Chapter 2

Chapter 2

A cheery tinkle of bells announced his arrival. The giant, red bull like creature behind the counter wordlessly lay his book down on the counter and silently raised one hairless, beetled brow.  “Not one word Del. Not. One. Word.”

The horned man merely shrugged his great shoulders. “I wasn’t going to say anything… Mind the second step,” he warned the merest moment before the man would send himself and his burden tumbling down the curved stairwell.  The man grunted in thanks before his footsteps faded in the distance.

Seconds passed in awkward silence before the lithe figure on the sofa stretched, turned and cast her pupil-less black eyes on the red giant. She smirked, her strange ear-to-ear mouth curving sinisterly before running her forked tongue over her lips. “Do you suppose he would be interested in this?”

Del readjusted his spectacles and narrowed his eyes at her. “Who knows what that one will find interesting? You can call him of course, but do you really think that’s wise, Fatima?”

Horror struck, Fatima recoiled, the sides of her slender neck expanding. She well remembered her last encounter with him and his part in how she’d come to exist in this book-louse infested spirit-trap. Wordlessly she slunk backwards into the shadows between the massive bookshelves.

Del let out a deep chuckle and returned to his book. “I thought as much.”

Meanwhile the man and his cargo had traversed the perilous hallways, finally coming to a long disused spare room. He laid the unconscious form on the bed and sighed heavily. What had he gotten himself into? Unabashedly he removed the girl’s shirt and examined the discolored flesh on her torso.  He tugged thoughtfully on his beard and mumbled to himself a moment before he began to gather his tools.

Her injuries were far more severe then he’d initially guessed. Luckily, for them both he already had that poultice on hand. He opened the container of salve and began his work with a grim determination. Stabilizing the girl would be the easy part. Through the skilled use of only his well-crafted primitive medicines, he could keep her in her current condition indefinitely.  Somehow he suspected that the girl, whoever she was, probably wouldn’t be too thrilled at the idea spending the rest of her life unconscious, sprawled halfway across death’s door.

Once her torso was completely wrapped, he laid her back down, and began the task of suturing the jagged slash across her shoulder. With a ‘plunk’ he unceremoniously dropped the needle in the basin beside him and turned his attention to bandaging the site.

He paused a moment as he evaluated his patient. She was young, maybe 16, tall and painfully thin. Her arms and shoulders were oddly muscular, a rarity in girls these days. This of course contradicted her sharp cheekbones and nearly exposed ribs. Not that surprising really, when you considered the fact that she probably lived on the streets. Taking one of her hands he inspected her dirty fingers. To his surprise, they were not the narrow fingers of a pickpocket. These fingers were long, lean and well muscled. Curious, he pulled the hand into the light. There, beneath the dirt, were the tell tale scars of someone who spent most of their time fighting, a knife wielder if he wasn’t mistaken. In today’s age of pistols, it was unusual to see a youth so enamored of bladed weapons. He could hardly recall the last time that some upstart had held a knife to him.

Great, just what he needed, another strange maniac come to distract him, a female maniac no less. The mystery of her occupation was only one of the many questions that he found himself asking. Who was this girl? What had happened to her? The questions rolled around in his mind. The only way he would get his answers was to heal her.  Tapping his foot, he thought over his limited options. He could just take her to a hospital, although she may not survive the barbarous barbering.  No, he would not subject this girl to their butchery. For God’s sake, he’d known several rabid dogs of which he wouldn’t wish ‘modern’ medicine upon. It just had to be done, he decided and strode towards the door.  

With the glass knob still in his hand he stopped and turned towards the girl. “Well, I can’t just go about this calling you ‘girl’ the whole time. So how about… Enid? You look like Enid. Just wake up if you have a problem with that.” He paused at the doorway a moment, the girl merely slumbering. “So, Enid, I’m just going to go and prepare for your treatment. Just call if you need anything.”  He said, straightened his tie and closed the door behind him.

Once in his laboratory he began the process that he knew would ultimately save her life. It was a somewhat complicated arrangement, but if all went well, as it usually did, she would be completely healed in a matter of days and he would be free of yet another distraction.

