follow. I do.

“What’s the last book you read that you really loved?” she asks as we head over to what looks like the sports section.

My mind flits to when I had actual, glorious free time and the title comes easily to me. “
The Watchers
by Dean Koontz.”

I went through a golden Labrador period after mine passed away and Clay swiped the book off his dad’s nightstand for me based on picture alone. He figured I’d like it. I tore through all of Koontz’s books that summer. 

Birdie stops short and I almost crash into her. Her fresh, rainy scent fills my nose. She looks at me with new eyes and cocks her head again. We do an about face and she heads towards the back of the library, pushing through a large door that reads STAFF ONLY above it.

I follow, curious.

She reaches the round lunch table in the staff room. A to-go box with cheeseburger meal leftovers sits open on it. She snags a cold fry and munches on it absently while she shifts through another pile of books on the table. Finding her selection, she holds it out to me.

“The Andromeda Strain,” I read. I take it from her and flip it over to the back, pretending to skim it. “Are these even allowed to be checked out? Why are we in the staff room?”

“This is my personal stash,” she says, some of the confidence leaking from her face. It’s like she was on autopilot when she lead me here and she’s now suddenly realizing where we’re standing and what she’s revealing to me. My eyes roam over her personal stash and she stiffens. She fidgets slightly. “Just bring it back whenever you’re done. I’ve already read it and I have plenty here to keep me entertained.” She pauses and licks her lips. “When you said The Watchers the way you did…I know what it’s like to love a book. Your face kind of lifted and the memory of it clicked in your eyes. So, I just…I think you’ll like this book. Lots of suspense and cutting-it-close scenes.”

“Thanks,” I say, holding up the book like an idiot. She wordlessly walks back out of the staff room and I follow her. She sits back down with her pile of books and I stand a few feet away turning Michael Creighton’s novel around in my hands. She is back to work and I am clearly dismissed. I clear my throat and she looks back up at me. Her smile is small but genuine. I like it. The look of it.

“Thanks,” I say again, feeling even more idiotic. She nods and then turns back to the shelf. It’s only after I check out the book (my father apparently keeps all our cards up to date even though none of us use this place) and it isn’t until I’m standing back out on the street that I realize I didn’t even tell her my name.

Birdie

I’m beating Tim. Before
I close the
Shield Protector
, I glance back to his dog-eared page. Marina only just found out the shipping lord is wearing a signet ring underneath those gloves. How he managed to stop on that page befuddles me. When I got to that chapter, I spent the next hour reading “one more page” until the clock on the nightstand blinked two a.m. and I finally forced myself to creep into the living room and put the book back on the coffee table.

I sigh. I’m in a slower part of the novel and the gap between Tim and I is widening. I kind of like this arrangement we have. I don’t see him much but this shared reading makes me feel linked to him in a way. I don’t want to finish the book yet and give that up. I put it back on the coffee table and heat up some Ramen noodles in a cup. It tastes like salt water and starch. Two more days. And I’ll use some of my paycheck to add some color to the fridge.

I dump the leftover liquid from my lunch and pull aside the cornflower colored curtains above the sink to see if Esther is home. She invited me this morning to join her in a manicure. Her nails are already lacquered in a loud purple hue but Esther changes colors like the horse from
The Wizard of Oz
. And not just her nails. Her hair tips are orange now and her tank top this morning was a striped green neon number over skinny blue jeans.

Spending the morning with her actually sounded pleasant. She does most of the talking and I’ve come to like to listen to her stories of current beaus, her damn ex-husband, and the trailer park gossip which at present I’m the star of. But I showered her with homework excuses to douse her insistent protests in lieu of telling her how incredibly broke I am.

“You’re not even in school yet,” she had argued, but I wagged a finger and responded with, “I’m a senior changing schools with the year almost up. I have to go in, guns blazing” which she took because she loves that expression. As she should. She is always capping her stories with blazing guns. “That driver cut me off then had the nerve to come yell at me in the parking lot, guns blazing!” or “Ooooh, he was all over that woman when his wife burst into the bar, guns blazing!”I stole it from her and used it to grind in my point. Actually, I have no idea what I’m about to face in the curriculum, but she was finally satisfied with the excuse all the same.

Her car is out front. I suck in a breath as I crane my neck to look up out the window. Dark gray clouds hang low, blanketing the sky. I know if I pull out a soda and plop down in the chair, she’ll talk with me a bit before offering me a ride to work.

A quick glance at the clock shows it’s noon. I have to start walking now to make it on time to my one o’clock shift but if I hitch a ride, I’ll have forty-five minutes to kill.

I go with option B and choose to murder minutes. These clouds look like they’re going to open up any second.

I grab
Shield Protector
and the last of the Raleigh’s coupons – a shake – and take my seat in the lawn chair outside.

Esther comes bustling over not even five minutes later, car keys in hand.

“We don’t need to do that song and dance where you sit out here hoping to catch me coming or going so I can offer you a ride to work. It’s about to rain. C’mon.” She’s yelling at me over her shoulder as she opens her car door and I quickly lock Tim’s front door and hop in.

Esther’s nails are bright green to match her tank top. I smile. “Nice color,” I comment and I can tell the compliment goes a long way. She waves it off, but she’s beaming and telling me about her date to the bowling alley tonight with a man from a neighboring town and fretting over whether he’ll like the green.

By the time Esther drops me off, the town has taken on a dusky gray hue and lightening lights up the street like camera flash bulbs going off, indicative of an impending storm. No rain has materialized for all its angry production but a strong wind attacks my bun and I can smell the clean watery scent in the air.

I pop into
Raleigh’s
with Tim’s book tucked under my arm and take a window booth. I want to shrink into the bouncy plastic with the milkshake and read as I wait out the forty-five minutes. A girl takes my order, one I haven’t seen here before. She crinkles her nose at the simple shake and coupon and glances around the table as if my order doesn’t warrant the extra three empty spaces.

After only a couple of minutes, she delivers everything I might possibly need. Water, extra napkins, two straws as if I might somehow fuck up the first one trying to use it and flag her back to a table that obviously isn’t worth her time in tips.

And it’s not.

I become hyperaware of the dollar tucked away in my pocket for just that purpose and I rub my thigh where it rests self consciously.

I read for a little while until I’m slurping the bottom of the glass. The coupon was for a small so it didn’t take long and the book is so engrossing, I forgot to pace myself and now I still have fifteen minutes to kill and nothing to consume. I lean back in my booth and look around the diner. If I’m going to get all hot and embarrassed because my imagination insists people are looking at me disapprovingly, I’m going to look right back at them.

Of course, no is watching me. Or at least, that’s what I think until I see that waiter guy glance my way a couple times.

The attention makes me turn back to my book. But it’s too late to get engrossed again. My eyes keep flicking up to see if he’s still looking but every time I locate him in some part of the restaurant, he’s busy serving tables and our eyes don’t meet again.

Five minutes until I’m heading out, and he’s suddenly by my table, plunking down a Styrofoam cup in front of me.

“Vanilla is classic, but this is heaven. Coffee chocolate chip shake to go. On the house. You will love me for this.”

He starts to walk away and I sputter a surprised, “Thank you.”

He turns briefly to flash me a smile. “
Andromeda Strain
for coffee chocolate chip shake. Fair trade.” And then goes back to waiting tables.

I don’t speak to him as I hurry out. He looks busy and I wouldn’t know what to say since I already thanked him.

And then it hits me, but I’m already outside, sucking on the shake. (Fucking delicious.)

I didn’t ask for his name.