by Jae
“Maybe she’s like me,” Grandma said after listening patiently. “She could be living in a retirement home and wouldn’t have an individual listing.”
Why didn’t I think of this? That’s so simple and obvious. Liz stood and hugged her. “That’s a great idea, thank you. I’ll make some calls tomorrow.”
After Liz had talked to her grandmother, it was embarrassingly easy to find Beth. All it took was a couple of phone calls, and the next thing Liz knew, Beth was inviting her over for coffee. Liz waited to surprise her with the book when they met the next day.
Beth fussed over the flowers Liz brought. “They are so lovely, thank you.” She set them on the perfectly decked table with fragile porcelain cups, plates, and a silver coffee pot. She offered cookies to Liz and winked. “It’s been a long time since a beautiful young woman gave me flowers.”
Was that an innocent comment, or did Beth just out herself? Liz’s gaydar was faulty at the best of times and certainly not tuned to elegant old ladies that resembled her grandma. She decided to ignore it for now and presented the wrapped book to Beth.
“Thank you, dear. That wasn’t necessary.” Beth carefully removed the paper.
Liz just smiled and studied her expression.
Surprise and hope warred on Beth’s face as she looked from the book to Liz and back. She slowly opened the cover and hesitated before checking the pages. Liz could tell the exact moment when Beth found the first note in the margin. A wide smile stretched from one side of her face to the other, and she squeezed her eyes shut, making the wrinkles around her eyes more pronounced. Tears streamed from them, and she sobbed.
Liz hurried to Beth’s side of the table and carefully laid her arm around her shoulders.
Beth returned her hug as she laughed, cried, and thanked her simultaneously.
After Beth had cried herself out, she told her story to Liz. “When I grew up, we didn’t have much money for books. I went to the library each week and went home with as many books as I could carry. I’d read everything that was deemed appropriate for my age and was rereading my favorites when I discovered the comments in this book. At first, I was furious. How could anyone dare to write in a book? In a public library! It just wasn’t done. I planned to report it to the librarians on my next visit. But then I found myself agreeing with the comments. They were witty and reflected exactly what I was thinking. I even thought of clever replies to one or two things and wanted to point out important passages the commenter had overlooked.” Beth chuckled. “The night before my next visit to the library, I wrote my first remark next to the others. I was mortified. What if someone noticed when I returned the book? I would never be allowed to go back to the library.” Beth paused to pour more coffee. She looked pensive as she stirred sugar and cream into it and took a sip.
“And were you found out?” Liz gently prompted.
Beth shook her head. “No, not for a long time. To make a long story short, we wrote to each other for over a year. She, or maybe he, was called JS. We started with our thoughts about the story and the writing, but we soon turned this into a conversation about everything that was important to us.” She played with the tiny silver spoon that looked big in her petite hands. “I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced this, but sometimes being anonymous frees you to admit things you barely allowed yourself to think, let alone say out loud.”
Liz laughed. “Well, that’s the joy of the Internet now. We can reinvent ourselves without looking anyone in the eyes.”
“Exactly. I’ve never had such a close friend since. Well, that’s not strictly true. I’ve had lovers, partners, and we shared intimate conversations, of course. Maybe the first time is just more memorable than the rest. I just wished I could have met her. Or him.”
“What do you think? Was JS female? Didn’t you get clues from the writing?”
Beth thought about that for a minute. “I always thought of JS as a girl my age. We were too similar for her to be someone else, but then JS started flirting with me.” There was that blush from their first meeting again. “Or I with JS, I don’t know who started it. But girls didn’t flirt with girls in the fifties. Or so I thought.” She grinned.
Liz couldn’t help grinning back. “Yeah. It always takes some time to figure that out.” She hesitated to turn the mood, but she wanted to know more. “Why did you stop writing? Because they found out?”
“No, not really. My father was in the army, and we had to move on short notice. I didn’t have time to check out the book again to let JS know, so I risked writing something in the library. I wanted to leave her a message to explain and ask her to write to the post office of the town we moved to. I should have just put a piece of paper in it or something, but I wasn’t thinking straight. The librarian saw me writing in the book and went mad. She screamed at me, and I ran away, leaving the book behind. I was always afraid to go back into that building.” She shook her head. “With my teenage imagination, I thought they had wanted dead or alive for desecrating books signs with my face hung up everywhere.”
It was tragic that their friendship had ended so suddenly. Liz wondered what JS had felt when BL had stopped writing. “Have you ever tried to find her?”
“No, how could I? I knew nothing but the initials.” Beth looked down into her cup. “And to be honest, I nearly stopped thinking about her. At first, it was too painful, and then life took over. I lived on the other side of the country for most of my life.” She tried to drink from her cup, not noticing that it was already empty. “Last year I broke my hip, so I sold my house and moved to a retirement home. Nearly all of my friends had either died or moved closer to their kids, so I decided to return here. When I read about the library sale, it seemed like a sign. I figured with all these wrinkles and white hair, they wouldn’t recognize me now.” She took Liz’s hand. “It was a sign. I’ve met you, and now I have that book again to keep me company.”