After his ritualistic preparations he began the tedious process of systematically distilling the primary ingredient; a sticky, tar-like substance that had once been a very rare blood sample. For several hours he distilled and distilled again, refining it with every cycle. Finally the black semi-liquid was ready to be used.

He walked over the shelf and contemplated the correct mixture of herbs and other, more insidious ingredients to use. Some would heal her quicker at the expense of some unfortunate side-effects. Not all of his clientele could be treated equally, as some of them had special needs.

His hand reached for the silver nitrate. This would provide a buffer for the serum he was creating, by killing the various enzymes in the digestive tract and disallowing it to be rapidly processed. It also had the added benefit of treating various intestinal parasites. If you’re going to treat a patient, you might as well treat them for everything. He was certain that the girl’s stomach was a variable petri dish of unwholesomeness; it would be doing her a favor. Any damage done by the semi-caustic solution would be healed as quickly as it appeared.

Holding the bottle in his hand he glanced at the carefully written warning on the back: “Do not use on lunatics.” He stared at the bottle and set in down on the table thoughtfully.

A new question formed in his mind: What was she? He had assumed that the girl was your average run-of-the-mill mortal, but he had found her in the spirit world. Very few things traversed physically through the spirit world and survived to tell about it.

He slid the nitrate back on the shelf. If he was wrong about what she was, that would kill her. Instead he grabbed the boring and tediously slow baking soda. She’d just have to live with her gut-rot after all.

A brief glance at the clock told him that it was time to check on Enid. Upon his arrival he found her, not surprisingly, very unconscious. Her breathing was shallow, and she was hot to the touch. Ah, the joys of opportunistic infection. Laying a hand upon her sweaty brow, he could feel the fever raging.

“Frankie?” The girl’s voice was surprisingly feminine, for all of its harshness. Perhaps she wasn’t quite as unconscious as he’d thought.

“Yes, Enid?” He asked. Feverish as she was, she was probably hallucinating and long experience had taught him never to contradict a delusional patient. She cocked her head slightly, so he leaned closer to her.

“I’m gonna... kill you.” She whispered before her breathing became more regular.

Interesting. Not at all relevant to her treatment, but interesting.

He put a cold cloth on her forehead and jammed a wad of shredded willow bark between her cheek and gumline. It would do nothing for the actual infection, but would reduce her fever enough that he didn’t have to worry about her convulsing. Talking about distracting!

With one last glance at the strange homicidal Enid he thought of the tasks before him. The concoction needed a buffering agent and a few other helpful herbs and spices before it would be fit for consumption. The potion would force her tissues into a carefully controlled near instantaneous cellular production. Human bodies being what they are, this would rapidly deplete her already limited stores of energy. By the time the serum had run its course she would have lost an alarming amount of weight. No doubt the girl would be here for some time, all the while eating him out of house and home. At this realization he sighed in a grudging acceptance and closed the door behind him

The entity had watched all of this unseen from the shadowy corner of the room. Creeping from his position he leaned over the girl speculatively and sat on the edge of the bed and tapping his lips in thought before pointing at her.  “I like you.” he says firmly with an affirmative nod of his dark head. “Yeah, you’ll do.” His high pitched voice revealed an unexpected accent, not that the girl was aware of this. His blue eyes peered out from a shaggy mass of black hair that poked out at curious angles from beneath a cap perched at a jaunty angle on the youth’s head. He tugged on the threadbare hem of his rumpled jacket nervously. “You’re pretty tough, for a girl and all.” He stated, still fidgeting with the hem that fell about an inch to short for his long boney arm. Sighing in frustration is shoved the sleeves up to his elbow in disgust.

“So, anyways...” He looked at her slumbering form and froze, completely transfixed. She was close to death, enough to get his attention, but still so very alive. The light reflected off of her short, sweat dampened hair, revealing hidden hues of vibrant red. The ruddy color of her skin gave only a slight contrast to the sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose. With every beat of her heart, she looked more and more colorful.

