chapter 1 preview

It was the sound in between a trumpet and a dying horse. In intervals. Their repeated calls beckoned for me to one simple thing. And that was to wake up.

I resist because I often feel like there is little difference to getting up now and getting up later. Was it going to make a difference? We don’t get much business, seeing how the emergence of the latest giant bookstores has stolen all the customers. No one really comes anymore.

But my duty stands firm. I had signed a clear contract some four years ago, stating that I will pledge to dedicate my time and energy for the bookstore, arriving to the store early to set up and staying late to clean up. Such a pledge was signed and agreed with the vision of a growing movement to readership, and a store hustling and bustling with customers. For people who search for rare books for interest or for research. I saw men and women, boys and girls, coming to the store to ask for books about Aztec Indians, apple picking, ant farms and asparagus. And it would be my glorious duty to direct them to our collection. Our collection, fierce and relentless.

Its ferocity was defanged by the coming of large corporation bookstores.
The alarm clock screamed. I couldn’t bear it anymore and turned it off. 7:30. I got out of bed.

As I headed to the washroom outside my room, I couldn’t hear my parents downstairs. I guess that they are already gone. My parents are early risers, and would usually be out of the house by then. Gray walls stare at me. I stare back.

I let myself starve this morning because I had let myself sleep more. 7:45. The bus normally stops by my house at 7:51, which meant I had a bit of time to turn on the television. I put on clothes and left the door.

I was greeted by wetness. The skies were gray as well. It rained hard and I didn’t find the weather channel in time to tell me that it was raining. My sweatshirt began to soak up rain as I fumbled in my pockets for keys. My wallet was in the way. I reached in my right jean pocket to find it empty. I must have left my keys in the house and locked myself in the house. I checked my watch. It also wasn’t there. It was turning to be a good start of the day, but I walked down the steps of my house and went to the side door, hoping that it was carelessly left unlocked. I pulled the handle but it wouldn’t give. It felt like my six minutes were almost up, so I was left to decide whether it was important to even get an umbrella by now. Sweatshirt soaked to the skin, my hair began to mat against my head. I shrugged and ran to the bus shelter covering.

“You’re soaking wet, Roger.”
“Morning to you too, Eileen.” Eileen was a lady that takes the same morning bus as me. I’ve seen her almost every day for the past four years. But I’m not much of a talker and neither was she, so it’s not like we’ve become best friends. But Eileen works in some big company downtown and takes the bus all the way to the subway. Of course, she was always dressed professionally. Today she was in a black dress suit with a long gray raincoat over it. She was not soaking wet. In fact, water beaded and fell effortlessly over her gray raincoat. Did she pick this raincoat to match with the sky? I didn’t ask her.

“I forgot to check the weather on the news, and then I forgot my keys in the house.”
She laughed. The bus came and we went on the bus.

My bookstore is located in a small mall. It’s more of a local mall, with many apartments and condominiums across from it. So the mall serves a large population, but some of the apartments are quite old, and I’m pretty sure down the street is an old folks home. The people shopping around the mall end up being old people or immigrants. So the problem with a lot of our customers is either they can’t see the words or they can’t understand words. Our collection of foreign books is actually sparse. As I walked through the mall I realized that my clothes were still quite wet, and I hoped that I had an extra sweater or something left at the back of the bookstore. My jeans were wet too but there was nothing I could do about that.

BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS was the name of our bookstore. I’m the one in charge of opening up the bookstore. My separate bookstore keys were in my backpack, so that I would never leave those keys at home. I turned the key into the glass panel locks and slid them into the slot. I flicked the switches to give life to the white fluorescent tubes in the ceiling. There was no denying that the bookstore was a mess. It takes a seasoned employee like me to know the location of a book. If a customer tried to find something, it may take them an hour. But it would take me seconds. So our book organization may need some work. It’s because some of our books have been here since the beginning of this bookstore, but no one has bought those books. And as we received newer books, they would take places around the older ones and eventually get buried. I had always tried to think of a clever way to organize the books but couldn’t figure out the best way. Is alphabetical the best way?

Mornings always start slow. After flicking on the lights, turning on the computer at the cashier and the back room, set up was more or less done. Every other Friday new books are sent in. Apart from some sweeping and organizing, my main job is then to stand there and hold the fort. Mornings are slow because there aren’t really that many people up this early. Seniors.

I made it a goal to reach 1000 wins on Freecell. The mornings give me a good chance to get a head start on it. Right now I have 572 wins. It takes hard work and perseverance to achieve this goal.

