Harry Kismet's New Favorite Book

Prompt :: 3000 Words or less about a library



    Joan topped the stairs and entered her son’s room for the 4th time that morning, determined to make sure he finally got his ass out of bed. The thought of interrupting her Saturday morning cleaning one more time to tramp up the stairs irked her. This time he will get up, she thought. He’ll have to. Joan cautiously tapped the door open inch by inch in case he had already risen and began to dress, but she knew what to expect. David was sprawled across his bed, one arm hanging down to the floor with the sheets spread haphazardly across it all.

    Joan made her way across the room, grabbed a corner of the comforter and tugged with all of the might contained in her 5’3” frame. Never underestimate the strength of a hard working house wife. The comforter unraveled David, spinning him over in the bed before he plopped to the ground head first. He was finally awake.

    “Goodness dear. I guess I underestimated my strength. But I am glad you are awake. That paper is due Monday you know. The library will be closed tomorrow and only open for another 3 hours today. Now get dressed and move it.” She felt bad enough about the rude awakening she had given him but without it he would have easily slept late into the afternoon. David may not have been concerned about his grades, especially being so close to graduation, but she had ridden him like a triple crown race horse all through his high school years.

    Joan left her son’s room and headed back downstairs to finish her cleaning. David peeled himself from the floor and started sifting through the piles of clothes on the floor until he found something that was “clean enough”. After a quick freshening up in the bathroom he ran out of his room, slinging a backpack over his shoulder as he flew down the stairs.

    “I’m out mom, catch you later.” David yelled back as he opened and slammed the front door. Pulling his keys from his pocket he made his way across the lawn and perched himself on the two wheeled Honda at the edge of the driveway. Moments later he was backing out and speeding down the street.

    The Kismet public library was less than 2 miles from his house. Earlier in the week David had made an attempt to find the material for his paper on the internet, but some things just can’t be found outside of crusty old hardbacks. Even though he had driven by it many times, he was not ashamed to tell his friends he had never been inside. He was, however, embarrassed to see that he couldn’t even find the front door. The library was massive, spanning almost an entire city block. All around the building were small arches positioned in-between columns that stretched to the sky and back. After circling the lot a few times he finally spotted a lone door, set back under two sprawling willow trees, concealed by their curtain of branches. David killed the engine and coasted into a spot right near the elusive front door. He leaned to the left off of the bike and swiped his foot across the bottom, propping it up on the kickstand.

    “Some fucking place. Looks big enough to hold every book ever printed.” David muttered to himself. He made his way up the long front walk. When he neared the building he parted the branches of the willow to reveal the door. He reached out for the handle and tugged. For a second the door didn’t budge. He became excited at the prospect of the library being closed. It would be the perfect excuse to ditch the assignment, hop back on his bike and speed over to Bryan’s house to meet up with the rest of his friends. Swimming with some hotties and putting back a few beers seemed like a much better way to spend one of his last weekends in high school.

    But the door only hung for that second before giving way. The antiquated building was just a little rusty. As the door opened he was struck with a wave of moist, pungent air. His mouth and nose filled with the stench as he fought back the urge to puke and sneeze.

    “I’ll just find the book, make a few copies of the pages I need, and head over to Bryan’s house. “

    The foyer was vast and empty. All walls extended miles above his head and were barren except for the one large mural of a familiar man. The plaque beneath the portrait read “Harry Kismet”, the man David’s hometown had been named after. Harry Kismet had first come to the area hundreds of years earlier to build a general store and enough rail line to tie his new city into the transcontinental railroad. The library hadn’t been built for many years after that but Harry had made it his life mission to build the largest library in the country and stock it with every possible volume available to man. His love of good stories was only exceeded by his love of biographies. This made the Kismet library the perfect destination for David’s research.

    As David stood in the foyer mindlessly starting up at the grand mural, an elderly man with his head hung low came through the door behind him and ventured off through the double doors to the left. David, having no idea of where to begin looking for his book, and seeing nobody around to ask, followed the gentleman. On the other side of the doors he found himself in the thick of things. In the center of the room sat a small patch of old wooden reading desks. Each one adorned with a single lamp that struggled to spread its glow to even half of the surface of the desk. The remainder of the space was occupied by gargantuan wooden shelves that also stretched their arms to the heavens. Even at his height David knew he had no chance of reaching even a fraction of the books he could see. Long stretches of bookshelves were planted neatly in perfect rows just as the corn that covered half of the city. The shelves broke here and there with small gaps just wide enough for someone to squeeze through.