Even in her sickened, wounded state he could only stare at her vivaciousness. Color, beautiful living color. He watched, a sense of awe creeping over the dead boy. “You’re... colorful.” As dumb as it sounded, there was no good way to describe his perverse joy in the simple sight of a living pallor. He hadn’t always been this way, not even after he died. At first he hadn’t looked much different, but the shadowlands had a way of leaching that sort of thing out of you.

A tear began to from beneath one of her closed eyes. He watched in rapt fascination as it slid down the sharp plains of her face. His brow furrowed, “Ah, yeah. Living hurts, don’t it girly?” he asked wistfully. Experimentally he ran a finger down her exposed arm, watching the trail of goose bumps appear in its wake.

“Sometimes...Sometimes I forgets what it was like.” He whispered to himself. “All I remembers is the anger, the hatred... The humiliation!” He exclaimed growing furious. “The way I was used and abused and treated likes I wasn’t even a person! Like- Like a dog or somethin’! No- a rat! Like some sorta thing that needed to be ‘dealt with’!”

 As the words grew more manic, the left side of his face took on a startling transformation. Starbursts of darkness started to appear, growing into massive swollen bruises, interspersed with horrifying tears in his flesh. With a sudden ‘crack’ the left side of his jaw dropped at a ghastly angle.  His eyes, an alarmingly bright blue took on an unfocused, wild appearance. Violently, the left cheekbone caved in upon itself, the crazed eye glowing like a beacon from within the pulpy mass that was once an otherwise normal face.

“Yeah! The b*****d thought he could just break me apart, likes I was nothin’! Then what does he do? What does he do? I tell ya what he did! I was dead. I wasn’t much fun anymore so the sick b*****d crammed me in his trunk and tossed me off a bridge! Threw me into the god-damned river for the all the fishies to eat!”

Loose papers ruffle to a forceful breeze that comes from nowhere. The unaware girl only groaned as the coolness of the breeze brushed against her aching, feverish skin. The sound snapped the wraith from his violent inner conflict enough for him to regain his composure. The frenzied wind died as suddenly as it was born, his ravaged face returning to normal as the fury in his eyes ebbed.

“Uh, sorry ‘bout that.” he apologized awkwardly. “I, uh, got away from myself...” For a moment he just sat, watching the girl breath uneasily. Finally, he stood up, shrugged and turned to the girl. “Be seeing you around, kid.” He said, tipping his dingy, transparent cap at her before slowly fading away.

---

It’s always disorienting to wake up in a place that you don’t remember being. The last time that I felt like this was the time that I nearly froze to death in the doorway of Bob’s bar. I guess I’ve always been lucky in the way that when I do nearly die, I always luck into doing so where the right people can find me.

The room that I wake up in is tidy and well kept, but very old-fashioned.  Not one for lying around and enjoying the scenery, I sit up and note that my shirt is missing. My entire torso is wrapped in bandages that reek of something pungent and, oddly enough, a very out of place mint smell.

I look around and spot my shirt hanging from the back of the chair next to my bed. Surprisingly, the shirt is clean for the first time in god knows how long. I debate with myself whether or not to put it on over the bandages.  I’d hate to forever smell like whatever it is causing the odor.

Being the practical sort of person that I am, I decide that smell or no smell, it’s probably best if I put it on.  The simple task of sliding the shirt over my shoulders is enough make my ribs protest.  I struggle with the buttons and give up once the shirt is half way buttoned.

I slide my feet onto the floor, kicking over one of my boots that had been neatly set where I could find them.  I jam my sockless feet into the boots and start yanking, painfully, on the laces.

There’s a sharp knock on the door right before it opens. “Oh good, you’re awake.”

“I’m hearing that a lot these days.” I mutter and finish tying my boots, a task that takes me much longer than it should.  Sighing with relief I look over at the source of the intrusion. It’s the crazy man from that … Place. He looks significantly less threatening at the moment, considering he’s sporting a rather frilly pink apron over his brown suit.

“What the hell was that place?” I ask, abruptly. Obviously he has an answer; he was there after all, apparently on his own volition, unlike me.

He stares at me a moment. “And my name’s Max, nice to meet you?” He says if I hadn’t just asked a question.  “I see that you’re--” I choose this moment to try and stand up, but the tightness in my side forces me to sit back down on the bed. “--not quite up and moving around yet.” He says, sounding somewhat disappointed.

