Overdue-ing It

Overdue-ing It

1 Day Overdue

I like things to be in their place. Always. At all times. I like things to happen on time. Never late. Never.

Naturally, when I received an email from the library saying I had a book overdue, I freaked out. The book had been borrowed on my behalf, by the root cause of all my neurotic behavior, who also worked at said library. Hence the reason I forgot about the book, and the reason for my instant and immense panic.

And, naturally, like the coward that I am, I merely asked my friend to return the book for me. In order to avoid the library and having to show my face there ever again. In case that wasn’t quite clear.

1 Week Overdue

Turns out, you don’t ask friends to return library books for you. Not even if they’re really close friends. Because, apparently, really close friends can’t be trusted to hand in a book at a library right across the street from their workplace for a friend who asked really, really nicely and gave them a friggin’ cookie!

But I digress.

I now had to form a new plan. One in which I returned the book, but still avoided the library itself. That last past was essential. Obviously.

Seeing as how I had become slightly more desperate than I had been a week before (the thought of that overdue book was driving me slightly insane), I decided to do something I knew I would regret for a very long time to come. I called my brother.

Roan’s guffaws threatened to tear my eardrum when I explained the situation to him.

“You mean to tell me that you, perfect, little Maura made a mistake?” He managed to huff out between snorts of laughter. “No, little sister, you’ll have to slay that dragon yourself. Sunday lunches are enough for me, as it is,” he said, after he finally managed to calm himself. I sighed into the silence, wondering how to convince him to help me, before he started laughing at me again. And he kept laughing. And laughing. And laughing. It took a good long while, several minutes of begging, many threats to his most treasured body parts, and finally an offer of monetary incentive to get him to agree to help me.

3 Weeks Overdue-in

Roan, the ass that he is, didn’t help me. In fact, he took my money but never returned the book to the library. I had received another email from the library. This one included the invoice for the late fee. My brother proved himself to be even more of an ass. After I called him in a righteous-ish fury, he dropped the book at the front desk of my apartment building and left. The coward probably thought it was funny.

It seemed that I had no choice. I had to go to the library and return the stupid thing myself. It took me a good two hours just to leave my apartment.

When I finally reached the library, I stood a ways off from the entrance, watching people go in and out. They all looked so at ease. I bet none of them had any overdue books. Or if they did, it didn’t bother them. Monsters.

A young woman around my age passed near me and I suddenly had a brilliant idea. A brilliant idea that made me rather uncomfortable, mind you, but it was a whole lot better than actually having to go into the library myself.

I rushed to catch up to the woman before she got too close to the entrance. I really didn’t want to be seen by anyone inside.

“Excuse me, miss?” Either she didn’t hear me, or she was ignoring me. Probably the latter.

“Miss?” I cried out slightly louder than either of us would have preferred. The woman turned to me with that uncomfortable expression on her face that we all reserve for strangers that stop us on the street. The one that’s a mix of trying to look at least a bit friendly, but still being wary and suspicious and make you look ever so slightly constipated.

“I’m so sorry to bother you,” I said, trying my best to look friendly and non-threatening. That probably made it worse. I most likely looked like a missionary from some kind of cult. “I was wondering if you could help me, do me a small favor actually. I-”

“I’m sorry, I don’t have any money on me.” The woman made a show of patting her pockets before turning and just about running into the library. When she came back out again, she walked as far away from me as she possibly could without walking into the street.

The rest of the people I managed to get to stop all reacted in less than desirable ways. One man spit very close to my shoe and muttered something about bloody Bible-bashers. Another man said he only bought what I was selling after dark. I had to work very hard not to execute the threats I had made to Roan on this man. One old lady listened until I finished asking her to hand in my book for me. I then got a lecture on being a responsible adult.

I marked the day down as unsuccessful and went home.

3 Weeks and 1 Day Overdue-in

The previous day had been a complete and utter disaster. I could admit to that. So I resolved to go back and hand in the book myself. You know, much like I had the day before.

It took me three and a half hours before I managed to leave my apartment that day.

By the time the taxi pulled up to the library, my nerves were shot. Again. Still, it didn’t matter. What did matter was that the taxi driver was almost begging me to get out by the time I got the courage together to do it.

I stood staring at the doors to the building, my hands shaking and my breathing feeling slightly labored. I clutched the book to my chest and thought today is the day I slay the dragon. We all know that wasn’t in the cards.

I could have been standing there for quite some time, I don’t know, but being slapped in the thigh by an oversized beach bag will jolt anyone from an anxiety induced trance.

“Stand out of the path now, would you?” the surprisingly gruff voice of a small old lady came from under the huge straw hat she had on her head. She didn’t stop to check whether I did as she’d asked before she waddled in through the large glass doors. I rubbed my thigh where the bag, no doubt filled with books she wanted to return, had hit me. And then another brilliant idea lit up my mind.

You’d think I would have learned that my brilliant ideas tended to be not so brilliant, but desperation makes fools of us all.

I stood close to the walkway leading to the library, keeping an eye out for people carrying large, slightly open bags. Bags filled with book going into the library. It took a while, but another sweet looking old lady came by. I fell in step next to her and peered into her bag. Jackpot! Books going in. I did my best to slip my book into her bag unnoticed, working slowly, and of course not paying attention to anything else.

“What on earth are you doing, girl!” the old woman screeched before grabbing my wrist in a surprisingly strong grip. By this time we had gotten close enough to the library entrance, without my noticing, to draw the security guard’s attention. The man in the ill-fitting uniform came storming out, no doubt happy to finally have something to do.

“Here now, what’s all this?”

“She’s trying to steal my library books!” Apparently the woman couldn’t do anything other than screech while talking. I jerked at my wrist.

