Theresa was born to be a librarian, and she knew it.
Even as a child she'd been obsessive about orderliness and organization. Every toy had its place, and her books were always alphabetized and upright on their shelves. If she was reading in bed at night, before she turned out the lights she placed a bookmark between the pages, got up and put the book back in its place on the shelf—otherwise she couldn't sleep.
Her mother had been somewhat the same: always cleaning and dusting and straightening, serving the same dinners on designated nights of the week. Theresa grew up associating order with security.
She had been sent to Catholic schools and as a teen-ager briefly considered becoming a nun and joining a convent. But she quickly realized that, despite her attraction to the orderliness and silence of the life there, her inability to believe in God (at least as He had been described by her teachers) would be something of a handicap.
That was when the library became her convent. She came to the attention of the school librarian when discovered re-arranging the books on a shelf because they were out of order, and she quickly became the librarian's indispensable assistant. She had proved so efficient and useful that by the time she graduated a small scholarship had been created for her so she could go on to get her degree in library science.
Which she did, and aced every class without effort, so well acquainted was she with every aspect of her discipline. It was rumored that she could recite the ten main classes, one hundred divisions and one thousand sections of the Dewey Decimal System from memory. Some of her more malicious classmates added that she'd probably learned it because she had nothing else to do.
And it was true that Theresa didn't have much of a social life. It wasn't that she was totally unattractive; she was shortish, dark-haired and perhaps a little top and bottom-heavy for her size, but she had, thanks her Irish forebears, a clear, pale complexion, and lovely green eyes—though these last were generally hidden behind her glasses.
The fact of that matter was she didn't know how to talk to people. She'd gone out with a classmate or two in her major, but with each the evening had turned into something very like a study-date; libraries were all she knew. And she decided, finally, that there was nothing wrong with that.
After graduation (with honors, naturally) Theresa seized the first serious offer that came her way. It was from a library in a smallish town and the starting salary was equally tiny. But the opening was for Head Librarian and Theresa knew that as a newly minted graduate, even with her outstanding academic record, there wouldn't be many opportunities like it and she had no intention of being anyone's Assistant Librarian if she could help it.
Which was how she wound up in Oakton, Michigan, population 12,000. It was a brand-new library, and when she arrived Theresa was a little dismayed to discover that she was not just the Head Librarian, she was the
only
librarian. The library had been more expensive to build than had been estimated, so there was nothing left in the budget for anything much besides her salary. There were a couple of part-timers and some volunteers but basically it was up to her.
And after an anxious first few days Theresa decided that she was perfectly happy with that.
Which she was, at first. The books had been shelved in a semblance of order but there was a great deal of fine-tuning to be done and the cataloguing software was both inadequate and unfamiliar and there were new library cards to be made and given out and a myriad of other tasks requiring her attention. She did them all perfectly. She felt a small thrill of pride every morning when she pinned on the tag that read "Theresa Bryant—Head Librarian" before opening the library for the day.
But after a few months had passed Theresa found her life settling into a routine. The budget being what it was, there wouldn't be any new acquisitions to catalogue for quite some time, beyond the occasional donation. So it was mostly just checking books out, checking books back in and putting them back on the shelf. The rare request for an interlibrary loan or a new card was a major event.
She was bored.
So what
, she told herself.
Did you think a librarian's life would be a mad social whirl? This is exactly what you wanted... right?
There was no answer. And though she cleaned and straightened her library as obsessively as her mother had ever cleaned the house, Theresa nevertheless felt dust settling onto her heart.
A year went by. Two.
She learned to relish the small tasks, the routine, the silence. Especially the silence. It was a rare library patron who allowed a cell-phone to ring in Theresa's domain more than once.
Her imperious, "Shh," accompanied by an icy glare, was enough to wither any speech above a whisper.
She made it clear that within her domain any sound louder than that of a page being turned was distinctly unwelcome.
She was therefore was less than thrilled when a well-off patron went to the town council and offered to both buy a new computer for the library and pay for internet access.
The library already had one computer (in addition to the one in Theresa's office) to allow patrons access to the library catalogue, and Theresa was not fond of it. She would have preferred an old-fashioned card catalogue; the clicking of the keyboard violated the perfect silence and grated on her nerves like fingernails tapping on a windowpane.
So when the new computer was delivered she banished it behind a tall bookshelf in the farthest corner of the library and tried to forget about it. If she was shelving books and saw that someone was using the new computer she would roll her cart to another area until the person left and she could finish her work in peace.
It was summer. Theresa preferred summer to any other season. The library was less busy and the hum of the air conditioning masked the annoying clicks from the catalogue computer's keyboard.
She was dressed that day as she generally was all year round. She had four skirts—one navy blue, one brown, one gray and one black—all of similarly conservative cut, which she wore in turn along with matching flat-soled shoes. She always wore a long-sleeved white blouse or a turtleneck decorated in a miniscule pattern. She added a cardigan in winter, when she also traded her white ankle socks for pantyhose.
But this was summer so it was navy-blue shoes and skirt, white ankle socks and a white blouse with a hint of pleating down the front. She kept her hair at collar-length and the air-conditioning system was working to perfection, so even though it was ninety-five degrees and sweltering outdoors she was perfectly comfortable as she wheeled her cart towards the back of the library on that late July afternoon, ready to shelve that day's returns. It was coming up on closing time and Theresa had the library to herself.
Or so she'd believed until she turned the corner and saw someone sitting at the computer. She grimaced to herself.
The computer was situated so that anyone sitting in front of it had his or her back to the rest of the library, which Theresa had counted as a small psychological victory. But this meant she couldn't see who was sitting there—not that she cared, particularly. It was a man and as near as she could tell no one she'd ever seen before. She shrugged inwardly as she turned her cart in another direction, although relishing somewhat the thought that very soon she would be able to tell him it was closing time.
It was the noise that made her turn around. A noise he made.
"Mmm." As if he were impressed with something. It wasn't particularly loud, but it was a noise. And despite the fact that there was no one else in the library, Theresa took it as a personal affront.
She drew herself up, fixed her iciest glare on the back of his blonde head, and hissed, "Shh!" Then, satisfied that she had vanquished her foe, she straightened her glasses and turned back towards her cart.
"MMMmmm."
Theresa wheeled in her tracks and started back towards the stranger. Was he deaf? This time she stood even closer, leaned forward and actually raised her finger to her lips.
"SHH!"
She remained where she was, placing her hands on her hips and waiting. Daring him to make one more sound.
Nothing. No sign that he'd heard her, but no further noises either. She nodded to herself and again turned to go.
