What In the Library?!

Stacks smiled widely like a neon-green Poison Dart frog does, and nodded dutifully. “Now,” he cleared his throat, “let’s continue.”                     

“Yeah, but,” Sticks, his neon-blue friend, interrupted, “Why continue if some of the pages are ripped out?” He maneuvered his head around to see Stacks’ pages. “Besides, you can’t read a torn book!”

Sticks shook his oil-black spotted head. “You know what, Stacks? Just sticking to the same book is not going to be enough. You’re going to run out of pages to read. I’m not looking forward to you reading the same pages. I understand you’re scared of failing again, and, thus, losing another loved one. But I, having lost someone dear to me, chooses to move on instead of let bitterness grow in me—”  

“Does the whole library have to hear this?” Stacks hissed. His back slumped. “I understand that I can’t. I know I can’t. But my fingers are sticky! Yours are, too. You can’t just judge others when you are the same way yourself. Besides, I just want to solve the mystery to erase it all.”

“Can I read at least the funny parts?”             

“No!”

“Why?” Sticks laughed. “Because you’re too serious?” Then he guffawed. Loud. Cheeks red, Stacks waved his webbed hand to quiet him. Some parrots and sloths looked over, annoyed. Others groaned—It’s Sticks again, laughing it up. The librarian came by, and widened her eyes.

“Oh my!” The mascara-laden jaguar threw both paws up to her face. “No! That’s a library book.”

“I know!” Stacks grabbed Sticks’ book, slamming it onto the table. The laughter ended reluctantly. Stacks glared up at Ms. Blackspots. “Anyway, why do you need to disturb us? You’re the librarian. If you are, then you should let us enjoy our books. Isn’t that your job?”

Ms. Blackspots threw her paws on her hips. “It’s also my job to keep this place quiet!” She threw a paw over to a couple of jaguars at another table, reading quietly to another. “See? Copy them, please.” Then Ms. Blackspots returned to her desk, grumbling about some readers she knew.

Sticks studied the two jaguars giggling with paws covering their mouths and then speaking in low tones. Then he leaned closer, ordering Stacks in a whisper to continue the story, old or not.

“What?”

Sticks nodded towards the book and crossed his arms.  

Stacks gave a huge dramatic exhale of a sigh. “No—you read it. Actually, fix it. Write it again. You can do that, right?” He let his eyelids go half-way down his eyes. And smiled confidently.

“No, I’m listening.” Sticks prompted and smiled, eager to hear Stacks’ story.

Stacks furrowed the skin that would be his eyebrows. “The frog cowboy who had jumped on his horse galloped so hard he almost fell off! Then he—”

“Wait. The cowboy galloped so hard? No—the horse galloped so hard!” Sticks laughed.

“Yes—I…” Stacks looked over the pages. Then he frowned and squinted. “Wait a minute. This book is all weird. I think I haven’t been noticing anything so much as that sentence…” Stacks inhaled and continued, only telling a patient Sticks that he wasn’t sure whether the book was written well or just rushed, and the author didn’t have time (or want to take the time) to edit it. Stacks blew a huge breath of carelessness.

“I don’t know, Sticks. Just read it!”

“I can’t. Look!” Sticks swung the book around, and showed Stacks. His eyes, Sticks saw with satisfaction, were full of confusion.   

“Yeah…these words are misspelled, not written in the right order or confusing. The rider doesn’t gallop—the horse does! The horse doesn’t tell the rider to giddy up—the rider does. The cowboys aren’t blown by the wind to and fro—the tumbleweeds are. What is this?” Stacks grabbed the book, reading furiously. Then he threw the book aside. “Don’t get it, Sticks.” He whispered furiously. “What’s with this book?”          

Sticks exhaled. “I don’t know, Stacks! But Ms. Blackspots might. You might just want to ask her, you know? Solve the problem, okay?”

“I do! I’m the detective—I mean, both of us. But you know I do.” Stacks looked hard at Sticks. “Don’t—”

“Well,” Sticks nodded, “librarians do know whether to throw books away.”