I bring my hand to my side. “At least I’m alive.”

He smiles at me, a wide perfectly white straight toothed grin.  “That’s the spirit!  Now let me see…” He mumbles before striding over to a dresser across the room.  On top of the dresser is an array of bottles and he mutters to himself as he examines them. “Ah, yes, this one should do it.” He turns around and hands me a small green bottle. “Drink this and you should feel a lot better in a couple of hours.”

I take the bottle, looking at its label: “Pain.” Very explanatory, that.

“My name’s Jack Murphy, by the way.”

“Jack?” He asks knowingly.

“It’s short for Jacqueline. I prefer ‘Jack.’, thank you very much.” I say as I uncork the bottle and toss it back. My eyes water and I have to resist the sudden urge to vomit. I’ve drunk a lot of awful things in my time, but this stuff tastes like raw sewage and mint. “Ugh, what was in that thing?” I ask, no doubt making a variety of amusing disgusted faces.

“An old family remedy I created using a bit of this and that,” he says cheerfully, his wild deep set eyes sparkling.

I want to ask him how can it be an ‘old family remedy’ if he’s the one who created it, but he flicks his wrist producing a card between two fingers and holds it out to me. “Maximilian Magus, at your service. You can call me Max.”

“Maximilian Magus:  Trader and Collector of Rare Books.”

I look up from the card to see him inspecting his matted beard in the mirror. He furrows his brow and brings his hand up plucking a piece of something out of the mass. “Ow!” Staring at the offending object he pauses. “Oatmeal? I haven’t had oatmeal in at least a week…”  He looks up at the ceiling pensively.

What does a person say at a time like this? ‘Well thank you, Mr. Crazy-Man; I’ll just be limping off to a familiar alley?’ The guy did kind of save my life, crazy person or not. “So… What kind of rare books?”

He startles and looks down at me as if he’d forgotten that I am there. “All sorts. Can you read?”

I raise a brow and wave the card a bit. How else would I have known that he deals with rare books? “What do you think?”

He smiles widely. “Very well then! I’d give you a tour, but I think you still need to recover a bit. You should be feeling better in a few hours, a day tops.” He says enthusiastically. “Is there anything I can get you?”
I want to shrug it off, but before I can even think about it my mouth is moving. “Food.”

He smiles and nods. “I just so happen to have muffins in the oven. I’ll be delighted to bring some up when they’re finished.”

Before he turns around I cough a bit, and cringe at what it does to my side. “Holy mother of god!” I gasp before nearly curling in on myself.

“You did quite a number on yourself.” He says.

“I didn’t do it to myself, buddy.” I say gruffly. “What the hell was that place anyway? Don’t think I didn’t notice you change the subject.”

He sighs and collapses into the chair beside my bed. “That would be one of the very many onion-like layers of the spirit realm.”

“Jackrabbit said something like that.” I mutter running my hand across my face groggily.

He stiffens. “Oh.”

“What?” I ask.

“I just… I didn’t realize you were… you know… running with a pack.” He said sheepishly.

I stare at him and raise an eyebrow. “What the hell are you talking about?”

Now he looks at me confused. “Well I had wondered why you were there.”
I grab the footboard and stubbornly shift my body through the pain. “Well according to the giant talking rabbit, I got picked up by something called a ‘snatcher’. Keep in mind that I am quoting a talking rabbit here.”

“So you aren’t, you know… garou?” He asks. “I mean, not that I have a problem with that. I just kind of assumed… You kind of fit the bill and all.”

I shake my head. “I have no clue what you’re babbling about. I’m not ‘garou’, whatever that is. I’m a half dead street kid that got jerked out of reality for a while.”

He looks thoughtful for a moment. “That seems reasonable.”

“Just how, exactly does that seem reasonable to you? What part of that seems reasonable to any sane human being? You are sane right? Dear god, please be sane, because I’m pretty sure I’m not and somebody has to be,” I say in a flurry of near hysterical loquaciousness. All of the talking makes me dizzy and I dig my fingers into the bed post as I try to catch my breath.