The morning went on with no customers for two hours until my boss showed up. Engle Tannenbaum is the owner of the store and generally shows up at around 10:30. It’s his store, so he shows up whenever he wants. He usually shows up without fatigue in his eyes, and his large gut protruded from his pants looking satisfied with itself. I suspect that he has a big breakfast each morning after sleeping plenty.
“Hey Engle. Quiet morning so far,” I said.

“Yeah, I can tell. It’s because I’m not here yet.” I admit that Engle did have a knack for livening up the store. He has a bit of charm that can entice customers to stay for conversation. Engle says that building relationships are the best way to bring in customers. I personally didn’t think so. I think prices are the best way to entice customers. People will always have reading needs, and as I mentioned will always need a good book at some point. Good prices will draw customers to buy our books. If we had bad prices, no one will buy our books.

But Engle says build relationships. I don’t usually do that.
I surrendered my place at the cashier while Engle took its place. I headed to the back to sort books. I got 11 wins and 4 losses in Freecell. It was good but not amazing. As I left the counter, Engle sneered.

“Freecell again. What if a customer sees this? I don’t want to see you and your ridiculous goal.”
“Comon, it helps with the quiet times.”
“There are no quiet times, you’re hired to do work here.”

I was reminded about my duty again, and headed to the back without protest. Before I closed the door behind me, I heard Engle’s boisterous European voice greeting people coming into the store. Coming into the store.

The back room was even messier than the front, as there was a multitude books stacked all over the tables and floors. My job is to sort them into categories and then alphabetize them by author. But there are a lot of books. I usually do this for one or two hours until lunch. Steinbeck, Steele, Stepanak.

The food court today was quiet. I ordered a beef fried rice from the Oriental Food Court, like I usually order. There isn’t much selection in this mall, so I’ve narrowed it down to a number of selections, and I would generally rotate every so often. Today was beef fried rice. I watched at the table in front of me as Engle ate and talked loudly with other store owners. A third employee named Kyle would come at noon to watch the store, so that I could have lunch. Sometimes Engle would watch the store during my lunch, but usually he would much rather come out to talk with his friends and let Kyle watch the store himself. I guess Kyle eats lunch before he gets here. The rest of the day runs a lot smoother with Kyle, because I would have someone to talk to. The three of us would each have someone to talk to. Myself with Kyle and Engle with customers. And Kyle. Kyle’s only worked at the store for a year, but he is good at what he does. Having known him for this year, we’ve also become friends instead of coworkers. We would talk about things other than books at the bookstore. At the end of the work day, we would leave together and I would wave goodbye to him while he gets inside his car and I walk to the bus stop to go home. But I ate in silence while Engle talked about the latest going ons of the bookstore and compared stories with his owner friends. I think employees just aren’t privy to this knowledge. He never tells me any of these stories. Of course I see most of the stories happen, but not everything. I don’t have access to everything at the bookstore, even though I’ve worked here for four years. But what little knowledge that I didn’t know about the bookstore, I would sometimes hear about it here in the cafeteria when Engle shares stories with his friends. But they aren’t always here, and when they are here, I sometimes get the feeling that they aren’t fully open about stories because people can hear them. God knows what they say when people aren’t there to hear them.

I finish my lunch quickly and head back to the store. Kyle is already there attending to some customers. I waved at him but he didn’t look up while he was cashing someone through. The customers were an older couple buying what I would call “junkie fiction”. Fiction written not for its art but its plot easily crafted through conventionally attractive themes. Such as violence, mystery, sex. But otherwise serve no purpose. But junkie fiction keeps the bookstore afloat. As the couple took their books and left, I chatted with Kyle.

“How was the morning Roger?”
“Nothing much. How was your night?”
“Quiet. Stayed home.”
“Of course. Work day next day right? Save it for the weekend.”
“Yeah sure.”

I headed back to the back room while Kyle stayed in the front. The rest of the afternoon usually involves a bit of book sorting until a wave of customers start to come in. When that happens, Kyle and I take turns addressing customers and manning the cashier. Around this time, Engle strolls back into the store to talk with customers. Usually he wasn’t talking about books. He would be talking about anything but books. I think Kyle agrees with Engle’s idea of building relationships with customers. Sometimes he talks to customers about things too. Things that have nothing to do with books. Usually I sort books and watch and listen. Most of the time there is laughing, because Kyle is a humorous guy.