Liz hadn’t wanted to promise anything to Beth, but the idea of finding JS lingered in the back of her mind for days. She knew her initials, probable age, and the town where she lived in the fifties. It shouldn’t be impossible to find her. But it was. At least with the tools she had at her disposal at home. She needed to pay the library another visit.
She tried to avoid it because she was hesitant to explain the case of the “desecrated” book. It felt like a betrayal of Beth’s trust. Finally, she made an appointment with the head librarian to see what she could find out. He wasn’t overly enthusiastic and sent her to a colleague in charge of the archive.
Liz went to the main floor in search of Ms. Tome. She bit the inside of her cheek to avoid making jokes about the name that was only too fitting for a librarian. The first staff member she spotted was Jane. Liz jumped on the opportunity to talk to her again.
“Hi, uh, Jane?” Liz hoped she wasn’t making too much of a fool of herself. She always got nervous around women she found attractive.
Jane turned. “Oh, hi. You’re the book finder, Liz, right? I’m sorry, I haven’t seen any elderly customer named Beth yet.”
She remembers who I am! She forced herself to concentrate on the conversation and not to stare into Jane’s dark brown eyes that shone like a well-polished leather cover. “I’ve actually found her. Thank you for keeping a lookout. Now I’m searching for someone else. The head librarian told me that Ms. Tome could help me. Do you know where she is?”
“You’ve just found her. What can I do for you?” Jane smiled.
Liz could imagine a dozen things. Do not go there. You’re here for Beth. “It’s a complicated story that might take a while.”
Jane nodded. “Do you want to go to my office? It doubles as an archive of sorts, but I have enough space for two chairs and a desk.”
Jane walked toward the back of the building, and Liz followed. They stopped to pick up two mugs of coffee from the break room. The
office wasn’t really small, but the walls were higher than wide and completely covered with filing cabinets and bookcases that were nearly twice as tall as Liz. It gave the room a crowded feeling, and Liz immediately loved it. The unique scent of old books, in combination with a little bit of dust, wood polish, and a trace of vanilla smelled like home to Liz. She sat in the comfortable visitor’s chair and sipped her coffee as she told Jane the complete story.
They silently drank their coffees. It was difficult to gauge Jane’s reaction. She smiled at times, and Liz took it as a positive sign, but then she wrinkled her brow in either concentration or displeasure. Sometimes it was much harder to read people than books.
“I fear it will be nearly impossible to find JS after all that time. We haven’t computerized anything before the late eighties. If JS is still registered, we might be lucky. And I’m not sure about giving the contact information to anyone else, but I can contact her if we find her. Or him.” Jane tilted her head and studied her. “What do you hope to gain from that? Do you want to write a book about it or something?”
Liz shook her head. “No, nothing like that. I just have a soft spot for elderly ladies that remind me of my grandma.” She tried to ease the tension with a joke. “And I might be a hopeless romantic, always searching for a happy ending.”
It seemed to work. Jane started to laugh. “Okay, let’s start with the current records first. What year of birth are we guessing?”
Liz relaxed into the chair. “Beth was fifteen in 1952 when they wrote to each other. I suppose JS was around the same age. Let’s have a look at anyone born before 1940. Beth mentioned that JS was born during the summer. She’d complained that no one came to her party because it was during summer vacation. She must have lived relatively close because she came every week.”
Jane opened a program on her computer and clicked and typed for several minutes. She frowned and hummed with increasing frequency. At last, she looked up and shook her head. “It’s depressing to see how few elderly customers we still have. None of them have matching initials. I even looked at the birth names in case it was a woman who married later. I’m afraid we have to look manually at the files.” She pointed towards the cabinets looming over them. “Going through all the files will take a while, and we have no guarantee that it’s even the right name. If J married and changed her name, the file will be in a new category.”
The task seemed nearly too much. It would take weeks, maybe months to find anything. If they did it, it also meant she would spend weeks or hopefully months in Jane’s company. Liz’s mood brightened. “I’m up for it. I can’t come here every day, because I need my day job to pay my bills, but my schedule is flexible. If you don’t mind, I could come whenever it’s best for you and work my way through the files.”
Jane smiled, and Liz’s heart missed a beat.
“I’d like that. I’ll help when I can. Can we start now?”
Liz had been right. It took them several months working on and off to plow through the “S-files” as they called them. She took time off to visit an auction for a client, but the commission had enabled her to work full-time in the library for a few weeks afterward.
Most days, she worked on her current projects from home for a few hours and then went to the library to work with Jane until her lunch break. In the afternoon, Jane spent her time mainly out of her office but came back to bring her coffee, snacks, and funny anecdotes about the customers. They started to bring each other lunch, and Liz enjoyed their conversations, which ranged from books to movies to politics and always returned to books. She had finally found her match in obscure literary knowledge. She used to bore her girlfriends whenever they discussed literature. Jane, on the other hand, actually seemed to enjoy their talks, rather than just tolerating Liz’s ramblings.
