Monday morning came and Chelle got up with the sun to prepare for her first day at Westbrook Public Library. She dressed in an outfit her mother bought for her after Chelle, beaming as they sat down to dinner, gave her parents the news that for once she was doing something with her life that they’d approve of. The white blouse with the Peter Pan collar and the mustard-yellow cardigan that she wore over it seemed perfect for a library job, and she put on a pair of black pants and flats to go with them.
She packed herself a lunch, grabbed the worn copy of What I Talk About When I Talk About Running that she’d bought in a delirious state after winning Mira over in the bookstore, and drove to the library on the opposite side of town.
The parking lot was nearly empty when she arrived, with just two other cars parked at the back of the lot. Chelle parked beside them and went inside, where the air conditioning humming was the only sound and there were no patrons so soon after opening on a beautiful summer morning. She went through the lobby and over to the reference desk along the left wall, where the librarian she’d met before her interview was sitting.
“How can I help you?” He asked as she approached the desk, looking up from the computer where he’d been checking his email.
Chelle extended her hand across the desk, straightening her posture and smiling as she said, “Hi, I’m Chelle. I’m the new library page.”
He looked her up and down, during which time Chelle became suddenly self-conscious about her clothes, wondering if the cardigan was too stereotypical or if the Peter Pan collar was too childish.
“Of course you are,” he said with a sigh, then while ignoring her extended hand until she awkwardly pulled it back, he picked up the phone on his desk and said, “Juanita, your new hire is here.”
“Umm, Juanita?” Chelle asked, a little confused. Wasn’t she going to be working with Mira this morning?
“You have to fill out your onboarding paperwork,” he explained, then turned back to his emails.
Chelle was beginning to feel uncomfortable standing in front of the reference desk, wondering if she should go have a seat or continue waiting here, when the door that led back to the offices opened and an older woman in a shoulder-padded blazer appeared.
“Are you Michelle?” She asked, her smile a welcome change after Chelle’s interaction with the reference librarian.
“I am,” she said. “I prefer Chelle, though.”
“Oh, that’s pretty,” the woman said, reaching out to shake her hand. “I’m Juanita Thomas. I’m Mira’s administrative assistant. We’ll just go back to the conference room to do a bit of paperwork this morning, okay?”
“Sounds good,” Chelle said, following Juanita through the door and letting it swing shut behind her. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes just a little bit at how strange and unfriendly the librarian had been, but she was relieved to see that not everyone at WPL was a cold fish.
Juanita chatted with her as she led Chelle down the hall past a couple of closed office doors. She asked Chelle about her commute, and what made her want to work in the library, and Chelle rattled off answers all while trying to remember which door led to Mira’s office. Had it been the last door, or the second to last? In any case, they were all closed at the moment and Juanita pointed Chelle into the window-lined conference room on the left side of the hall.
“Right in here, dear,” she said, gesturing for Chelle to take a seat at one of the high-backed executive chairs that circled the conference table.
At one end of the room there was a small table with a laptop plugged into a port on the wall, and at the other end there was a large projector screen. There was a small stack of papers neatly arranged on the conference table, along with a couple of pens and a fresh legal pad, and Chelle sat down in front of them.
“First we’re going to fill out your tax documents,” Juanita said, taking a seat beside Chelle and picking up one of the pens. “Then there’s about two hours of training videos for you to watch, things like OSHA safety and how the library union works. After that, you’ll be ready to go out on the floor and start training with Jack.”
“Not Mira?” Chelle asked, her heart sinking into her stomach for two reasons – first, she’d spent the whole weekend looking forward to asking Mira whether her running tip had worked. And second, she couldn’t imagine an entire day with the grump at the reference desk.
“Oh no, dear, the reference librarian manages the pages, not the director,” Juanita corrected her.
“Oh, okay,” Chelle said. It made sense – Westbrook was a small town with a little library, but it wasn’t that small. Of course Mira would have more important things to do than worry about whether Chelle was shelving the books properly.
Juanita pushed the stack of papers closer to Chelle and said, “So, let’s start with the W2. Have you filled one of these out before?”
***
It was about an hour later when Chelle got her first glimpse at Mira. She’d completed all of her paperwork and Juanita left her alone to watch the training videos when she heard a commotion in the hallway.