“Yeah—” Stacks snipped. “Come on—don’t have all day.” They both got off their chairs and went over to the librarian wide semi-circle of a circulation desk. They asked for Ms. Blackspots, and she walked into the scene with a bright smile.

“Yes, boys? May I help you?”

Sticks handed her their book. “For some reason, this book is not written right. Please know it’s unreadable.” Ms. Blackspots opened it and read some lines. Then she read some paragraphs. Her eyebrows went up and she looked back at Sticks and Stacks. “Weird.” Shrugging her shoulders, she walked back and sat into her chair, swiveling around to them. “Well…I guess we’ll just have to see whether we’ll keep it.” She placed it on her desk after pulling herself up to her computer. Then she turned her computer on. “Please—go pick something else.”

Sticks nodded quietly, and smiled at Stacks. He blew a breath of frustration.  

Walking back to their table, Sticks and Stacks talked amongst themselves. “Wow—she didn’t even know what to do. I mean, she’s the librarian, right?” As they sat back down across from each other, Sticks and Stacks leaned towards each other, sliding their arms closer so their armpits were over the table’s edges. “I don’t know if I want to read another book. What if it’s the same kind of story? Where it doesn’t make sense?”

“And,” Stacks said, looking around cautiously, “I don’t see the point of doing so if she doesn’t even know what to do with it. I mean, what’s the point of coming to this library if the books don’t make sense?”

Sticks nodded understandingly. “Let’s think. And just keep investigating.” They headed back over to Ms. Blackspots. They saw her work on her computer, typing away pretty quickly. Stacks and Sticks looked at each other and then back at Ms. Blackspots.

“Um,” Sticks began, “Ms. Blackspots, we have a question. We’re not so sure we should pick out another book. We can, but we don’t know whether the other books are reading the same kind of books. As in reading stories that don’t make any sense.”

Ms. Blackspots gave a pursed smile. “Well, I didn’t write those books, so I’m not going to go see whether those books are accurate. How about you pick out one for yourself?”

“We can do that, but why would one book be weird, while all the other ones be right looked at?” Stacks Sticks, and whispered something. Sticks agreed in the same tone. Then Sticks grabbed a book off a long shelf of books. He read some lines. “Hm.” He squinted to himself suspiciously. “That’s weird. This book doesn’t seem right, either. This book is about flowers,” he flipped the book over, “but the whole thing…” He read some pages. “Have nothing to do with flowers.” Sticks returned to the desk, jumped up on it and shouted, “Hey, everyone, check out what you’re reading. Some books may not make sense, or be irrelevant to the title or just not matter to you. It may be pointless stuff just being jotted down.”

Every parrot, sloth, jaguar, Spider monkey, Capybara, Giant anteater, Harpy Eagle and Bullet Ant owned widened eyes and gasps. They all started calling, squawking, yelling and shaking their fists about the wrong material!

Sticks waved his fingers to mollify every angry animal and motioned for worried animals to release their fears that their children weren’t learning. But the animals started protesting, complete with winged animals carrying their thrown books and tossing them into the middle of the circulation desk to, as he found out, to burn them. This library should be renovated into a museum or something—something useful! One Amazon Rainforest animal called out, its fists waving in the air. Please—do something about it, Ms. Blackspots.

Ms. Blackspots, Stacks saw, cowered underneath her computer. He saw Sticks join her amidst the chaos. Stacks yelled at everyone to shut it, but failed to calm everyone. Some animals threw out verbal assaults on this library, but Stacks grumbled they needed to pipe down!

He went to a back room. Finding all these boxes with books spilling out of them, he grabbed one. Flipping it open after reading the cover, Stacks read some of the work involved. But he found nothing in common with the other books in the library’s shelves all around this place.

