The Bookkeeper

Bellamy had always been fond of reading. Throughout his schooling, he was nose-deep in some sort of fantastical novel or brushing up on his seemingly everlasting knowledge of sharks by reading the most up-and-coming research publications about his favorite finned fish of the sea. It only made sense for him to own what he loved most in the world -- books. He collected books from his travels in his early adulthood, his school books from as far back as he could remember, and local bookshops that carried his favorite classics like Dracula and Don Quixote in special edition covers. He had books from his honeymoon to Scandinavia in Europe, older than his parents' parents, new books from the Barnes and Noble at the mall near his little bungalow of a home, and retired books from the bookkeeper in the downtown area of the city in which he lived with his wife, Yanna, and his aquatic turtles, Fin and Flash.

His favorite books were fantasy novels, particularly those with dragons or forest creatures that destroyed the land to smithereens. He enjoyed the simultaneous thrill and relaxation that reading brought upon him, by being able to escape his real-life scenarios, like arguments with his wife or money coming in slowly that month, and venture into a whole separate universe where his stressors were merely getting obliterated by the bluish flames of a wyvern, or losing his life from a measly infection with limited healthcare since he was now immersed before the medieval times.

So he bought, found, collected, traded, and was gifted books upon novels upon articles upon short stories every birthday, Christmas, Valentine's, or random times in between for the past 30-something years of his life. His obsession did not only pertain to wanting to read their contents but also to have some sort of decoration, he loved how some of them looked, he had prized books signed by his favorite authors, and because they made him feel and look smart. Of course, he had also read and mostly enjoyed the contents of the over 1,400 originals, pre-released, and copies of books that resided in the majority of his household.

Yanna never paid much mind to the books, for she never would have met Bellamy if it wasn't for their shared mild obsession with cosplaying the book series Game of Thrones at conventions around the country. She loved him, his books, and his turtles enough to marry Bellamy and coexist with his ever-expanding collection of tomes. She loved him enough to cook for him at least twice a day, every single day, especially now with her beautiful new gas stove and convection oven that Bellamy gifted her for Christmas the year prior. Some may think that a gas stovetop cannot possibly be beautiful, but to someone who previously had a single glass top burner, any quad stove with an attached oven was an upgrade.

She was using her stove to make a roux, a combination of melted butter and flour with milk added in order to make soups or cream sauces. The thing about a roux is that heated milk tends to boil over if left unattended, which is exactly what happened when Yanna felt a sudden urge to use the restroom while cooking chicken alfredo one evening. She went and took some time to return, all while the roux bubbled and bustled over the sides of the saucepan, sticking to the edges and turning brown then black on her new stovetop. As it continued to dribble and subsequently burn, the fire from the burner quickly migrated onto the burnt bits, and then to the wooden cabinets above and below the stove, soon to encompass that whole side of the kitchen.

Yanna smelt the smoke and quickly departed from the bathroom to find the horrific scene of a kitchen fire erupting in her home. She darted through the kitchen, clinging to the opposite wall of the fire, trying to get through to warn her husband and collect as many things as possible in their first and only home together, the home they never had a reason to obtain a fire extinguisher for. Her first thought was to grab as many books as her arms could hold, as she passed by the multiple stacks and bookshelves full of them on her way to her husband. Yanna bellowed out to Bellamy that there was a fire and that they needed to evade the household promptly. Bellamy sprung out of his study, looking as if he had just been awoken from a nightmare, only to find himself in another.

His first thought matched that of Yanna -- grab as many books as you can. The amount of time, money, and traveling spent to obtain his massive collection was worth more than anything in the world to him, including his own life and that of his wife. He grabbed and threw books out the front door, going for the sections that had the most money invested in them first. The flickering flames quickly superseded the walls of the kitchen and shuffled into the attached living room rather quickly. Yanna was calling 911 as she continued to frantically grab at anything she could, throwing it all out the front door. The operator asked if they were out of the house, and when told no, immediately ordered her to leave the premises and to not think twice about going back. She ran into her husband's study as a last resort to grab the turtles straight from their tank and ran back out through the blazing living room and out of the front door, nearly tripping on the small mountain of books forming outside. She yelled for her husband to give it up, that nothing is worth his life. He silently pressed on, determined to save as many as he could, no matter what. Yanna was screaming at him, devastated and tearful at the fact that her own husband, who was supposed to love her more than anything, would not listen to her pleas.

As the flames further engulfed the living room, Bellamy sprinted through the facade to the opposite side of the house, now throwing books through their bedroom window. Once he saw the dancing orange and yellow approaching him through the hallway leading to their room, he threw himself out the window just like he did to his books. He was dripping sweat and tears, silently watching as the flames further took away his home, his tangible memories, his work, and most importantly, his books. He fell to his knees, inconsolable for the foreseeable future over the loss he just suffered.

Finally, he remembered his wife, and that thought alone was powerful enough to make him rise and sprint to the front of the house where he had watched Yanna abandon his desperate efforts to save his massive hoard of words. He quickly hugged her, both of them sobbing into each other, the dispatcher no longer on the line in his wife's hand and sirens sounding in the distance. He asked her if she was okay then what had happened, and she explained the dreaded roux incident, and how she, in Bellamy's eyes, destroyed his beloved compilation.

He stopped hugging her, then and there, with sadness and now a look of anger in his eyes. He replaced their sweet and caring body hug with a hug of his hands around her throat, tackling her to the ground with the weight of his body being greater than hers. He grunted and she grunted, he screamed in rage and she tried to scream in fear, she was kicking and slapping at her husband as her face turned beet red and her veins popped out of her face like tree roots in the surface of the ground. Through the strangulation that ensued, Yanna still loved her husband, as confusing and terrifying as this moment in her life was, until she realized it would be the last moment in her life. She chose to stop fighting, to let it happen, to go limp and emotionless in order to pass quicker, to end the suffering. She could only hope that the firetrucks and ambulances got there in time through the thick woods on the winding gravel road. Her hopes were in vain, and she went flabby under Bellamy's weight. He continued out of acrimony, only realizing what he had done when he shook her with bitterness in both his heart and his hands, to which her eyes rolled back open after being clenched shut for so long, her mouth drooped, and her neck no longer strained under his fingers. He pushed himself backward and sat still, staring at the corpse of his wife, a wobbling image of two little green discs attempting to run away into the woods in his peripheral vision.

He continued to stare silently until the first police officer appeared, soon followed by a firetruck, an ambulance, and another firetruck. As most of the visitors got to work on the house, the EMTs focused on bounding over to Bellamy and Yanna, who was soon declared dead at the scene. Bellamy did not have the heart to say what happened, that he had killed his own wife. He was scared they would treat him as a psychopath if he dared to say he did it over some books.

So, he remained silent until an autopsy report came out some weeks later that she had died from asphyxiation in the fire from an obstructed airway, presumably by some sort of fallen debris. He let out a heavy, emotionless sigh and slid the report that the coroner mailed to his hotel room on top of one of the many stacks of his 128-piece collection of novels.