He always slunk in, eyes to the ground, shoulders hunched, thin, beaten up coat way not warm enough for this weather hanging on him, obviously trying to be invisible.
And he stole lbooks. One or two each time he came, whatever he could shove in his coat and take away.
I hadn’t made a big deal of this because, with regularity, books not checked out were in the return bin in the morning and I’d put one and one together and made the two that he wasn’t stealing them, he was borrowing them. Just not the normal way. And I’d tried to approach him on several occasions to tell him all he needed to do was apply for a library card. But the instant I got near, he shuffled away, darted between rows of books and eventually raced out.
The first time this happened, I thought he wouldn’t come back. But he did.
This meant he liked his books like I liked mine. And clearly he didn’t have the money to get them at a shop. So he got them the only way he could.
I didn’t get why he didn’t get a library card but at the same time I did.
Something was not right with that boy.
And today it was less right. I knew this because, even though he ducked his face away and headed straight to the short flight of stairs that led up to the fiction section, I saw he had bruising on his cheekbone and around his swollen eye.
This made me forget about Chace Keaton.
It also made me forget about the decision I made some time ago that I’d let him borrow as he felt he had to do it. He returned the books, it was no skin off my nose. And clearly they gave him something he needed enough to brave stealing them (essentially) and going out into a world filled with people that scared the heck out of him. I knew this because I was a librarian, I was a woman, I was five foot six and I was no threat and still, he ran away from me. Sure he was stealing my books (essentially) but also, he was not.
But seeing that black eye, I was reminded of something my Dad said.
“A wrong is just wrong no matter who’s doin’ it or who it’s done to. You know someone’s doin’ wrong and even if it has not one thing to do with you, you do what you can to right that wrong. You don’t, you’re no kind of person or, at least, no kind of person I’d wanna know.”
These were words Dad lived by.
This was also a philosophy that meant him living in Carnal with what had been going on for as long as it had been going on had made his life a living hell.
He’d lodged formal complaints (twelve of them) against the Carnal Police Department. He’d also encouraged others to do the same, blatantly and with intent, even going so far as to go to their house and have a chat (or chats, plural, if need be) if he heard something not right had gone down. He’d also visited Mick Shaughnessy, the head honcho of the Police Force in Gnaw Bone and a buddy of my Dad’s, about how he could intervene and he did this more than once (in fact, five times that I knew). He’d further told Arnold Fuller, the dirty cop ringleader, the police Captain then the Chief of Police, and now a dead man (literally), exactly what he thought of him on more than one occasion both publicly and privately.
As well as all this, even though everyone agreed, Dad was one of few who speculated openly and widely (in other words, to all who would listen, including Mick Shaughnessy) about the fact that Ty Walker was extradited to stand trial and then went down for a crime my father was certain (and he was right) Ty didn’t commit.
And last, my Dad had been pulled over and had more tickets than any other citizen in town and once had been arrested for drunk and disorderly when he was neither. And all this happened because he did all of the above.
Every single ticket, as well as the arrest, he fought loudly, boisterously but not always successfully.
But he never gave up.
And I knew, looking at that boy, wrong was being done to him. I also knew, with his eye swollen shut, I had to stop doing the little I was doing, letting him get away with stealing books (essentially) and I had to start doing something more.
I searched the immediate area, noted no patrons were close to approaching the check out desk and I skirted it to move out into the library. Cautiously and quietly, I moved up the steps then, like a super-sleuth, feeling more than a little idiotic, I rounded the shelves and stopped. Hiding my body, I peeked just my head around the side to check the aisle to see if he was there.
I found him three rows in.
I pulled my head back, pressed my back into the side of the shelf and took a deep breath.
Then I peeked just my head around again and called softly, “Please don’t run. You aren’t in trouble.”
He was squatting to the bottom shelf, a book in his hand and his head snapped around and up.
It was then I saw the full extent of damage to his face.
Not only a black eye, swollen shut, and a bruised cheekbone but a swollen, painful looking nose and a gash on his lip that glistened, not because it had been treated with ointment but because it was gaping and exposing flesh.
My stomach clutched, my frame froze and my throat closed. He dropped the book, shot up straight and dashed down the aisle the opposite direction from me.
At his movements, I came unstuck, quickly turned on my boot and raced down my side, clearing the shelves and seeing him darting down the stairs. No, jumping down them three steps at a time, taking him down in two big jumps that made my heart jump with him because I feared he’d harm himself.
“Please! Stop! You’re not in trouble!” I shouted. “Promise!” I kept shouting as I ran down the steps after him. “I just want to talk!”