Author's note: This story takes place following Holly's Winter and Cecee's Spring, but before Vicky's Fall and Oksana's New Year. However, this story was written immediately after Holly's Winter and before any of the others in the series. It should stand as its own complete story. I appreciate comments, feedback and constructive criticism.
I
Why is it that some libraries have become places of mystery and dark corners again? I know long ago that not many people read, or not many people read regularly, so libraries remained little used aside from the odd, bespectacled and bookish person. Of course some were more popular than others, but it seems to me that many old horror stories would have something to do with a musty old library, bereft of recent human activity, full of dusty and cobwebbed shelves and ancient tomes that hadn't been looked at in over a hundred years. They were more mausoleums for books than the living, breathing, child-friendly neighbourhood places that we sometimes find today.
And perhaps that is why I sometimes find libraries comforting, especially this one with its limited lighting and almost absolute silence. Being around people too long makes me uncomfortable and being away from them too long makes me feel lonely, but when I find an old and little-used library I find an inner peace. The authors become platonic friends. Their writings become an alternate world that temporarily frees me from my disturbing sexual appetite.
I wilfully admit that I am weird and sometimes I even creep people out. I want to be around people; hell, I want to be near people, but I've found that it always leads to emotional disarray, pain and sometimes violence.
I am a bisexual woman. I am not a normal bisexual, though. While I can find temporary satisfaction in the loving embrace of either a man or a woman, I cannot find permanent satisfaction there. When I've made love to a man I then desire a woman and when I've made love to a woman I then desire a man. I can fall in love, but I cannot stay faithful to any one partner.
The first minister I had ever talked with concerning my orientation had informed me that I had a problem with sharing: I needed to share my love more than was practical in our society. The second minister told me I was evil, an abomination, and he cast me out of his church, freeing his congregation of my 'depraved desires'. Needless to say, it took me a few guilt-ridden years to come to the realization that the second minister didn't know what he was talking about. Though, I think deep down I still may believe some of the things that he said to me.
There are those who cannot accept what I am and desire to take possession of me as if I were some animate sex-doll, there to fulfill their sexual needs but none of my own, unless they happened to coincide. This includes men and women. I have rarely met anyone willing to accept me and my needs, although my friends here, at the North Pole, have been true friends in every sense of the word. But, not everyone I've met in my life was and so I hid myself away in Santa Clause's library for hours and hours, every day.
Holly and Douglas, Cecee and Yuri and some of the elves honoured my unspoken request to be allowed to sit and read in solitude. They did not exactly understand why, but they did understand that when I was not left alone, I was troubled as if some demon were gnawing at my soul.
Unfortunately, not everyone understood my need for seclusion. Vicky and I had been lovers a couple of times, until it became perfectly clear that she only really desired men. I didn't mind as it had happened to me before and she was a very honest and open person. True, Vicky was very beautiful and I mean retouched-photo, men's magazine, very beautiful. I turned heads when I moved the right way or said the right thing. Vicky turned heads away from me just by being in the same room. We had both agreed to be 'just friends' and then we quickly became good friends and I love her dearly like a sister, now. In her mind, she sees me finding the right person, man or woman, and then settling down happily as Holly and Cecee both did. It just cannot happen that way. She doesn't truly understand how my hunger works.
Neither does Sergei. He entered the quiet library unnoticed by me, as I was lost in my research. He came up behind me and put his arms around my shoulders. "What are you reading there, Jennifer?"
I closed the book on the table in front of me, showing him the cover. Leaning back in the chair, I foolishly implied that I wanted to turn his gentle touch into a warm and affectionate hug. "It is an atlas of faerie explorations of the world," I explained.
"Deep reading. A beautiful woman such as you was made for better things, my Jennifer." His hands slipped down my shirt to my boobs and he gently squeezed them together. I understood immediately that he wanted 'better things' right now and, aside from us, the library was empty...
Sighing, I disengaged his hands from my breasts and sat forward in the chair. "I've already discussed this with you, Sergei. Our relationship is over. I would like it to continue, but man alone cannot satisfy my needs. I'm not complete when I have only one partner of one gender." I turned in my chair and looked at his face to gauge his emotional reaction. Some people have turned violent when I've ended a relationship. I've tried to learn to end everything before emotions run too deep, but I haven't always been successful.
His hand came up and I cringed, but he only adjusted some of my strawberry blonde curls off my forehead. "I would never hurt you, Jenny. I accept your need to end what we have. It is sad, but I do accept it. However, I know you have not taken up with anyone else in the last couple of days and I thought you might be a little lonely and possibly missing..."
"Sergei Gregorovich, I do indeed miss your touch and you are very skilled at giving me pleasure. But if we continue then you or I may fall in love. If you fall in love, how will you feel when I eventually slip into a woman's bed because I am unsatisfied with just your touch? If I fall in love with you, and I could, how will I feel when my body's weird desires draw me to another woman because you alone cannot satisfy me? Our relationship is over, Sergei," I said with finality, although once again I deeply wished that I was a heterosexual like most other people, or even a lesbian. Life would be so much less complicated.
He lifted my chin in his hand. "Jenny, I will no longer make you feel uncomfortable. It has been my pleasure to spend time with you, to make love to you. I hope you find what you need, but you must know by now that you will not find it here. You must go out in to the world and be around other people. Only then do you have a chance to find what your heart desires." He bent over, gently kissed me on the lips and then left me.
As he left, I opened the tome again, thoughtfully running my fingers along the leather binding. It was a very old book and a faerie, a very unusual faerie, had written it. There were geographic gaps in the knowledge and I found that curious. Why hadn't any faeries explored these regions? I looked in the direction of the remote, dust and cobweb covered shelf I had found this book on. There were other books, some in impossible languages. I had looked briefly through all of them. A couple had made my skin crawl as I opened them and my meagre attempts to examine the scratchings which served as words and letters had given me a bad headache. There seemed to be no exploration of these 'here be dragons' regions found around the world in this particular book. Why hadn't the faeries explored these areas? Or perhaps it was a faerie secret not meant for the eyes of man?
I grinned. The elves and faeries here trusted me. One of them would give me the answer to this mystery! All I had to do was find Breeleigh. And depending on what time it was, she might be in her usual haunt right at this moment.
I closed the book, rose to my feet and headed for the stables, in search of the ancient elf woman.
II
I encountered Vicky in the shed where Santa usually parked his sleigh. The gleaming, red sleigh sat waiting for its next excursion with its master. Truthfully, I have never regretted taking Santa Clause up on his first offer to come with him to the North Pole. Now there was a new Santa, Holly's husband Doug O'Hallihan. He was a good man. If I were to decide to go, then he would take me back to my last home. Although, I doubted if my roommate still considered me a roommate, considering that I had been gone without a word for almost six months now.
Vicky was sitting in the sleigh and was deep in thought, which was so atypical. Or at least it seemed so unlike her. Despite her impossibly firm, D-cup breasts, porcelain complexion, full lips, dark eyes and long, wavy, raven hair, she actually had a working brain. I was pretty enough that most men assumed I was a bit slow and the Georgian accent didn't change their mind. Most people looked at Vicky and assumed she was stripper-dumb. Every time I saw her I felt the same near-insatiable lust. And not for the first time I wondered what my life would be like to be that beautiful.
Vicky looked at me in surprise. "Hi, Jenny. I've been meaning to talk to you." She patted the seat beside her and I accepted her invitation.