“I told you that job fair would attract the wrong element.” Chelle heard Jack’s voice as the door from the reference area swung open. She looked out the window and watched Mira coming down the hall, with Jack trailing after her. He was red in the face as he said, “We’ve got more homeless in here than ever before.”
“And that’s a bad thing because?” Mira asked, not even trying to disguise the roll of her eyes as she walked toward her office.
“They’re scaring away our patrons!” Jack hissed, and Mira spun around to face him, pausing just outside of the conference room where Chelle couldn’t help but eavesdrop.
“They are our patrons,” she said. “They need the resources of a public library far more than all the people who don’t want to vote on our tax levies because they can afford to buy whatever they want instead of coming here.”
Chelle was openly observing their argument now, turning her chair to the windows as she admired Mira’s ability to hold her own against Jack, who she was liking less and less by the minute. She was mentally cheering Mira on when she noticed that she had an audience, looking into the conference room at Chelle. Their eyes met for only a second before she looked back to Jack, but Chelle caught a hint of pride in Mira’s eyes at having a witness to the verbal lashing she was doling out to him. Chelle also thought she caught just a hint of pleasure in that expression, like Mira was happy to see her.
Then she turned and continued down the hall toward her office, Jack still following her and saying, “They’re a menace, Miranda. Do you know I just caught one of them taking a hobo bath in the men’s room sink?”
***
Mira was sorely tempted to slam her office door in Jack’s face – the homeless population and their use of the library was one of his favorite things to harp on, and she just didn’t have the energy to listen to his intolerant rambling so early in the morning. But ever since she took this job and realized that Jack intended to make it his mission to detract from her at every turn, she’d adopted a stern policy of striving to be the bigger person. Slamming doors, however cathartic it may feel, did not align with this policy.
So she went into her office, setting her messenger bag down on the floor beside her desk and putting her lunch in the mini fridge by the window while she concentrated on tuning out the stream of ridiculousness pouring out of Jack’s mouth.
“If they want to use the resources, that’s one thing,” he was saying, “but the truth of the matter is they act like the library is their own personal hotel. They should be at the mission downtown, not here. You may not notice the problem because you’re not on the front lines like I am, but people complain. Especially in the winter when-”
“Stop,” Mira barked. So much for rising above – she couldn’t take another second of this. She’d heard the whole argument many times before, and she wasn’t in the mood to hear it again today. “Anyone who complains that they have to share the library with someone who has nowhere else to go can drive over to Camden or Lisbon or wherever there’s a public library that doesn’t serve the homeless population. I don’t want them at Westbrook.”
“Miranda, I’m just trying to help you out,” Jack said, adopting that infuriating tone of condescension that Mira had gotten to know so well in the past few months. “Many of these people are criminals, and mentally unstable. Think of the backlash if one of the other patrons was assaulted.”
“I have things to do this morning, Jack,” Mira said, coming up empty in her effort to form a rebuttal against this completely illogical argument. So she simply ushered him out of her office, saying, “I’m glad that you’re passionate about something Jack, but if I could make a suggestion, maybe you can take all that energy and put it into helping our disadvantaged patrons find jobs, get housing, or otherwise improve their lives. Wouldn’t that kill two birds with one stone?”
“That’s not the point-” he began to object, but she cut him off.
“Back to the reference desk, Jack,” she said in her most managerial tone.
It still wasn’t all that intimidating – her voice didn’t reach the low registers necessary to really boom an order, but Jack nevertheless seemed to agree that they’d reached a stalemate in this ongoing battle. So he walked away and Mira went back to her desk, exhaling loud relief that at least she’d gotten her daily argument with Jack out of the way early.
She sat down to turn on her computer and check her emails, ready to find out what problems had surfaced over the weekend, but before she got that far, Mira picked up on the droning narrator’s voice from the OSHA training video playing down the hall. She’d forgotten about Chelle in the heat of her argument with Jack, but she certainly hadn’t forgotten about her this weekend after their meeting at Next Chapter Books.
