So Many Books

So Many Books

By

Ted Harrison

        He reached for the door knob, but jerked his hand back. The bite of the sleet and freezing rain hit his knuckles like an electric shock. He remembered when he had been run off from here twice before. The dark green door was lit up by a brass lamp hanging from the arched doorway. Light, but no warmth. Rubbing the stinging fingers on his poncho, he knocked on the door and stepped back down the three steps onto the sidewalk. Waited.

        The plastic poncho crackled when he moved. Adding to that the sounds of the December storm he made a lot of noise even standing still. He could remember three years ago when he was starting quarterback playing in weather almost this bad. He love it then. Tonight it was so very different. 

        If he wasn’t doing this for his Gran, he wouldn’t be standing here freezing. Outside of a place where he knew he wasn’t welcome. And if he hadn’t forgotten to get this chore done sooner it wouldn’t be late. He started to knock again, but the door opened. He couldn't help it. His mouth dropped. A red-haired boy no older than he was stood in the doorway.

        “Ir’s okay,” the other kid said over his shoulder to someone inside, then he turned back.

“I got these books to return to the library.” He thrust the paper bag toward the red-haired boy, who made no move to take them. So he stepped up closer to the open door. Wiping the rain off the bag with his arm, he couldn’t help but think that he was standing in the sleet and rain while the other boy was warm and dry.

“ My name’s Andrew Poole. My Gran works for a white lady over on Hamilton Street and Gran promised to return the books for the lady. My Gran gave them to me and I forgot to turn them in…” He thought he was babbling. “The white lady would have brought them back, but she’s sick.” Why the hell did he need to tell this white boy all of this? He goes to his high school. I go to mine. Never seen him before. I'll likely never see him again. I don’t owe him the time of day.

The red-haired boy took the bag. This time he was the one to attempt to dry the parcel with his arm.

He looked again at the boy in the doorway thinking that this was as close he had come in a long while to a white boy close to his own age. Could they ever go to the same school? Maybe they would graduate before anything like that happened.  His Gran said she’d never live to see it no matter what the Court said. “They may be Judges, but they’re not the ones that’ll go to the school house,” she had said.

Standing in the freezing December rain a year and seven months after the Supreme Court Decision on school desegregation, he doubted any likelihood that he and the boy in the doorway might go to school together. His feeling was backed up by the story his Gran told about her battle to be able to vote.

“You wanna come in?” the red-haired boy said.

“Nah. I’m wet.” He moved back down to the sidewalk. “Besides…”He jerked his head toward the Shell Service Station across the street. “I’m gonna bed down at work. I work for Mr Overby. Tonight I’m sleeping over until my shift tomorrow.”

“Oh...Okay.” The red-haired boy stammered. “I’ll check these books in.” He looked down at the books and Andrew pulled his poncho a little closer to wrad off the sleet.

“We’ve got a lot of books that came in. I’ll go ahead an shelf these before we close” His words weren’t necessary and Andrew shifted his feet. He knew the two of them were separated by more than just the steps outside the library.

“I go to Carver. I guess you go to the new high school. Central.” Andrew was still running off at the mouth. He cussed himself. Damn! Just let him take the books. When he looked up the sleet stuck needles into his face. Serves me right he thought.  

The two of them stood for a few more moments that could have been longer than either wanted to allow. The other boy lifted the books as accepting a gift. Andrew felt some unseen force that bound and divided the pair at the same time. Neither said another word.

Andrew backpedaled through the downpour across the street and into the service station office. When he looked back the other door was closed and the light turned off.  The heater here in the office warmed his body and he looked at his little room in the back of the station. He could spend the night here again because he had to do an oil change first thing in the morning. Mr. Overby let him do work on the cars he just could ‘t pump gas or wipe windshields out front. Overby said that would hurt his business.

In the room he kept some books on hand for times like this when he slept over. He had a little table for his desk so he could study and a good lamp. The sleet and rain rattled the window above his bunk, but he was warm. It was too late to call his Gran and tell her that he had gotten the books delivered. That could be done tomorrow after he got ott work.

  He picked up one of the volumes and looked inside the back cover where the library card and date due slip were glued. Large black letters DISCARD were stamped on the endpapers. The printing blocked out the fact that the book had seen its most useful days at the library across the street from where he sat. The WHITE public library. Just like always his library had to wait for the leftovers.

Andrew thought of the world of books more than just the library across the street. That world just had to be open to him. Maybe not now, but when?

“It’s more than just school,” his Gran had said. He knew one reason the books he turned in were overdue. Gran had stayed up late at night to read them. Andrew had read them, too.

For now he had the one at hand. Adjusting the light he figured he could read a little before going to sleep.

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