“Hm.” He thought, returning to a semi-calm atmosphere. “Doesn’t the librarian shelve the books?” Then he gasped. “Wait—” He joined Sticks and Ms. Blackspots, nodding quickly at Sticks’ suggestion of interviewing Ms. Blackspots and crawled out towards her computer. Some words were weird and others made him use a dictionary, but they were all correct. It wasn’t like Ms. Blackspots was…

“Typing the words from her computer into the books themselves?” Stacks wondered. He strived to calm down the semi-chaotic library, failed, glowered at Sticks when he won and then, with heavily pursed lips, grabbed a pen and notebook to take notes as he jotted down the animals’ comments and reactions.

“Excuse me” or “Hey—I was wondering if we could talk” or “Please stop so I can ask you some questions” became the lingo of the day. Stacks flipped from one sheet of paper to the next as he wrote and inquired. Finally, he grabbed Sticks by the shoulder, spinning him around when they were in a certain section of the library.

“So I wrote all these notes as to whether Ms. Blackspots could have written all those words into the books from her computer. I know it sounds weird, but look at her computer. It’s…made strangely.” Sticks saw—indeed, the computer’s keyboard was worded weirdly. The ABCs were worded so that they had words on them, not just letters out of alphabetical order. Plus, the keyboard’s Enter button had a special design.  

“It’s Ms. Blackspots. She’s the criminal mastermind behind this case!”

“Stacks,” Sticks sighed, “we can’t just keep coming to conclusions like that. Besides, she could be just having a weirdly designed computer. But…” he thought. “You know what?”

Stacks squinted in worry. “What?”

“I forgot my coffee.” Sticks chuckled as he went to retrieve it. When he returned, Stacks said, “Any information about her? Any weird behavior other than the fact that she didn’t respond to us when she was first working on her computer—”

Sticks bobbed his head. “She said she was terrified of the parrots dropping books into the middle of the circulation desk. She thought they’d all gang up on her and drop her on top of her books to prove she had written them all wrong. But how do they know she wrote those books wrong? How do we know—”

“Sticks!” Stacks rolled his eyes. “We will know if you focus! Come on, man. Don’t you know anything?”

Sticks said he’d be back. After returning with two cups of coffee, Sticks gave one to an impatient Stacks and drank the other. As he sipped, Sticks listened Stacks clear his throat. “You better interview the animals more, Sticks!”

“Why don’t you?” Sticks smiled, squinting at Stacks. “Do it happily!”

Stacks huffed and left. Some time later, Stacks returned to Sticks, saying they all saw Ms. Blackspots enter information into her computer every time she picked up the book on the shelf. “That means,” he concluded, “she was checking to see if she had worded it right, and whether it had gone from the computer into the book. Like magic!

“Hm.” Sticks sipped his coffee. “Let’s say Ms. Blackspots was doing that daily. If she were, she must be the culprit, because all the animals are just guests here. They can’t have a computer, and even if they do, they don’t do that because they’re just studying or doing homework or reading. The librarian wants her readers to read the best. So…” He raised his eyebrow skin.    

“So…” Stacks looked at him suspiciously. “Maybe Ms. Blackspots had deleted the content and rewrote it! Don’t know why you’re looking at me like I don’t know.”

“Oh, you do. But could you solve this case with a good attitude?”

“Yeah.” Stacks nodded. “But we must dig deeper. Look around you—how many librarians do you see?”

“Um…” Sticks looked and counted. “Two. Three, no… Four.”

“Great. I also interviewed all of them.” Stacks grinned triumphantly. “And none of them—Ms. Blackspots included—claimed none of the words from her computer were able to transport from her computer to the books. So…either her computer isn’t magical, or—”

“Magic?” Sticks smiled wide. “Wow! What an adventure—”

“Forget the magic, Stick! We have a case to solve! Don’t know why you need to be so weird. You’re a detective, too. But your humor needs to be solved first.”

Sticks looked hurt, but Stacks sipped his coffee. “So Ms. Blackspots claimed no words went into the books. And I saw the computers all had weird keyboards. So…”

They both looked at each other. “All the librarians are secret authors.”

They hunted down each librarian. Demanding proof each one wasn’t an author in disguise, the two Poison Dart Frogs stole answers until late. The library had closed, but the case was still open. Stacks protested he had to stay until he found the culprit.  