    Out of the millions of books, David needed just one, a biography on the life of his great great grandfather. Conrad Dunning’s claim to fame was his discovery of silver deposits at the base of the foothills at the edge of the family property. The book David was looking for might not have even existed, but his grandmother was sure it did, and that it could be found right there in the Kismet library.

    “A fucking needle in a needle stack.” David whispered to himself as his neck craned and swooped around the room, wondering where to begin. He made his way to one of the outer walls and began to walk the length of the shelves, looking for any indication as to how they were organized. As he paced, he drug his finger along the spines of the books, wiping the dust and leaving a trail of cleanliness behind. He stopped and raised his finger to his face, disgusted at the amount of dust that had accumulated so quickly. He puffed his cheeks and blew hard, sending the dust bunnies scurrying about. One particularly large clump caught his attention and he kept eye contact with it until it landed, much further away, on another shelf.

    David turned his head sideways to read the spine of the book nearest the dust clump and was pleasantly surprised to find that he was at least close to the section he needed. The book was named The Life and Death of Sir Jonathan Gladewater. David tilted his head back and looked up at the shelf. He could see that the shelves above were going backwards in alphabetical order but the D’s were too far up to reach. He glanced around and found a rolling ladder in the corner, affixed to the shelves. As he pulled the ladder back to the shelf the wheels squeaked loudly as they rolled. The squeaks echoed throughout the library, sounding much more like a child’s screams than rusty rollers. He parked the ladder in front of his shelf and ascended it, peering through the rungs as he climbed, looking for “Dunning”.

    Beneath him he felt the ladder sway and creak. He glanced down to the ground to see the man he followed gripping the ladder as if to force it out of the way.

    “Hey, watch it old man! I’m hanging by a thread up here.”

    “Yes, I had noticed. I think it’s best if you come back down here and leave the library.”

    “The hell I will. I’m not leaving until I find what I’m looking for.”

    “Suit yourself boy.”

    David watched as man wandered off and took a seat at one of the desks. The man pulled a small notepad from inside his jacket, clicked a pen, and began writing. Every few words he would pause to look up at David.

    David turned back to the shelves to continue his search. Using his finger as a guide, he brushed it across many volumes, skimming over Dawson and onto Dunning. There it was: The Life and Death of Conrad Dunning.

    “What the hell?” He thought. “All of these books have the same title?” David pulled the book from the shelf, tucked it under his arm, and placed one foot on the rung beneath him. David glanced back to the shelf as one clean book caught his eye. Amongst all of the decrepit volumes sat one that appeared decades newer. Again he leaned his head and read the title.

    The Life of David Dunning.

    “What the fuuuuuck is this?” David pulled the book from the shelf, almost dropping the one he initially came for. Still perched atop the ladder he thumbed through the book bearing his name, stopping here and there to read excerpts. The book was incredibly accurate, down to the tiniest detail. Long before he reached the end the pages ran out of text. He flipped back a few pages to find the last one bearing words. There was mention of him going to the library to search for a certain book. He focused his eyes on the bottom of the page at the last word written. But it wasn’t the last word for long. He gasped in fear as he watched words being written in his book right before his eyes. David looked around the room in panic and found his eyes fixed upon the man at the table, still looking up at David and writing on his notepad. As the man scribbled, David saw words appearing on the page until they finally stopped and it read: “David Dunning passed away in the Kismet Public library at the age of 18. He had taken a terrible fall from a very high ladder. He was survived only by his mother, Joan Dunning.”

    David didn’t feel himself slip, but he was very much aware of his free fall from the top of the ladder. In those few split seconds he made eye contact with the man at the table. The man’s expression was simple, an evil grin spread wide revealing rows of perfectly white teeth on an all too familiar face. David crashed to the floor, head first. His neck snapped and his skull crushed, sending blood and spinal fluid all over the floor beneath the ladder.

_______________________

    “What happened to the boy?”

    “I told him to forget the book and leave, he was an belligerant young chap. I couldn’t risk him telling others what he had found.”

    “Rightfully so Mr. Kismet, you did the right thing by wrapping up his story early. Shall I put this one back on the shelf?”

    “Not yet. I rather liked the ending. I think I shall read it once more.”