Half-Moon Hollow’s literary outlets were limited to an ailing Waldenbooks and the library. How could there be a bookstore in this town that I was unaware of? Of course, this place didn’t look as if it was a member of the local chamber of commerce.
Sure that I was about to enter a cleverly disguised adult bookstore, I pushed the door open. An old cowbell tinkled above the door as I walked in. It was an Ali Baba’s cave of literary treasures, their cracked spines winking out at my superhuman eyes through the incredibly bad lighting. I loved old books as much as the next bibliophile, but these were crumbling, suffering. I wandered the shelves, running my fingers over the spines. The shop offered everything from sixteenth -century manuscripts hand-copied by monks to old Tales from the Crypt comics, but finding either on purpose would be a small miracle.
Hanks of herbs hanging from the ceiling, candles of all colors and shapes, and scattered crystal geodes only added to the air of committed disorganization. There was no effort to let the customer know what subjects were located where. Plus, there didn ’t appear to be a division of subjects, anyway. Books on astral projection were mixed in with books on herb gardening. Books on postdeath tax issues were mixed in with guides on the proper care and feeding of Yeti.
I picked up an orange soft-cover book, titled The Idiot’s Guide to Vampirism.
“It is official. Vampires are now uncool,” I muttered to no one, as there didn’t appear to be anyone else in the building.
I shuffled through the books. There were some useful selections, but it took a keen eye to find them.
Werewolves: A Vampire’s Best Friend or Foe?
A Compendium of Self-Defense Spells.
From Fangs to Fairy Folk: Unusual Creatures of Midwestern North America.
50 Ways to Add Variety to Your Undead Diet.
Living with the Dead: How to Happily Occupy a Haunted House.
And perhaps the most bizarre title: Tuesdays with Morrie.
I was so engrossed in my task, I didn’t detect the presence over my shoulder that asked, “Oh, hello, what are you doing?”
I turned to see a skinny old man, wizened to the point of cuteness. He was dressed in a gray cardigan with skipped buttons and brown corduroy pants held up with a black leather belt and bright red suspenders. There was a Mont Blanc pen stuck behind his ear, practically lost in the frizzled gray nest of hair. A pair of bifocals, repaired with white tape and a paper clip, sat perched on his balding crown.
I looked down and saw I was balancing stacks of books in my hands. I hadn’t even realized that I’d spent about a half hour sorting the books by fiction, nonfiction, author, then subject. It was as if I were in some sort of alphabetically induced trance.
I dropped the books to the floor. “I’m so sorry. I’m a complete freak. I used to work at the library, and it—it just drives me crazy to see books so out of order.”
“It’s a pretty habit. There are more shelves in the back, you know.” He grinned. Following Gabriel’s advice, I cast out my senses, feeling for anything out of the ordinary. There was nothing. He was 100 -percent human, just a funny old man who loved weird stuff.
“I must be the rudest customer you’ve ever had,” I moaned, shelving the books.
He chuckled. “No, that would be Edwina Myers, a horrible woman who tries to close me down every few years. Claims I’m a bad influence. Though whom I’m influencing I have no idea.” He nodded to the empty store.
“I’ve lived in the Hollow for my whole life. How did I not know about this place?” I asked.
“Well, I don’t advertise in the Yellow Pages. And there’s a limited interest in occult books in the Hollow. We don’t have walk-in business. I like to think of the store as one of those mystical places you pass right by unless you already know it’s there.”
“But I found it.”
“Yes, you did. Gilbert Wainwright, by the way,” he said, extending his hand.
“Jane Jameson.” I reached out to shake it, then shrieked as my fingers brushed the silver band he wore around his middle finger. I yowled, and my fangs extended. A defense mechanism, I suppose, kind of like cursing when you touch a hot iron. I drew back my hand and watched the dirty gray streak across my palm fade away.
“How interesting,” he said, his voice tinged with awe as he stared at his ring. “It’s still thrilling to meet one of your kind, you know. The Great Coming Out was a dream come true for me. As a boy, I used to pretend I was a vampire hunter on a mission to kill Dracula. Or I would pretend I was the vampire, stalking the foggy streets of London for a tasty lady of ill repute.”
“You must have had a very interesting childhood,” I said, suppressing a smirk.
