What Am I?

The Berber carpet caressed my hands as I slipped into the brisk library on that cold autumn night. My brother and I made our way through the long rows of stiff books with rough edges, as though the people who’d borrowed them previously had not cared for them as they should’ve. Bryan, my brother, and I would never do such a thing to a book. We thought of books as gifts, beautiful and wise.

“Come on, Volcano,” Bryan whispered from the end of the aisle.

I tried my best to speed up, but I had an illness, disability of some sort. I was slower than the others in my family, smaller and weaker. I didn’t know what was wrong, no one ever seemed concerned.

After a few more pushes, Bryan giggled and ran over to me, lifting me in his arms and carrying me to the edge of the aisle. That’s when we stepped foot into paradise. The children’s section.

Bryan ran us to the chapter books, then set me on top of the shelves. I followed him as he brushed his fingertip against the cheap paper covered with goofy drawings and even goofier titles.

He stopped and kneeled, rising moments later with a small stack of books in his hand, a sappy smile tattooed on his face.

“Perfect,” he said, lifting me back into his arms and placing me on the stack of books. I turned to face forward, breathing in the scent of old books, filled with the different environments of past owners.

Bryan and I agree that they should make a candle resembling the scent but know it to be impossible. Part of the appeal of the scent was the joy of being around the stories, some fiction, some not so.

“Look Volcano,” Bryan said, pulling me from my thoughts. He sat me and the books on the ground, then pulled out a long, thin book from the non-fiction section. It was not unusual to get books from this section, but Bryan rarely pulled a book with pictures as he did that day. It was covered in small, green reptile-like creatures with hard pieces…rock? Dirt? A part of them?

I shivered. It reminded me of the weight I always carried around with me. Weighing me down, possibly making my disability worse. I don’t know much about life before it. I just assumed the devices were to help my back from being deformed, like the other young children who wore back braces.

Bryan pointed to a picture of one of the weird animals. “Look, that might be your cousin.”

I let out a laugh. Was he trying to make me upset? Make me feel ugly? I knew all my real cousins by name, and they were all quite fond of me.

He pointed to another one. “And that could be your dad.” He scrunched his eyebrows. “Or your mom. I don’t know how to tell the difference.”

Now he was just being ridiculous. We shared the same parents. Martha and Thomous Gunny and their three children Bryan, Tamiya, and me.

“We should check out this book to learn more about your family and where you come from.” I’d already grown tired of the joke but apparently, Bryan had just begun.

He placed the book on the floor, put the stack of chapter books on top, and then placed me back in my spot. I sat like a king on a throne, but when I leaned down and saw the book of weird animals, my stomach churned.

Bryan stopped suddenly, then turned and darted to the powder room. “I gotta poop.”

He pushed the door open with his back, but just as I was about to remind Bryan that we were not supposed to, under any circumstances, bring library books into the powder room, he set the stack of books on the counter and ran into one of the stalls.

I sighed, before resting on the top book and breathing in the scent of off-white paper. I placed my hand under my head and turned to close my eyes, but before I did so, I caught sight of one of those animals. The ones I’d seen in the book.

I hopped to my feet and hands and looked around, trying to find the animal. I would’ve screamed if I wasn’t in a library. I turned in circles, but I didn’t see the animal anywhere but the mirror.

I got as close to the edge as I could, knowing it wasn’t possible to be stuck in a piece of reflective glass. I took a close look, and that’s when I noticed how similar the movements of the animal were to mine. Was it mocking me, just as Bryan had done earlier? Perhaps this was all a setup for a much more involved joke. I felt my throat growing dry. I was conflicted. Bryan was my brother and best friend; he would never commit to such contrived manipulation.

The toilet flushed and out jumped Bryan. He washed his hands, turned to me, then to the animal in the mirror then grinned. His grin confirmed my suspicion.

“Checking yourself out in the mirror, huh?” Bryan asked before lifting me into his arms and bringing me closer to the mirror.

I reached out and touched the glass, hoping to get close enough to touch the animal they’d somehow trapped in the mirror, but instead of feeling warm scales, a cold as ice sheet met my hand.

I took my other hand and placed it on my face. Was it me? Was the reflection I met with, the person…no not person, the animal I truly was? Was I different species than my family? Had they adopted me and attempted to keep a secret until now? I scooted backward until my bum met Bryan’s back, making him giggle.

“Oh, don’t worry buddy. You’re a cute turtle.” He walked back out the door and carried the books to the counter. I was placed beside them, as though I were nothing more than an object. Something manmade, uncared for.

But, as the old woman scanned the books, I realized that just because they were objects didn’t make them unloved. Quite the contrary. Some people loved books more than other people. So, maybe I was a turtle. Maybe I was adopted, but Bryan was still my brother and best friend. Anything else was unimportant to the story of my life. When the old lady was finished Bryan scooped the books up in one arm and me in the other.

“Come on, Volcano. Let’s go read our books.”

Yes Bryan, let's.