By 5 my day would be done. Kyle and Engle stay back for a few more hours before they close up shop. I never really knew why we don’t all just start at the same time and leave at the same time.

The mall is still quiet at 5. I walk through the foyers looking at other struggling businesses like ours. Comic book stores. Light fixtures. Out-dated cell phone accessories. Dollar stores. Sometimes there are good buys but usually there aren’t. I feel sorry for them sometimes and buy something that I know is of lower quality and higher price than I can buy elsewhere. But I want to support them as much as I want to support the bookstore.

The rain has stopped now, which is good news for my sweatshirt which has dried after I changed back into it for the ride home. I don’t usually see Eileen. She tends to work late. When I reach my door I remember that I didn’t have my keys so I pressed the doorbell, hoping my parents would be back by now. Mom opens the door. “Did you forget your keys again?”

“Yeah I was in a rush,” I replied.
“I noticed. The TV was still on when I got home,”
I wasn’t tired but I plopped myself on the couch like I was. My mom and I don’t talk much. We watched the news in silence and commented on outrageous events. Mom makes dinner when the news is over and I sit there flipping through channels for sitcoms to watch.
“Amy is coming this weekend,”
“Oh. What’s the occasion?”
“Nothing, she just wanted to spend time with the family. And Nathan wants to get to know the family.”

Nathan was my younger sister’s husband. She married two years ago and moved to the suburbs with him. Very occasionally they would come into town to visit. Because of that, our exposure to Nathan wasn’t high. I still don’t really know what kind of a person he is, but I haven’t seen what Amy loved about him. He seemed like a very average guy. But Amy wasn’t average. Amy was pretty and smart and popular among her friends. I am five years older than her but she easily knows more people than me, because of her charm. I could see everything that people would like about her.
Often it seems like their marriage is on the rocks, though it’s only been two years. Mom would report during dinner of their latest struggles. A lot of times the issues appear menial and easily worked through, but their fights are consistent, which leads us to worry. And sometimes we would laugh about it with the security that she is not here to listen.

Whenever they do come to visit, I suspect that there is an ulterior motive. Are they out of money or out of love? What are they replenishing here? My parents accept them positively, because they manage to keep their conflict hidden during our family dinners. Days before they come here, I get a building sense of dread in my heart for the dinner, from not knowing what to expect and wary of high emotional fluctuations that may occur. Amy, being an emotional being, would often start the mishaps. Amy and Nathan would talk about something but Amy would find some way to complain about Nathan. Then Nathan would get defensive and blame her back. Then it would escalate, and we would watch them snap at each other. Mom would fight to change the topic, but it does not always work because Amy would say “Don’t change the topic!”

What I know of Nathan is little. I know that he works at an engineering firm having something to do with solar panels. So Nathan is an environmentalist. He would do some outlandish thing to save energy and save the environment. Having been their home, it is apparent that he applies those principles there. Sometimes that is a subject of argument for Amy because it causes her inconveniences. Judging from that, I believe Nathan does his job well. He gives off the impression that he is both smart and detail-oriented. But other than that, I know very little about Nathan. We haven’t talked much.

Dinner was almost ready when Dad came home. He said hi to me and proceeded to the kitchen to chat with Mom. Dad works as a manager in a large engineering company. Maybe that’s why he likes Nathan. They would often chat about things that I don’t understand for long periods of time when he is here to visit. Maybe Nathan is closest with Dad in the family. I heard him go upstairs to change. Mom called me for dinner. It was beef fried rice.

I tasted the repeated irony. It was luckily better than this morning’s version. More flavour and sauce. I ate in silence as my mom and dad chatted about the dealings of the world. News and politics. Dad darted a glance at me but I was looking at my food.
“How’s the bookstore, son?”
“it’s alright. Quiet day today.” Pause.
“Have you found something else yet?”
“No I haven’t, Dad. I like it there.”
“You don’t do anything there. You sort books.”
“I run a bookstore. A business.” I felt the heat build in my chest.
“You can’t sort books for the rest of your life.”

I flipped rice over itself with my spoon. Swirls of rice at the center of the plate. Little bits of beef and peas climbed up the ridge of the hill and rolled gently inside the vortex. I smooth the mountainside with the back of my spoon and then flipped it over. I put some in my mouth. I could feel my mom’s glaring eyes touch me for about a second and then leave. Dad sighed loudly. The rest of the dinner was in silence.

My room has four large bookshelves, which hold an elaborate book collection. Sometimes after dinner I would read a book. Or I would watch TV or a movie. Or write in my notebook.