The Lending Library

by Aliza Fogelson

I was now holding the book innocently in my hands, like a normal library-goer. Which I was. Except for my overwhelmingly passionate desire to read books and reread them, hold them, surround myself with them, and yes . . . sometimes even smell them. It wasn’t just the heady scent of glue in the spine. It was also the scent of the pages—timeworn or slicked with new ink—and the old cloth cases, how the linen had aged. The smell of imagination and escape.

Elmira Pelle passed by, trailing after her mother, with a stack of books in her arms. I was about to get their attention when I overheard her say, “Mom, can I have one of these?” “No, Elmira. I bought you a new book two weeks ago. If you can’t show any self-restraint and you’re going to read them that quickly, you’re going to have to check them out of the library.” I goggled at her words. First of all, was she really reprimanding her daughter for reading too quickly? Second of all, did she have any idea of the burning urgency of reading for a book-loving child, how two weeks was a complete eternity without a new book to dive into?

A few days later, Elmira was sitting on the bench outside the gym reading From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler—again. Now, I have probably read that book more times than there are visitors on a Saturday afternoon in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where the action takes place. But in the months since my arrival, I had hardly seen Elmira reading anything else.

“Mom did it alone for years.” “Yeah. And it sucked. Besides, you loved painting more than anything, but you gave it up after a few crappy reviews. How do you know you’ll be like Mom instead of Not Dad? You love babies, but what about when it gets really hard and there’s no out? How do you know you won’t want to cut and run?”

“I don’t know what’s up with you,” Kendra said, probably surprised by my lack of enthusiasm, “but do you want to talk about it?” “No, I think it’s just the weather,” I fibbed. “But you always talk about how much you love the winter . . . how ‘the whole world becomes like a doily with doves nesting near the holly berries,’”