The Book 12

My very first story, written for a Friend. No sex but a sequel is in the works. Please vote and comment whether positive or negative. Enjoy!

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I enter the library to pick up The Book. It had arrived on loan from another library and delaying its retrieval was not an option. I take a deep breath before ascending the stairs to the circulation desk. I can almost feel condensation sprout between the librarian's cool aura and my approaching warmth. I'm grinning from ear to ear, something I usually have the self control to avoid in public. I thrust my card into her palm just as a child might on their first visit. She gives me a strange look as she turns to get the book, my cue to try and suppress my apparently unnerving excitement. I fail. She returns and hands me the book in it's little white sleeve. There's a glimmer of amused curiosity softening her voice and her face when she reminds me that there are no renewals.

I walk away from the desk with my eyes on The Book. It really isn't anything special: brown with black binding with the title stamped in a simple typeface on the cover and spine. The contents of it isn't even particularly exciting, to me at least. It is, however, huge: with the covers about eighteen inches wide, I can't just stuff this into my purse as usual. I'll have to carry it in front of my chest, arms crossed over it. That's how He would want it. For weeks since our last talk I've waited for The Book to arrive. Only with it in hand am I allowed the privilege of His presence.

Weeks of fantasizing about having it in my hands ... The Book, that is. For some reason, I'd imagined something small, thick, novel-sized. Something that would allow me to fan the pages with my thumb. A disrespectful act, I know, but thinking of the difference between my expectation and reality only brought the realisation of just how well He knows me. I'll read anything in the library, but what comes home with me is subject to the test of portability and the privacy that affords me. I use public transportation and prefer to keep the openings for smalltalk to a minimum.

This book, His Book, is a different kind of shield than my usual aloof expression. It keeps Him in the front of my thoughts and blocks the many places my mind usually wanders. For once, I'm not worried about what I'm wearing, whether anyone's giving me strange looks, or about the inevitable awkward moment in the past or future. Well, maybe I should worry about that last one, considering I'm now walking around the library without aim. I can't go home, not yet. The library will close in only a few hours, but going home now means encountering my roommate who will almost certainly ask more questions than I'm in the mood to answer.

I step into an elevator and head up into the stacks. There, I find a corner study booth that feels private enough to and begin to examine His Book. I trace my fingers along the edges of each cover as if searching for a secret button on an ancient rune. I'm looking for another lesson in His choice. This book is so large, so visible, that I actually dread leaving with it "strapped" across my chest. The thought reminds me of childhood, when everything was big for me and people seemed all too pleased to point it out.

Resentment coats my body and I'm looking without seeing when a soft thump brings me crashing back to the present. Someone is sitting on the other side of my booth. Seriously, there's a whole floor of empty ones! I will never understand some peoples' propensity towards being right up under strangers instead of giving them space. Don't they watch TV? Don't they realize how dangerous people can be? Having thoroughly ejected the previous moment's feelings onto the intruder, I start packing up to find another spot.

"Sit." The word cuts like a knife, softened as it is by the partition's muffling effect. My neck end eyes instantly roll in unbridled incredulity. I'm about to give this guy the what-for when the fact dawns on me: it's Him. The anger leaves with a whoosh and threatens to show itself in tears of unexpected release.

I sit as quickly as possible and grasp for words to let him know that it's done.

"Yes, Sir." It comes out somewhat strangled but hopefully acceptable.

"Good girl." I can hear the stillness, and the smile, in his voice.

I try but fail to suppress my grin as his face rises like a sun over the partition. My sun. The center of my universe in this moment.

"Hello, pet."

"Hello, Sir."