Max lets out a strong burst of laughter and slaps his thigh a few times. “I see you’re new at this. What if I told you that you were perfectly sane?  You aren’t crazy, and you really did talk to a giant talking bunny.”

“He’s not a bunny. He’s a hare,” I interject, somewhat lightheaded.

“Okay. A giant, talking hare,” he corrects, oddly serious. “It was all real. What if I tell you that?”

I pause and look at him, taking in the rumpled suit, frilly pink apron, and the gaudy purple tie. “I’d say you’re not exactly one to be determining one’s sanity.”

He laughs again, his eyes crinkling as he tilts his head back with mirth. It takes him a moment for his laughter to subside and he shakes his shaggy head. “You’ll just have to take me at my word, won’t you? I tell you what, I’ll go and let you straighten yourself out. I’ll come back in an hour with muffins and we can talk all about it,” he says reassuringly as he strides over to the door.

The whole situation is so entirely surreal that I just nod stupidly. “Let’s hope the muffins are better than your ‘old family remedy’,” I say, making a face.

He grins, “Lets!” He says, closing the door behind him. What a very strange man.

As I find myself alone with my thoughts, I do what comes naturally and ignore them. Instead, I painfully lever myself to my feet and start exploring my room. I notice strange gouges on the head board of the bed. Looking closer I find a series of crudely made lines carved into it, and the faded remnants of somebody’s initials.  

Narrowing my eyes I run my fingers over the faded carvings. The room starts to spin a bit; the natural order of things twists ever so slightly. In my peripheral vision the dividing lines between the floor and the walls begin to defy gravity and ripple uneasily.   I yank my hand away from the head board quickly. Immediately the distorted sensation stops and I stare at the head board quizzically. What the hell was that all about? I nearly reach out again, just to see what will happen, but decide better of it.

Shaking my head of the weirdness, I try to distract myself from my curiosity by limping over to the dresser and examine the other bottles. Upon their labels are such inspired words as ‘fever’, ‘infection’, and ‘warts’ written in a clear scrawling script. I suspect that each of the little bottles contain similar ‘old family’ remedies.

I can’t complain too much, I am alive after all. I hear a punctured lung can literally drown you in your own blood and wonder how I’m still alive. The last I checked, snake oil wasn’t a practical treatment for damaged organs, not that Max seems all that forthcoming with the particulars where that’s concerned.

The room is fairly empty, all things considered. No books lay scattered on the night stand, nor are there paintings crookedly hung on the wall. I lean against the back of the chair, drumming my fingers in boredom. What to do, what to do. I can’t go lay back down, that would be putting me perilously close to that damned headboard. We all know what curiosity does to cats.

Finding no other option, I test the doorknob and find that it is unlocked. I don’t know why I thought it would be locked. It wasn’t like Max had bolted the door, cackling manically as he went on a monolog about how he was going to tie me to train tracks or anything.  Then again, the past couple of days hadn’t exactly been good to my already blossoming paranoia.

I opened the door, half expecting it to squeak out some sort of alarm. Not surprisingly the well maintained hinges weren’t of the ancient iron variety and slid quite soundlessly. Stepping into the hallway I see a window. I stagger over to it and peer out through the glass. I’m treated to an actual view of the street, rather than yet another astounding brick wall scene.

People are bustling about the street like ants, their mindless movements so rehearsed that they probably won’t know then left until they get to their locations. Ignoring the masses, I stare out at the street itself and try to find a familiar landmark. There’s a kosher deli across the street. That doesn’t really tell me much, since this is New York and there’s a practically a deli on every street.  Great, I’m still lost. At least there’s living, breathing, non-creepy people out there.

I pause to resist the urge to cough, knowing full well that it’s futile. The pain roars to life in my side and I just suffer through it until the coughing stops.  I wheeze slightly before returning to my explorations.

There’s a small bookshelf by the window and I browse its contents. “A Guide to Spirits” catches my attention.  I slip the book from its place and lean against the wall as I open it to its first page. The book is rather dry reading, but I continue as it tries to explain the relationship of certain spirits in the most general way possible. One chapter is humorously titled “The Dog You Loved and the Hell Hound You Don’t.”
I turn yet another page and find a careful bold hand written sentence in the margin. “This is complete and utter rubbish.”