“That’s not... I mean, I didn’t... Let me just-” Every time I tried to jerk away, the woman would jerk me back. She plucked the book I’d been trying to sneak into her bag from my hand.

“Hey! That’s not-”

“This isn’t mine,” she interrupted. Looks like she could speak normally after all. I finally managed to jerk away.

“No, it’s not! If you’d just allow me to explain, we can have this all cleared up.” I tried to sound as reasonable and pleasant as possible. The security guard crossed his arms over his chest, scowling, and the old woman let out a little huff. I explained, as briefly as possible, that I merely wanted to return the book without having to go into the library myself. Of course, I didn’t give them any reasons to explain my aversion to going in.

For a moment, both the woman and the guard merely stared at me with the strangest expressions on their faces. I had no idea what would happen and fear jolted through me. What if the woman decided to press charges? Or worse. What if the security guard made me go inside to return the book? The tension in the silence grew until I thought it would suffocate me. Then the woman laughed. A full belly laugh. “Thank you, my girl! Oh, I can’t wait to tell the girls at bridge all about this,” she wheezed out. She turned and walked into the library, still hiccuping with laughter. Both the security guard and I were slightly stunned. We watched her walk away and then turned to look at each other, each mirroring the other’s dumbfounded expressions. At least until an awkwardness started to settle between us and I started fidgeting while he stared hard at me.

“Well, I suppose you can go. No harm done. Just... Don’t do it again.” It almost sounded like a question. He turned to go back inside, shaking his head slightly.

“Hey, um, wait a second,” I called after him with a shaky voice. He turned back slowly, a suspicious look clouding his face.

“Could you maybe, you know, give the book ba-”

“Get lost!”

3 Weeks and 6 Days Overdue

The same security guard had been on duty every day since my last catastrophic attempt at returning that stupid book. I should know. I was there everyday. And there was no way that I was going anywhere near the place while he was on duty. A girl could handle only so much embarrassment in front of one person. Even if she did kind of want his number.

4 Weeks Overdue-in

I no longer had any choice. I would have to go inside. There were no more brilliantly terrible ideas to try and there would be no more chances to stall. That didn’t mean I was going to allow myself to be seen. I knew where the returns counter was. I knew exactly how much I owed in late fees. All I had to do was make it to the counter, leave the book and the envelope with the fees in, and get out, all without being seen. Not that difficult, right?

I gave the security guard on duty (a new one, thank goodness!) what I hoped was a confident smile. All the books I’d read said the key to these things was confidence. I wore dark colors to make sure I would be less visible. The walls in the library were pretty dark. My clothes and shoes were also comfortable, for maximum maneuverability. Was I going overboard? Only if you didn’t know what I knew.

I stayed close to the wall and peeked around the corner where the library’s entryway opened up into the main reading area. Along the wall were a few ancient computers sitting on even older wood and steel desks facing the counter. The the dark, wooden counter stretched a good four meters and behind it three librarians bustled about, checking out and receiving books. A door stood open on the far side of the counter and occasionally, a librarian would come or go through it, carrying stacks of books, papers, or stationary.

I thought I was going to be sick. My palms were sweaty, my heartbeat was far higher than it should have been and my stomach was rolling. Why did the returns counter have to be on the far side? I ducked back behind the corner for a moment to figure out how I would get there without being seen by one of the busy bees behind the counter.

The bookshelves housing the Young Adults literature was fairly close to the returns counter. At least, far closer than I was. I would be much easier to sneak the book back from there. I peeked around the corner again, trying to find the most covert route to the Young Adults section possible. I also did my best to ignore the tiny part of me that felt like a spy in one of my favorite novels.

I ended up sneaking to the newspaper stands on the far left of the library. I was going in the opposite direction of where I needed to be, but it had the most cover. If I moved quickly enough, I could move back behind the stands deep enough that they wouldn’t see me.

I then crawled behind the reading tables right to the back wall. From there it was a simple matter of hiding behind a bookshelf until I made sure no one was looking, before darting the next hiding spot. I circled my way around the library, peaking around the edges of shelves, doing my best not to get distracted by the books all around me, until I reached my intended destination. At least, my first one.

I was back on my hands and knees again by the time I reached the Young Adults section. The shelves were very short and I was, well, not. I sat with my back to the shelf nearest to the returns counter, again, sneaking a peak, making sure no one behind the counter was looking my way.

As fast as I possibly could, which, in retrospect, was not very fast at all, I crawled to the nearest part of the long counter and pressed my back to it, pulling my knees up to my chest. I was so close I could almost taste the relief of being rid of this friggin’ book.

Slowly, very, very slowly, I crawled over to the returns section of the counter. I kept glancing up, watching for the gold-colored plaque hanging from the ceiling that would tell me I had reached my destination. When I finally reached it, I reached up to slip the book over the edge of the counter. The sound of movement right behind the dark wood made my whole body tense up. I sat frozen in that half reaching position until the sound of movement receded, and then I waited some more. I would not fail. Not when I had come so far. Not when I had been so ridiculous.

When I finally felt safe enough to move, I ever so carefully pushed the book over the lip of the counter, envelope with the late fees tucked inside. A sense of achievement washed over me. I’d done it! All that was left was to crawl back to the bookshelves, sneak back around the library, crawl back past the news stands and dash out. That was all. I was just about ready to start my victory crawl when a head popped over the counter. A scowling, wire-rimmed glasses wearing head. And suddenly I was aware of every other person in the library watching me as well.

“Besides the fact that it’s beyond deplorable for a book to be returned this late, you do know we have an after-hours return slot in the door, right?” the head hissed at me and I winched. The look of disapproval was expected and well known. Not any less scathing, though. Well worth avoiding at all costs and at all times. The head obviously expected some form of response from me, if I read her expression correctly. With a deep sigh of resignation I said:

“Hello, Mother.”