I don’t think he heard me, because he continued, “It came as absolutely no surprise to me that vampires lived among us, so to speak. I’ve devoted my entire life to studying the paranormal. Ghosts, demons, the living dead, the undead, were-creatures. I’ve always found it all fascinating. But still, it gives me a zing whenever I see that.” He nodded at my healing palm.
“Gave me a zing, too,” I said, my fangs snagging my lip when I smiled.
He took a moment to get the joke and laughed uproariously. “Yes, yes, in the future, I suppose it would be more polite to offer vampires my left hand.”
“Or you could take the ring off,” I suggested.
“Oh, no,” he said, absently stroking the worn band. “I never take it off.”
“OK, then. Not cryptic at all.” I chuckled. “You have an interesting selection here, Mr. Wainwright. How much of this was added after the Coming Out?”
He gave me a curious look.
“You had books on vampire diets and after-death tax issues before you knew for sure that we existed? ” I asked. He nodded. “Do you have any books on ancient vampire laws? Because I’m pretty sure I’m getting hosed on a murder rap.”
“Actually, no, but I can probably find something if you give me a few days,” Mr. Wainright said, apparently unimpressed by my mentioning the murder thing. This made me wonder about his clientele. “So much of my business is handled online now, I just don’t have time to keep things up here at the store.”
“You sell online?”
“Eighty percent of my sales are online. My Web site registers fifty thousand hits per month.” A smirk lifted the wrinkles at his mouth. “Loyal customers and eBay are enough to keep me going. Just last week, I sent three volumes on were -monkeys to Sri Lanka.”
“Were-monkeys?” I repeated, unsure if he was joking.
Obviously upset by my lack of familiarity with were-monkeys, Mr. Wainwright gave me a copy of A Geographical Study of Were-Creatures. He explained that he became familiar with the more exotic weres while he served in World War II. After that, he continued to pursue his interests abroad. There are some things you just can’t study in the Hollow. He’d returned home thirty years earlier to tend to his ailing mother, who had died only the previous year.
I scanned the shop. It had so much potential. And now, with the emerging vampire population, there was an emerging market. And I’d be able to work around books again. The schedule would be flexible, and the boss seemed to understand, nay, embrace, my special needs. Sure, there wouldn’t be a lot of kids in an occult bookshop, but you can’t ask for everything.
“I don’t suppose you’d be looking for a shop assistant, would you? ” I asked. “I could box and ship orders, do some shelving, maybe a little light cleaning. I could start off part-time, night hours, obviously, on a trial basis to see whether it works out.”
Mr. Wainwright chewed his lip thoughtfully and patted his pockets. It looked as if he was searching for his glasses, which were perched on top of his head. I plucked them from his crown and pressed them gently into his hands. He smiled.
“I’ve worked in the public library for six years. I have a master’s in library science. I have experience helping people finding the right books for their needs.”
“It sounds like you might be overqualified, dear.”
“I’m not, really. I just want to work around books again.”
At the rear of the store, a bookcase collapsed, sending several leather-bound books skittering across the floor. He lifted a scraggly white eyebrow. “Perhaps you could start off with some reorganization,” he said, looking at the neat stacks of books I’d arranged around us. “You seem to have a steady hand at that.”
I had learned my lesson from Greenfield Studios, so we sat down to discuss schedules, pay scale, distribution of responsibilities, and the fact that at some point, he was going to want to see a copy of my résumé. I left the shop feeling considerably lighter than before. I believe happy people call this emotion hope.
I got as far as the parking lot before I ducked my head back through the door, thanked my new boss, and said, “Mr.
Wainwright, do me a favor, if you meet a woman named Ruthie Early, don’t marry her.”
I emerged from my first night shift at Specialty Books covered in dirt and suffering several injuries that would have probably resulted in tetanus before I was turned. But I was happier than I ’d been in weeks. It was like being given a glimpse into my life before my firing.
My first order of business was cleaning. I chased several generations of spiders from the storage closet with a very large broom. I scrubbed the windows until you could actually see outside. (I remained undecided about whether that was a good thing.) I hauled away the broken shelves and organized the stock into piles by subject. I had not found Mr. Wainwright ’s office or computer, but I did find what could have been a blueberry muffin petrifying in the back of the cash -register drawer. Also a small vial of dirt, a mummified paw of some sort, a pack of Bazooka, and currency issued by twelve governments, three of which had collapsed.
And at the end of the day, you could not tell I’d done anything. But still, Mr. Wainwright was thrilled to have that paw back.
He’d been looking for it for twelve years.