I smirk to myself. “I concur.” I state sarcastically and replace the book into its former position.

“Now, you’re up and moving around.” Max’s booming, jovial voice says behind me. I don’t flinch at it, surprisingly. There’s just something about this guy that puts me at ease. Maybe it’s the apron? Yeah, it’s probably the apron.

“I was just inspecting some of your books.” I say with a shrug.

He raises a brow. “Charlatans all,” he says definitively. “And, these are not my books.”

“So… Whose are they?” I ask confusedly.

He shrugs. “Nobody’s now, I suppose. They have been good and thoroughly abandoned.” He brings his hand up and stage whispers “With good reason!” as if trying to spare the books’ feelings.

I smirk and shake my head in amusement. “Didn’t you say something about muffins?” I ask.

“As a matter of fact I was coming to see if you were up to joining me. If you’re feeling hearty enough we may even take a grand tour of the emporium.” He says companionably.

“Emporium?”  I ask.

“Max’s Rare Books Emporium, to be exact,” he states confidently.

I pause. “Why not just call it a book store?” I ask.

His face slacks comically. “Max’s Rare Book Store? ... Sounds ludicrously common don’t you think? Who buys rare books from such a common establishment? Nobody, that who!”

“I just think that maybe ‘emporium’ is a bit… archaic?” I suggest.

He smiles wide. “That, Jack, is the entire point. An archaic name means archaic knowledge. What better for rare books?” He says gleefully his arms spread wide like a toddler. It is very strange seeing such a large man fling his arms about with such abandon, and yet I’m seeing this.

I stare at him for a moment and sigh. “Okay, okay. Muffins, we’re going to eat muffins, remember?” I say, trying to keep him from becoming even more involved in this revolving door of a conversation.

“Oh, right!” He says and turns around, gesturing for me to follow. I trail behind him as he leads me down a flight of stairs and along a squirrely path through the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. I pause a moment and sigh. It seems to me that an ‘emporium’ should really be better laid out than this. The shelves are haphazardly placed, often in strange angles.

“What’s up with the shelves?” I ask gesturing to the bizarre collection of shelves. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just set them up like the library? You know, in rows?”

He smirks at me. “Each one of these shelves is at least 600 pounds. If I were to set them up in rows, and one fell over...” He trails off.

I look at the behemoth wooden shelves and mentally picture one of them toppling over. “They’d all fall.”  I finish for him.  I frown. “So why does the library use rows?”

Max sighs. “The library’s bookshelves are bolted down.”

“So why don’t you do that instead?”  I ask.

He shrugs. “I rent this place. Contrary to popular belief, archaic knowledge doesn’t bring in as much money as it should.”

“Why is that?” I ask curiously.

He chuckles. “Everybody goes to bookstores.”

“I see...” I say and follow the man as he navigates the squirrely path, leading us to a strange little kitchenette. “What kind of muffins?” I ask idly as I collapse in a kitchen chair.

“I’ll tell you after you try them.” He says cheekily, dropping a couple muffins onto a small plate and setting it in front of me. “Milk?” He asks.

I nod my head. Milk? I have to wonder what he thinks he’s calling milk. These city people wouldn’t know real milk if it slapped them in the face. Ever since I left the farm, it’s been this bluish white watery stuff that they like to pretend comes out of a cow like that. I stare down at the muffin. It stares back, sort of. The muffin in question has baked up to the unfortunate appearance of a face. Two strange green globules float c**k-eyed above a weird nutty ridge of a nose. I shall call him ‘Mr. Ugly.’

“What did you say went into these things again?” I asked, poking one of the ‘eyes’ with a wary finger. The green thing slowly decompresses, looking as c**k-eyed as ever.

“I didn’t. Besides, you haven’t even tried them yet.” He says, setting a glass down beside me. I grab the glass and take a sip. Setting the glass down I look at Max and raise a brow. “Real milk?” I ask him.

He shrugs. “Not quite. You can’t get real milk here in the city, so I mix the supposed ‘milk’ with heavy cream.” Then he stops and looks at me, raising his own eyebrow. “How would you know the difference?”

