The Reading List(15)
Aleisha couldn’t tune out of the conversation, Kyle was so sodding loud.
‘I’m so sorry, sir, I didn’t realize. When was this? Yesterday? Hmm, yes, thank you, sir. Thank you for letting me know. I’ll investigate and see what I can do … Yes, well, if you don’t have a library card, how about I set one up for you today and take the book out for you, and you can return it when you can. That way I’ll make sure my colleagues can’t charge you when it is returned.’
Aleisha hid herself behind the wing of the chair, frozen, ashamed. She pictured the old man from yesterday, standing in front of her, asking for help. She heard her own voice, harsh, telling him that no, she couldn’t be arsed. Aleisha wanted the chair to eat her whole.
The moment Kyle shoved the handset back onto the desk, he jumped up and turned his head on his neck like a meerkat. Searching for something … for her.
Aleisha kept as low as she could. But it was useless, Kyle knew exactly where she was.
‘Hey Kyle, what’s up?’ she said, as he arrived at her side.
‘You were on shift yesterday, right?’ he asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘I’ve just had a lovely elderly gentleman on the phone, rather distressed, to put it lightly, saying you forced him out of the library. Is that true?’ He was putting on his ‘authoritative’ voice. When Thermos wasn’t around, Kyle took it upon himself to step up to the plate.
‘That’s not exactly what happened. He wanted book recommendations. I don’t do book recommendations.’
‘You need to. Do you want this job?’
She didn’t want it, she needed it. She needed to help Aidan out. Leilah was an artist and a designer – usually she worked with ad agencies around the world and often she was swamped with work. But it came in waves. And her income was sometimes irregular, especially when she was going through one of her bad patches. Aleisha couldn’t lose this job. There’d be nothing else to go to. And, for all its faults, this place was becoming her silent retreat from the chaos that was her home, she knew that much.
She nodded.
‘Do you know how many people could work here, how many people actually wanted to work here?’
Aleisha shook her head.
Kyle continued, his chest expanding. ‘Loads, quite frankly. Dev is always saying we need to do our best to keep people happy, provide a friendly place with book recommendations, the full service, otherwise we’ll lose regulars. If you don’t start actually doing your job, you’ll get sacked, or worse, we’ll just get shut down – and we’ll all lose our jobs.’
Aleisha didn’t believe it. It had been so easy to get in. But she really couldn’t lose her job, and she couldn’t face it if she was responsible for the volunteers, Lucy and Benny, losing their favourite place. Or for Kyle, as much as he annoyed her, losing the only place he could ever be bossy and get away with it, and for Dev who would literally do anything to keep the Harrow Road Library up and running. She pictured this cute building with its windows blocked out, a sign from the council on the door directing people to the Civic Centre instead. It wouldn’t be right. Even though they were never completely rammed with customers, people loved this place. She imagined Aidan in her mind, parroting Uncle Jeremy: ‘Do better.’
‘If that man makes a formal complaint about you to Dev, you’re out.’
Aleisha shifted in her seat. ‘Look, I’m actually here for pleasure today not work, so can you save it for—’
‘And it’s pretty horrible being nasty to like an eighty-year-old man. I don’t know what you’re going through, Aleisha,’ Kyle’s tone had softened now, ‘but try to be nice to people. Just a smile or a friendly face can make someone’s day a bit better. You might have ruined his. Was it worth it? Did you feel satisfied?’
Aleisha shook her head again, unable to speak, feeling like a toddler being told off for fighting.
‘Right. If you see him again, give him a blooming book recommendation—’
‘I did try, he ran off!’ Aleisha interjected, but Kyle ignored her, continuing his pre-rehearsed speech.
‘Read some stuff,’ he said, pointing to To Kill a Mockingbird in her hand. ‘If you like that, then tell him to read it. It’s simple. Read a book. Recommend a book. You know what, even if you really hate it, recommend it to him anyway. Everyone has different tastes and beggars can’t be choosers as my nan says.’
Aleisha sighed and watched Kyle strut off back to the desk, feeling like a boss, probably.
She reached for the book again and opened it somewhere in the middle. The spine was broken in so many places, but she wanted to make her own mark on it, and bent it in two. It wasn’t as satisfying as she suspected. The book was soft, supple … the warmth of the library had turned the glue to jelly.
She rewound to the first page. She started to fiddle, with her nose, with the pages, with a few straggly bits of hair that were falling over her face. She couldn’t take in anything. She was forcing her eyes to focus on the words in front of her, but she couldn’t settle.
She was stupid, a fraud. Giving up, slouching back into the fading salmon-pink chair, she surveyed the room. A few people were reading and browsing. They were proper readers, people who belonged here. Bookworms. Book nerds.
‘Ef this,’ she hissed to herself. She gathered up her stuff and shoved it into her tote. The book was still on the table. She didn’t know whether to take it or just leave it there. She glanced around again before shoving that into her tote too.