After a while, Stacks was stumped. “So it wasn’t Ms. Blackspots. Or Lisa. Or Quail. Or Pickles. So…” Gritting his teeth, Stacks headed out with Sticks.

“I just don’t get it, Stick.” Stacks whined as they walked together towards their apartment downtown a few blocks away. “I’m confused. I thought librarians loved material so much they—”

“Let’s just let our minds run with the info. We don’t have any more leads. You’ve asked all our questions. You’ve done all our research. You’ve—”

“Have you ever thought of an animal sneaking in late at night to write all those books him or herself? Or gathering a group—say the circulation desk librarians—and getting all the words in before daylight? You know—like a group of con artists?” Stacks stopped right before escalating up the stairs to their front door. “So…librarians would gather in groups? What are they, sloth mothers or macaws? Seriously, Sticks?”   

Sticks jerked a finger, growling, “I don’t remember, but you’re the one who wanted to solve this case!” Then he stared at Stacks. “Don’t see why you can’t just be my friend—”

“Wait—I was in the back room, looking at those books. They were all stories—”

“That were replaced with the fake books!”    

Sticks smiled winningly, and Stacks looked down reluctantly. “Yep—you’re smart, too.”

The camera pans out, revealing a movie theater. Someone gets up, collects her half-eaten bag of popcorn and half-drunk soda, and exits the movie. Then she paused.  

“Well, hello, Stacks and Sticks! So good to see you eating popcorn rather than just read a book.”

“Yes, Ms. Blackspots.” Stacks clicked his pen closed and flipped the notebook closed. “Yes, you’re right. Let’s take a closer look at what you’ve been doing, Ms. Blackspots!” Heading back to the library, we all entered at the opening time, and Ms. Blackspots walked out of the back room in which cardboard boxes were strewn all over the place. “Um…it is messy in there. Please excuse our—”

Ms. Blackspots glared at us. “I didn’t do anything. The back room is messy because we’re trying to organize the books and replacing the real ones with the nonsensical ones. We’re just organizing and haven’t gotten to the job yet. It’ll take us all summer. It’s just the spring.” She crossed her arms. “Who solved the mystery now, huh?”

Stacks looked back at Sticks. He waited for a red-cheeked Stacks to say something, but only sputters came from Stacks’ mouth. He tried standing his ground, but Ms. Blackspots just shook her head and continued glaring at him—

Sticks stopped writing. “Gee, Stacks, Just don’t publish this part—it’d have to be rewritten. By you again! Ready to solve the real mystery?” Sticks laughed. “Get it? The one in real life, too. Just do it with a good attitude, Stack!”                   

After doing so with a superior attitude, Stacks wrote and then handed it to Sticks. “See? I solved the mystery. Happy?”

Sticks stretched a gracious smile.

“What?” Stacks threw out.

Sticks frowned. “Your attitude needs work!”  

“But…”

When Stacks returned the book, Sticks shook his head firmly. Storming away, Stacks entered that certain section.

“Please,” Sticks said, “be brilliant for once. Humble, you know? You’re my best friend, and I’ve stuck by you, helping you solve the case. Maybe—for once—you can listen to me, huh? All I’ve ever done is be your partner. How about you be mine, too.”            

Stacks turned. He watched him go. Best friends never give up on each other. But I’m a detective. I need to solve the mystery—both of them! He sighed. When he returned to the table with Sticks, Stacks said he, Stacks, should continue his story. Case closed.    

“Well,” Sticks said, “can I write the funny parts?”

“No—it’s my story.”

Sticks slammed back against his chair. “So, it’s all yours. This book, this case.” He got up. “Okay—whatever!”

A few minutes later, he came back with coffee in his hand. “This is mine. You’re not—”

“You should read it!” Stacks swung the book around. “It’s you and me—the detectives solving the mystery.”

Sticks read some of the first chapter, and then got up to leave. When he returned, he handed a cup of coffee to Stacks. Both sat together, Sticks reading Stacks’ book. And Stacks drinking his coffee.