I roll my eyes. “My parents had a farm. When you have to milk the cow, you learn about milk pretty fast.” I say cramming the muffin in my mouth. To my surprise, Mr. Ugly is both moist and delicious. I swallow quickly. “Hey, these are pretty good.”

He smiles at me teasingly. “Not bad for spinach, zucchini and pine nuts, huh?”

I scrunch my nose and stare down at the greenish brown muffin. Dark ribbons of green, presumably the spinach swirl around in the moist ness. Okay, so Mr. Ugly-But-Delicious was made of some pretty weird stuff, but he was alright by me. Then again, he could have been Mr. Tastes-Like-Road-Apples and I still would be eating him.

Max sits across from me, reading the paper, slurping from a chipped coffee mug. I don’t take my eyes off of the front page as I read the primary article. “Parole Commissioner Lou Gehrig Resigns”. I reach over blindly and cram Mr. Ugly Jr. into my mouth, mindlessly swallowing the masticated muffin. “Go figure. Didn’t the mayor just give him that position? No account celebrities.” I grumble grabbing my milk and taking a long swallow.

The paper folds backwards and Max looks at me with narrowed eyes. “Pardon?”

“Gehrig.” I point at the paper. “Can’t seem to hold down a desk any better then he could hold up a batting average.”

Max looks at the paper and sighs. “Or perhaps he held up that average a little too long, at whatever the cost. You don’t know the man, so don’t make judgments.”

“Touchy.” I mutter.

“You have no idea.” He replies, snapping the paper open, effectively ending our conversation. Taking that as my cue to skedaddle I stand up, setting both the plate and the glass in the sink, and walk into the ‘emporium’ proper and begin digging through massive piles of books in hopes of something interesting to read.

Two hours later I find something interesting deep, deep in one dusty, forgotten corner. “Occult: Spirits” the plaque says. I drag an armful of the books to a table and begin pouring over them. I find the easiest way read of these books, is to cross reference them with at least three others. The further I delve into one sort of spirit, the more I find them connected to others.

A cup of coffee is set next to me. “How are your researches?” Max asks humorously.

I shrug, reaching over and hauling a very large text on top of the one that I’m currently reading. “Good enough, I suppose.”

“Need anything?” He asks.

I pause and look up at him. For the first time I realize that I’m in a bookstore not a library, and here I’ve been manhandling the merchandise. My face heats with embarrassment. “Uh… No?”

He laughs, as if he understands my predicament all to well. “Reading is free.”

“Well that’s good, because I’m not exactly swimming is cash right now.” I say and stretch. “I suppose you want me gone, right?”

Max lifts a couple of the books, taking note of their titles, and looks at me. “Where are you living these days?”

I stare at him, he stares at me. This goes on for a while until I shrug. “I sleep where I can.”

“Homeless.” He says.

“And what of it?” I ask.

He closes a book and sets it aside with a heavy ‘thump’, “I think you should stay, even if it’s just a couple of days. You just regained consciousness, no sense exerting yourself.”

I look at him and let out a yawn. “I really appreciate what you’ve done for me, I do, but I can’t just stay here.”

“Promise me one thing: Stay tonight. Get a good night’s sleep, in a real bed, and tomorrow you can go on your merry way.”  He says.

Shrug, to exhausted to argue. “Fine.” I say, staggering to my feet wearily. “I’m assuming I’m sleeping in the same room, not a couch or boiler room, right?”

“Yes.” He says cheerfully. “Good-night, Jack.”

“Good night, Max.”  I say before climbing the massive flight of stairs and staggering into ‘my’ room. I plop down on the bed, and kick off my shoes and crawl under the covers. Maybe ol’ Maxi-poo had a point about taking it easy, I think as I stare up at the ceiling. When was the last time that I slept in a bed like this? Back of the farm, I suppose.

I close my eyes, imagining my old room, with its bookshelves, and the long desk where I sat and read on lazy Sunday afternoons. I imagine that I can hear the porch swing creaking in the breeze. Back and forth, rhythmically singing in its rusty chain voice like it had for most of my life.

Creak… Creak…Creak…Creak…