A Waltz of Words
By: Michelle Muses
Tags: Books, Relationships, Fiction, Travel, Short Story

The day her mother left, Hazel wrung herself around her mother’s legs and cried. “Please don’t leave me. Please.”

Her mother gently untangled herself, leaning on to her steel suitcase for support. She pulled the gnarled knob of the rosewood cabinet and found what she wanted in the messy key-strewn drawer.

She cocked her head up and winked at her eight-year-old daughter.

“Let me show you something.”

Her mother’s skirt swished gently at her ankles as she made her way towards the staircase. She moved like water, flowing in graceful arcs.

They pattered up the staircase, not stopping till they reached the attic. Hazel never knew what was in the attic, and she never asked.

Her mother fumbled with the keys and flung open the door.

The attic was huge. The air was stifling like a clenched fist, and musty with the smell of dogeared books. Rows of redwood burl bookshelves, powdered with dust, housed a vast collection of books — everything from children’s paperbacks to psychology tomes.

Hazel stepped gingerly into the room, feeling the dust tickle her nose. Her bare feet crunched loose sheets of paper that laid scattered over the parquet floor.

And that was where she was left, surrounded by a legacy of books, and cradling the hope of seeing her mother again. Her mother packed and left for a few weeks each time she was hit. But she always came back, with new books and toys for Hazel.

After her mother left, Hazel spent countless days in the attic, travelling to faraway realms and seeking solace in books.

When darkness swept into the room, she would jump to her feet, startled by the swift passing of time, and let the book in her hands collapse at her feet. She would feel the dull ache in her chest as she wound down the stairs, yearning to envelop her mother’s soft neck and inhale her familiar musky scent.

Her mother always came back. But not this time.

At the public library, located in the suburbs and nestled between sleepy retail stores, sixteen-year-old Hazel works as a part-time librarian. She would do anything to stay out of the house. Since her mother’s departure, things have never been the same. She dreads going home to an eerie silence punctured only by her father’s attempts at small talk, and she loathes her father for what he did.

On a rainy Sunday morning, the library is so empty that Hazel can hear the thunder echoing through. Two librarians are out sick, so Hazel is the only staff in the library today. Behind the counter, she bends down, trying to yank open a stuck drawer, when a deep voice shatters the silence.

“Excuse me?”

Startled, she jerks up abruptly and finds herself looking straight into the blue eyes of a guy with tousled auburn hair and long sideburns.

He runs his hands through his auburn hair and droplets of rain run down his arm. “Uh, I’m sorry. May I know where’s the computer area? I need to use a computer.”

She slides the sign-in form across the counter. In a backhand scrawl, he prints his name, “Brandon”. He fills in the rest of the details and thanks her. From the corner of her eye, she can see his silhouette curving up the spiral staircase to the second floor.

Around noon, the rain shows no sign of abating. Hazel, having completed her morning’s work, goes over to the “New Books” shelf and casts her eyes over the books.

She runs her fingers down the taut spines, pausing when she reaches a book in the middle of the row. Ah, this one. She pulls the book out and feels the glossy cover slide over her cold palms. The book flutters open with a gentle crack and the pages are deliciously crisp.

Her long brown hair spills over the pages. As she finishes the first chapter, she sees the moving of a shadow across the olive tiles. Brandon. She has no idea how long he has been watching her. He puts up his hand to wave goodbye and slips out the glass doors.

Brandon keeps coming to the library over the next few days. He always has something to do — use the computer, borrow books, return books. He talks to Hazel, who just nods in response. One day, he asks Hazel to show him where a book is. At the W section, in between musty shelves, he asks her out.

Their first date is at a bar downtown. Hazel does not talk. Brandon is fine with it. He seems happy to chatter on and let her listen. She learns that he is a year older than her and works as a retail assistant while training to be a professional dancer.

“My mother is a dancer,” Hazel blurts out, one of the first few lines to come out of her dry mouth, and watches as Brandon brims with excitement.

Her heart lurches. She wonders why she said “is”. She has no idea where her mother is, and what she is doing now.

Later that night, he sends her home in his family’s rundown car. He turns to her as they reach her front gate. “You stay here? And it’s just you and your dad?”

“Yeah,” she says, and leaves it there. She thinks about her father’s big, heavy steps echoing through the hollow house. She thinks about the dinners spent chewing through the stillness in the air. She thinks about how she came back from school one day to see the family photos wiped off the mantelpiece, and feeling shards of glass needling into her foot, jolting her to harsh reality.