On the contrary, every time she tried to push the thought of Chelle out of her head, she just kept swimming right back in. She’d even invaded Mira’s dreams last night, taking the form of an enchantress who appeared on a jogging trail in front of her. She led Mira off the path, further and further into a forest, and just as they reached a small clearing, Mira saw that the trees were all covered in vines.
They began to grow and constrict around her, binding her up, and Mira woke up to her alarm going off and her limbs tangled in her sheets. Her heart was racing and she was covered in a thin sheen of sweat, her body responding to the enchantress. The symbolism was obvious – to pursue the temptation presented by her would be to find herself on a dangerous path. Jack would love nothing more than to find an excuse to attack her character in front of the Board, and another illicit kiss like the one Mira and Chelle shared during her interview would probably be enough to give Jack a second chance at the director position.
Still, when Mira leaned back in her chair, she had a clear line of sight to where Chelle sat in the conference room. She was looking toward the front wall, watching the dry training videos that Mira herself had suffered through only a few months ago, and Mira found herself lingering over Chelle’s features.
There was something naturally sexual about her, something that stirred Mira’s carnal urges every time she looked at Chelle. Her eyes were half-glazed from the monotone of the video narrator, and she was absently twirling a loose strand of her hair around the tip of her pen, but Mira was pretty sure Chelle could be standing in the middle of a dumpster with a banana peel in her gorgeous red hair and she’d still find a way to look sultry while doing it.
Before she could look away, Chelle glanced up and caught Mira staring at her. She smiled and waved, and Mira snapped her chair upright again, dodging out of Chelle’s line of sight.
“Shit,” she muttered to herself, feeling her cheeks going rosy at having been caught, but a smile spread involuntarily across her lips.
That was the single most awkward thing she could have done, and because she was the library director, she couldn’t ignore that it had happened – that would only make it worse. So she got up, straightening her modest navy skirt, and walked down the hall to the conference room. Chelle watched her every step.
“Good morning,” Mira said as she walked into the conference room. She was determined to be the picture of professionalism in this interaction, and all interactions with Chelle going forward. “How’s your training going?”
“Good morning, Miranda,” Chelle said, remembering her request to use her full name. Mira wasn’t sure she’d ever get used to hearing it on Chelle’s lips, but then this was the bed she had made for herself when she decided to hire her. Chelle asked, “Would it be inappropriate to say these videos are pretty bad?”
Mira smiled. “No, I’d question your sanity if you said you were enjoying them. Just try to think about it as a library initiation ritual.”
“Hazing, you mean?” Chelle asked, and Mira chuckled.
“If you prefer,” she said. “Well, I need to get some things done. I just wanted to come by and see how you’re doing.”
“I’m doing well,” Chelle said, and Mira started to leave but she called after her, “Hey, did you try my breathing trick?”
Mira turned back to her, a more sincere grin on her face. “As a matter of fact, I did.”
“And?”
“I ran four miles yesterday with not a single side stitch,” Mira said. “The best I’ve ever done before that was two, and they were brutal.”
“That’s awesome,” Chelle said, looking genuinely excited for Mira.
She got so swept up in Chelle’s enthusiasm that when she held up her hand for a high five, Mira slapped it, grinning. Then in the aftermath of that touch, which had the effect of bringing her instantly back to the tension that had grown between them in the bookstore, she felt self-conscious.
Looking around to see that there was no one around to observe that moment, Mira gestured back to her office and said, “Well, anyway, I’m going to go do some work. See you around, Chelle.”
“Bye, Mira,” Chelle said, then half a beat later, “Miranda.”
***
Mira spent the morning with the door of her office closed. She didn’t want the temptation of being able to lean back in her chair and check on Chelle, and she didn’t want to invite Jack back for further discussion on the homeless issue.
She spent about an hour handling voicemails and communications that came in over the weekend, including an email from the state library association reminding her that their annual conference was quickly approaching, the deadline for registration closing at the end of the following week. She never missed an opportunity to go to the conference, and she’d even managed to get the price of registration covered by the library budget, but she’d been procrastinating, hesitating to actually sign up, for months.