Sometimes, the names in the files reminded one of them of people they used to know or places they used to visit. Over time, they learned each other’s history. Jane told her about the year she worked and studied at the British Library in London, and Liz told her how her love of books had been supported by her grandma since she’d been little. They even found the file of Aunt Jo, who wasn’t really Liz’s aunt, but her grandma’s best friend. Liz couldn’t stop giggling when she found out Jo’s real name was Marjorie.
They talked for hours and flirted subtly. Some days, Liz was sure she imagined it, so she held back because she was afraid it was all wishful thinking. On other days, she was sure she’d interpreted the signals right and basked in the warm glow that Jane’s smile cast over her.
“That’s it. The last one.” Liz put the file carefully on the tall stack on Jane’s desk. She wanted to fling it in the corner of the room instead. Only two files were possible matches in their last batch.
Jane sighed. “Let me put them away, and then we can discuss how to proceed.” She took the files and climbed a few steps up the ladder to gain access to the correct filing cabinet.
Liz allowed herself to eye the legs and perfect figure emphasized by the long narrow skirt. Jane completed the look with a purple-and-green-plaid pantyhose that Liz found incredibly sexy. She always brightened her conservative attire with little details that showed her mischievous side. Liz suppressed a sigh. It might be the last time they saw each other. She shook her head. Don’t be so negative. They were friends now, bordering on more. Even if they didn’t have an excuse to meet several times a week, they would stay in contact. Liz was sure of it. She had only to work up the courage to ask Jane out on a date.
“I have some useful tools to find people on the Internet. Let me try those first.” Liz opened her laptop and started searching. It didn’t take long to come up with some information. “The woman died. That leaves the man, Jim Sedge.”
Jane rested her hands on the back of Liz’s chair and leaned over her shoulder.
The smell of vanilla distracted Liz. She bit her lower lip to keep herself from sighing out loud.
“Oh. I had hoped to talk to all of them. Now we’ll never know for sure. What did you find about him?” Jane spoke much too close to Liz’s ear.
How could she concentrate with that warm breath playing through her hair? “I have… Uh, that tickles… I found someone, I think.” Liz was disappointed when Jane pulled back.
“You think?” Jane walked back to her side of the table and slumped into her chair. Usually, she sat very straight. Now she slouched against the back of her chair.
Liz wrote down the telephone number and slid the paper over the table. “We can’t be sure this information is up to date, but we can at least try.”
As Jane made the call, Liz felt as if she were reading a really bad novel. It didn’t feel real. She was missing something vital. She massaged both temples with her hands. Maybe she was just too tired.
Jane hung up, shook her head, and grimaced. “Humorless old guy. He made a speech about wasting tax dollars with my call. He denies ever writing in a book. Even if it were him, I wouldn’t want Beth to meet him.”
That certainly was anticlimactic. After all the work they had done, they were back where they had begun. “So, that’s it. Maybe it was the woman.”
“Maybe.”
They both stared at the files for a moment. Then Jane looked at Liz with a completely different expression. A smile began in the corner of her mouth.
“Would you like to meet for lunch on the weekend? What are you doing on Sunday?”
Liz gasped. She hadn’t expected Jane to ask the question she was afraid to ask herself. It took her three tries to clear her throat before she could answer. “I’d love to.” Her mind was already making plans for a date when her speeding thoughts came to a crashing halt. “Wait, no, I can’t.”
“Oh, okay. Maybe another time.” Jane’s voice was carefully neutral.
Now she’s thinking you don’t want to go out with her. “It’s just that I promise
d to go to my grandma’s book club.” Liz hesitated. “I know it’s probably not how you planned to spend your only day off, but would you like to join us?”
“Talking about books in my free time? Why would I want to do that?” Jane winked at her and laughed. “If it’s okay with your grandmother, I’d love to go and meet her. You’ve talked so much about her and your aunt Jo that I feel as if I know them already.”
Sunday presented itself with sunshine and perfect spring weather. The members of the book club were happy that most of the other residents went outside and they had the comfortable community area for themselves. Coffee and cake were served, and they were ready for a lengthy interrogation. Liz had underestimated the attraction of a newcomer. The usually placid ladies fired question after question at Jane, which she fielded without missing a beat. Liz tried to intervene but was shushed and told to sit and wait. Jane smiled at her as if to say she shouldn’t worry. So, Liz took a piece of cake and watched the show. Jane didn’t show any signs of uneasiness and even seemed to enjoy the interaction.
“Liz,” Grandma said suddenly. Her voice still held that school-teacher quality, and Liz sat just a little bit straighter. “Tell us what came of your research project you’ve been working on. Did you finally find the person you were looking for?”
Liz looked at Jane, who nodded slightly. Nobody here had met Beth before, but she decided not to mention any names. She explained to the others about the chance meeting, the friendship documented in the book, and their futile search. Everyone was quiet for a change and listened. Without warning, Jo jumped out of her seat and bolted from the room. When she didn’t come back, her grandmother followed Jo. What was that about? Was she sick? Liz wondered if she should follow them. The ladies’ questions drew her back to the conversation, and she finished her tale.
