Ten Years Overdue

Ten Years Overdue

By Heather Ann Martinez

If you were to visit my home, you would see a very simple, organized space. There are sticky notes on the mirrors and a growing “To-do” list hanging on the fridge. There is a bucket list journal on my nightstand and symmetrically arranged flowers in the vase on my dining room table. Groceries are picked up every Tuesday and Friday. Bills are paid every Wednesday. Normally, everything runs like clockwork. It was on a Sunday that I received a call from a former college roommate who said some of my things were accidentally packed with her belongings when we moved out of our dormitory last spring. She said she accidentally put one of my boxes in her car. She had put everything in storage for the past year, because she was backpacking across Europe before starting her new job. She came over that afternoon and showed me pictures of her adventures across Europe. She encouraged me to start checking off things on my bucket list and left me this box.

For some reason, I didn’t go through the box right away. I let it sit next to the dining room table for a month. My high school letterman jacket was sitting on the top of the box, and I thought the majority of the contents were going to be old clothes I would probably end up donating anyway. It was a task I put on my “To-do” list that I kept putting off until autumn. I realized that I didn’t want to visit the donation center too close to the holidays with such a small amount of donations that I didn’t think anyone would want anyway. I decided to try on my high school letterman jacket. I hadn’t worn it for a decade. It was sitting in a suitcase in the dormitory throughout college. I am not certain how it ended up in my former roommate’s box. When I picked it up, something small fell out of the side pocket and landed on my carpet. It was my library card from high school complete with my photo and mouth full of braces. I cringed at the memory. I wore those braces for a year. I had fond memories of visiting the library with my high school friends. I had volunteered at community fundraisers for the library, and I had worked there the summer before I went to college.

Returning to the box, I discovered that there weren’t just old clothes. There were CD’s, photo albums, a stick of unopened gum, my favorite lip gloss and at the bottom of the box lay an unfamiliar book. I thought it was my former roommate’s at first. There was a slight smudge of something on the outer jacket covering some letters. I grabbed a wet cloth and wiped away the smudge to discover the words, “Property of Woodland Heights Public Library.” I quickly opened the book to find a list of patron names and mine was the very last. It was dated ten years ago. I turned the next page and found a sheet of paper wedged in the binding. It was my handwriting. It was a list of books for a research paper I wrote my sophomore year of high school. This was one of the books I didn’t have to use as a source. I was supposed to turn it in ten years ago. It is ten years overdue!

This book is ten years overdue and five hundred miles away from that library in my hometown that I haven’t visited in three years and four months and six days. A town that I did not really care to go back to. I don’t have any friends or family members that live there now. The only person I know who is still there is an old boyfriend, the one who gave me the letterman jacket. I called the library, and I asked the librarian for a mailing address. I explained that I had a library book that had been misplaced for more than a year and asked if I could mail it and pay whatever the fine is for books that are overdue more than a year.

The librarian laughed. She said she never heard of a book being overdue beyond six months. She said all of the library patrons are very careful with the books they borrow. She said the books and periodicals that go in and out of that library are handled by responsible members of the community. She finished by saying that if there was a missing library book, it would have to be hand delivered. She said the bar codes have changed and she would also need to see the library card that also had an outdated bar code. In short, she said this has never happened before. I could be used for the local newspaper and would be a headline for everyone in the county to see. I hung up the phone. She shamed me and she wanted to publicly humiliate me in front of hundreds of strangers and my ex, Simon.

A million thoughts ran through my head. I could burn the book. I could donate it to the local library here in town and carefully remove the jacket and the first page that has all the patron names. I tried removing the first page with fabric scissors and the binding began to give way. My hands were shaking. Then my phone rang. It was my mother calling. She had also moved several miles away from my hometown but kept in touch with a few people that still lived there. She said that someone posted a blurb on social media about how a woman called in asking about returning a library book more than a year later. The phone call prompted the librarian to look further and discovered there was one missing library book that did not have the new barcode on it. The book was still used regularly at the high school for the research paper for sophomore year English. The blurb asked for any unused copies to be given to the library as the book is now out of print. The librarian also asked for the book I have to be returned to the collection.

My mom started laughing and asked me who would be that irresponsible. She said she appreciated the fact that I was so organized and would never do anything like not return a library book or pay my mortgage or drive with my sunroof open during a rainstorm. I quickly hung up with my mother and thought to myself I have to return the library book. I packed a small suitcase and started driving. I put the book on the back seat. I knew the library was closed on Mondays and I knew there was a side door that was not used often. I still have the key to that side door. I could just walk in and hide the book in the stacks and walk out without anyone even noticing that I was there and I had been irresponsible.

There was one small problem. It was a small town. Everyone knew everyone. Everyone knew who drove what car and when they would be driving. It was Monday and some sort of local in-service day. I was about to be noticed. I wasn’t fitting in with the rhythm of this small town. I decided to park my car on a residential street a few blocks from the library. I opened the back of the car and shoved the book into a large bag. When I was closing the car door, I walked right into his chest. It was Simon!

“I knew it! I knew it had to be you!” He said.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“The overdue library book. I knew you still had it.” He shouted.

I looked at him like deer in headlights.

“How could you possibly know?” I asked. Tears were welling up in my eyes.

“Open the book to the first page. I forged your signature. I didn’t have a library card. My parents thought I was too irresponsible for one so I borrowed your library card and forged your signature on the book’s copy and the master journal in the library with the due date. The librarian, at that time, didn’t even look at the library card.”

After looking more closely at the front page and the note wedged in the binding, I realized this was Simon’s handwriting, not mine. I hadn’t forgotten to return the library book. He did! I was so relieved. Simon told me the story of how he borrowed the letterman jacket he gave me and took my library card to check out the book for his research paper. He had every intention of returning the book to the library but forgot. He stashed the book in my car trunk in a box that I never noticed underneath a blanket. My mother must have put it in my suitcase when I was packing for college. My roommate and I shared the same dormitory for five years. We stayed an extra year to finish an advanced degree program. I told Simon my plan to return the book. He said e would help me since it was his mistake to correct. He said that it would be better to return the book after dark.

We drove out of town and spent the day by the coastline. He asked me if I remembered the night we went driving in the rain and couldn’t get my car sunroof closed all the way. We were drenched and repairing the sunroof went on my “To-do” list within a few hours. He said he could never figure out how or why I would want to be as organized as I am. I told him I couldn’t live my life without my lists. He said that was part of why he broke up with me and moved back to our hometown. Later that evening, we went to the library. The main street was empty. With the exception of a few lights on, the street was dark. We made our way to the side door and I tried my key. It didn’t work. It was stuck in the keyhole. Simon tried to budge it, but it wouldn’t move. He took my hand and we ran to the other door and he opened that door with a credit card and elbow grease.

We were in. I put the book in the stacks. I moved some other books around so that it would be noticed the next morning and we went through the side door. The key I tried opening the side door with fell to the ground. We went our separate ways without more than a few words and a few moments of laughter. The next day, I received a phone call from my mother. She asked me if I had seen the social media post regarding the overdue library book. She told me that two people were caught on camera breaking into the library. She told me one of the people looked like me and the other one looked like Simon. I told her I didn’t see the post. She asked me if I had fun breaking into the library. She said she saw the library book in the trunk of my car and put it in my suitcase when I went to college. She hoped someday I would realize that sometimes life doesn’t always go according to plan. She knew finding a ten year old overdue library book would unravel my world. She said she thought I would find it much sooner. She told me Simon had called her earlier and asked for my number. She said he would be calling later and she said not to put him on a list.