Mira could afford to pay for two Westbrook employees to attend the conference, and she had agreed to bring Jack with her since he had the most seniority. Of course, she made that decision when she first took the job, well before she realized what a thorn in her side Jack would become. Now that she knew, Mira couldn’t stand the idea of spending two hours in a car with him – four, when she took the return trip into account. But the conference was only a few weeks away and she hadn’t come up with a single idea about how she could get out of an overnight trip with Jack.
Time was running out, though, so she scribbled a reminder on her desk calendar and told herself she’d register the two of them this afternoon. Then at least the distasteful task would be done.
Mira was just wrapping up a few emails and getting ready to retrieve her lunch from the mini fridge when her phone rang.
“Westbrook Public Library, this is Miranda Lockhart,” she identified herself as she answered. She still hadn’t quite broken the habit of answering every call as if she was working at the reference desk. “How can I help you?”
“Mira, it’s Liv,” came the voice on the other end of the line.
Olivia Winters was one of the eight members on the library’s Board of Trustees, and the only friend that Mira had managed to make since she moved to Westbrook. By the strain in Liv’s tone, she could tell this was not a social call.
“What’s wrong?” Mira asked with a barely disguised groan.
Every time Liv started a call with that curt tone, it meant the Board was getting disgruntled about something and Mira would have yet another fire to put out. She wondered if she’d even get the chance to eat the sandwich she’d packed for lunch – most of the time she got so busy leaping from one problem to the next that her food went untouched and her growling stomach was ignored until after the library closed at night.
“Did you see the Westbrook Chronicle this morning?” Liv asked.
“No,” Mira said with a sigh. Ever since she started at WPL, the library had been plagued by unflattering media coverage – she’d never seen a public library appear so many times in the local newspaper, and she’d even begun to wonder if there was someone working at the Chronicle who had a vendetta against the library. “What now?”
“I’ll scan it and send it over so you can read it,” Liv said, “but the gist of the story is that there’s a Facebook group dedicated to boycotting the library until you crank the Internet filters back up.”
“So much for the citizens of Westbrook’s right to freedom of information,” Mira said, throwing her hands up in defeat even though Liv couldn’t see this gesture.
Mira considered the reasonable level Internet filtering to be one of her greatest accomplishments at Westbrook, even though it had taken her four months to convince the Board that Jack had set it so restrictively that the library’s computers were basically just word processors. She was constantly having to override the filter for simple searches, like when the middle school assigned a project on human anatomy and no one could pull up diagrams of the integumentary system.
So while Mira considered it a triumph that she’d gotten permission to scale back the filter to the point where the Internet was accessible again, Jack took it as a personal insult. After the Board made their decision, he snarled at Mira, “I hope you’re prepared to deal with homeless people masturbating to Internet pornography at the public computer terminals.”
“I’ll ready my shooing broom,” Mira had said dismissively, and despite Jack’s protests, nothing more remarkable than functional Internet access came out of it… until now.
“There are only about fifteen people in the group so far,” Liv said, “but this is a small town and now that it’s gotten newspaper coverage you can expect there to be some additional interest.”
“Are you telling me to turn the filters back up?” Mira asked, disheartened.
“No, nothing that extreme,” Liv said, trying to sound reassuring. “All I’m saying is that it would be wise to have a statement prepared for the Board when we meet next month, and maybe even a compromise in your back pocket that you can offer if need be.”
“Okay,” Mira sighed, grabbing a pen and scribbling herself a quick note on the cluttered desk pad in front of her. She already had quite a few things to address the Board about – various crises and problems that had arisen since the last time they met – and now there was one more thing to add to the list.
“Listen, Mira,” Liv said, pity trickling into her voice, “You can’t keep playing defense like this. You gotta figure out a way to get that library under control, if only for the sake of your own sanity.”
“I know,” she said, tossing her pen down on the desk and running her fingers through her bangs, which she did every time she felt stressed even though she knew it would make them stick up at weird angles for the rest of the afternoon. “Maybe you guys chose the wrong person for the job after all.”
“You think we should have hired Jack?” The name bubbled into a laugh as Liv said it. “God, no. That man and his antiquated ideas are scary. Mira, you are exactly the right person for the job – you just need to stop trying to prove yourself and start being the kick-ass director that I knew you were when I voted to hire you.”
Mira laughed and said, “Thanks, I needed to hear that.”