[Izulde]

I've never been able to sleep for very long in hotel beds - even when they pass for average. So it's no surprise when I'm at 6 am to greet the dawn (4 am in my old time zone). I stumble down to the modest breakfast bar of coffee, juice, day-old doughnuts, and oatmeal packets.

Too much work for oatmeal, so coffee and doughnut it is. Neither one tastes like anything. Fuel for the body and brain is all.

And then it's off five blocks north. A weatherbeaten, white sign made dingy grey by the last winter and neglect, informs me that this is Main Street Used Bookstore. So much for originality. Maybe I'll have to change the name.

My key thankfully works, though the lock is a bit stubborn before yielding. When I step inside, I'm enveloped in that smell of must and dust so common to old books. I'm not surprised to see hand-written signs in an array of colored marker designating sections. Industry standard in a business that has profit margins more slender than a heroin addict. Why am I doing this again?

The warped wood floors creak with every step as I wander around aimlessly. There's probably asbestos waiting to kill me. Oh well. I'm staring at a pile of World War 2 books that are haphazardly stacked on the floor due to bursting shelves when the bell tinkles overhead with someone opening the door.

It's a tiny woman with electric socket shocked white hair and a face writ with wrinkles.

"Hello! You must be the new owner! I'm Matilda Swan, though you can call me Mattie. Are you open yet?"

"Um, I guess?" No sense in turning down a potential customer.

"Wonderful!" She moves with surprising speed towards one of the sections, "A girl can't go without her romances, you know. Especially with my poor Harold in the ground 17 years and the unmarried men in this town thinking you're too old for sex. Not true, of course. But maybe that's too much for me to say."

"No, you're good."

Another beaming smile as she rummages through, as I see when I get within the prescribed six feet of her, paperbacks whose spines are mostly tattered as the presumed bodices on the covers.

"I'm so glad you've come to our little town. We've been losing a lot of people, you know. Hard times for everyone. And Jeff was so happy to be free of this place so he could move down to Florida. Disney is the best, he'd always say."

Indeed, the insanity of my predecessor is now portraying itself on the walls as I spot far too many images of America's most famous mouse. "Eeyore is better. I don't know why everyone likes Mickey so much."

"Should I get you some thistles then, Mr... ?"

"Besserdich. Barry Besserdich. My father loved alliteration."

"I don't know what that is, but good for him. I like it when people have repeating initials. It's so fun! And your girlfriend or wife can refer to your man part as a BB gun."

"..."

She turns at my silence, holding a few books in her hand, "Oh! I'm sorry! There I go again with my big mouth."

"It's all right. What did Mr... err.. Jeff charge for paperbacks?"

"A dollar fifty or 4 for $5 usually. I've got four here."

"Okay, let's just do that for now. If prices change after I review the books, the financial ones I mean, I'll let you know."

"Thank you, Mr. Besserdich! Or would you rather I call you Barry?"

"Barry's fine."

An Abe Lincoln in my hand later, the smell of lavender is in my nostrils and filling the shop. I'm once again alone. I stare at the Mickey Mouse prints on the walls. No idea why, but they irritate me to the point of wanting to tear them down. Why didn't Jeff take the damn things with him?

I spend the next hour carefully removing the prints. Maybe I can sell them. No other customers in that time frame, nor throughout the rest of the day. I get the feeling this wasn't a well-patronized place. Small wonder Jeff sold it so cheaply and ran off to A Small World.

Shoot. I should have asked Mattie if she knew anything about Nichole, if that's her name. Too late now.

Over the ensuing days, I work on straightening and organizing the current inventory, periodically studying the finances. Just as I anticipated, business was virtually nonexistent. Worse yet, as I find out in an unpleasant conversation I don't want to to rehash, there's a monthly rent and utilities obligation I have to make. Great. Now what?

On the bright side, because I don't have any animals, I'm able to quickly move out of the hotel and into the small apartment above the bookstore. This, too, has a rent of course, but it's much cheaper than the weekly rates. From one apartment to another. A house seems so far off.

Hell, just making enough money to survive - let alone be one of those modestly successful small businessmen - seems remote. I do get a few customers - mainly summer tourists' housewives who want to read while their husbands go fishing and the kids play outside or inside on their phones. I'm already quickly determining that the Romances section is nowhere near big enough and should be one of the largest parts of my inventory.

So much to do.

And then, two weeks later, just as I'm starting to get into a rhythm, the bell chimes normally when it should have tolled ominously.

Because that's the visit that comes to change everything.