Chapter 51: If a Stack of Books Falls in an Empty Bookstore, Who Has to Pick it Up?
Rounding the corner, the group found a hall with a shocking number of hairdressers. Four different ones to be exact. Vivian paused and made her way to the side of the hall to get out of everyone way.
"Right well, this is new" said Vivian
"Um is there supposed to be four of them" said Lily
"Nope, there was only two before and I can't rightfully remember which one the bookstore is behind" said Vivian
"It's that one" said Sylvie pointing towards the hairdressers in the back right of the hall. It was past a few other shops and the furthest hairdresser from the group.
"Um, how do you know Sylvie" said Lily
"Vivian said this is new, but only two of them. The two on the left are much newer than the ones of the right and the other one on the left is stuck between two other shops. The one at the back has another hallway if you look closely" said Sylvie. Lily and Vivian looked at Sylvie surprised, while Kat simply nodded and focused on looking for the hallway she'd mentioned.
*Yup, I can see it there just past the hairdressers. It's actually pretty noticeable now that I'm looking.* Thought Kat as she patted Sylvie on the head for her hard work.
The hallway behind the hairdressers was a well-lit service entrance with a large fire door at the end and lights all across the ceiling. Despite this it still felt dingy, the wall was stacked stone bricks without a covering and the ceiling had a number of pipes running across it near the lights. Towards the back of the hallway right next to the door stood an open shop front with books that almost spilled into the hallway. It seemed that the owner had taken care to keep the fire doors unobstructed, but this resulted in a number of precarious stacks of books lining the stores edge
"Ah, yes just like I remember it" said Vivian beaming.
"Wait this is normal for this store?" said Kat
"Yup its been like this for years, at least a decade I think" said Vivian
"What were you looking for last time" said Kat
"Second-hand textbooks for my university degree" said Vivian
Walking into the store they found a young clerk manning the counter. He was reading an unmarked book and simply waved to acknowledge the groups presence in the store without removing his eyes from the page. Kat found herself a bit wary of the strange stacks of books, her newfound appendages threatened to topple many of them if she turned to quickly or in the wrong way.
*Even the tunnels under Minor's place weren't this bad. How do you expect self-respecting demons to fit in here. Plus, why are all the books in stacks? How do you tell half of these apart?* Lily however had other thoughts as she seemed to glide through the stacks of books like they weren't there at all. Vivian showed similar grace and while it was not to the same graceful extent as Lily, Vivian was more than able to hop from pile to pile as she inspected books. Sylvie was simply small enough that she had room to spare and wandered the store with ease.
*It's just me? Am I the one who's crazy? Surely normal people struggle with this right?* And Kat was right, the piles were stacked in such a way as to challenge people who enter, they were never intended to stand for long, a gimmick the owner had come up with after finding a number of compelling books by accident, but Kat didn't know this.
Kat let her eyes scan the store in order to limit the amount of movement she'd have to do. What she saw however further reinforced that she had no idea what she was doing. The books in any one pile didn't seem connected to each other and were just as likely to contain a school textbook as a fantasy novel. Despite this the stacks did seem to be group together somehow; adjacent stacks seemed to have the same types of mixed literature.
For example if one stack contained a few business textbooks spread throughout the stack it was almost certain that its neighbours had the same. This continued with fantasy or sci-fi books as well, sticking in their clusters despite the muddled piles. There were a few other books that Kat saw no connection between, but simply assumed there must be something connecting them, as she was no bookworm.
It was just after Kat had finally made some sense of the filing system the shop employed that she spotted Lily. Now this wasn't strange, but it was her hands Kat noticed. They trembled as she hovered between books. Without Kat's new eyes she might not have noticed the difference but there was no excitement in Lily's movements, only hesitation. Lily looked like if she chose the wrong book her arm would be taken instead.
Lily would be so close to placing her hand on a book a number of times before pulling back and shying away. Kat made her way over to her friend, being extremely careful not to topple any of the stacks. Kat stood right next to Lily, clearly within eyeline but she didn't react.
"Hey" said Kat softly. Lily jumped half a metre into the air and spun around, coming awfully close to toppling a few of the nearby books in the process before staring at Kat like a dear in headlights.
"Is everything alright" said Kat.
"Y-yes, everything… is fine" said Lily swallowing
"Lily, you can talk to me about anything you know that right?" said Kat. Lily nodded to Kat but kept her mouth closed.
"Really, I won't hold it against you, no matter what you say" said Kat
"I… I don't know what I'm doing" said Lily finding the dust on the floor fascinating all of a sudden.
"I'm afraid you are going to have to be a bit more specific than that" said Kat
"I, don't know what to do now" said Lily
"Well, right now you need to tell me what's wrong" said Kat firmly
"I just, I don't know what to do with myself now that I've finished school" said Lily
"I don't see how that could cause you to make such a face, surely that can't be all" said Kat
"It's complicated" said Lily
"I'm sure it is" said Kat
"I meant to tell you, I did" said Lily sighing "I'd been putting it off for weeks, I probably should have included this in the birthday note, but I just couldn't. I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do Kat"
"I don't see how that would offend me" said Kat
"Well, I just… I'd planned to go to university, I think. But I can't figure out what to do, and I felt like I had to go. I was hoping to use this as a chance to learn some new things and get away from my parents" said Lily stammering "And look I know that's horrible to say, I mean you didn't have that chance and I'm running away from it. Then all this demon stuff happened and I mean, this has just been so much more important, and like I came here…
"I came here to look for as many old textbooks as I could the cheap ones and just read them all so that I could find anything at all that I wanted to do, but I can't help but feel that I'm making a horrible mistake" said Lily
Kat brought Lily into a hug, careful not to automatically wrap her tail around Lily. *I can't be seen moving that, and I don't think I want to use my aura here. Lily needs to deal with this herself, or at least ask for help without prompting.*
"I think that's perfectly reasonable Lily. Your parents haven't been terribly nice, but I think going off to university is an admirable idea" said Kat
"But I don't really want to go" said Lily "Its an excuse. I wanted to be away from my parents, and I think for some reason I thought you'd be with me. I doubt that will be the case now" said Lily
"Hey, I can still come with you. I have no idea what I'm supposed to do with myself. Apparently, I'm being payed every time I get summoned. Once I awakened, they said, but now look, still not a cent to my name" said Kat
"I know, I just… I think I'd lose something if I went. If I decided to commit myself to a course that I hated just to get away" said Lily crying into Kat's shoulder
"Why not take a year off? Maybe work at the library or something" said Kat
"Hahaha" laughed Lily between sniffles "I… I hadn't even considered that. My parents seemed to expect me to go, the guidance council didn't even recommend it. I certainly never thought of it" Lily tightened her grip on Kat "I shouldn't have needed to hear that from you. I should have figured it out myself. But thank you Kat. Really, thank you" said Lily as she tried to crush Kat's bones with a hug. Luckily for Kat, hers had been improved since and was able to comfortably embrace her wounded friend.
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