Libraries, Bakeries, and Geriatric Fish

Short Fiction

It was post-winter in the way that Killing Joke is post-punk: It was still frigid and bleak, but some masochist at the Oliver North Public Library put the rusty cart of free books outside the door, a tradition usually reserved for summer.

Someone was gently thumbing through the free selections, which Cliff MacLeish knew to generally be littered with poorly or completely unresearched self-help, 1980’s melodrama that somehow managed to misquote the Bible every other chapter, or epic fantasy that existed solely for the nerdy but muscular male teen hero to copulate with a wood nymph.

The someone absently thumbing through the softcover castoff pablum was Rowan.

Her boots were untied, her skirt had what looked to be a latte stain on it and she seemed to be avoiding something else rather than actually looking for underappreciated nonfiction like Pescatarian Diets and Your Ability to Cope with Premenopausal Stress.

Cliff walked up behind Rowan, because the only way to approach her from the front would have been to enter the library from the door the cart wasn’t blocking, then immediately exit, eschewing the warmth and comfort inside and stand dumbly in front of a pile of pseudo-Christian romance.

Cliff had something rather serious to discuss with Rowan.

“I noticed the bakery is closed.”