I will tell a story.

Not mine.
Not others.

Somebody else's in another time and another world.

This is the story of a boy who just turned 17, and have lost both of his parents the year ago, where he was at the top of his life and school then his parents happen to die, where he gave almost everything up, where he was reminded that he has a lot going on yet.

Marcus brought down the book with a thud.  He hadn't expected any of this at all.  Since a year ago, he can pretty much read about anything and it came into his mind in a river. Something happened to him when he was down in the gutter... a year ago.

Back in the real world, the library was abandoned as always except for a lady librarian who's wearing a pair of thick-framed glasses and reading a book entitled "The Zone of Midnight" by some foreign author.  Probably the book itself was foreign.

Marcus skipped school today. He did the same every week.  He needed to calm down even until now. He went mad, he thought, that he must hit a wall with his head and somehow the doctors forgot to put one screw back on. He wasn't the kind that skipped school for the fun of it and meet some shady guy in some shady place and puncture his skin in some shady sewer.

No, he was at the top of his life, the top of youth... a year ago.

A snap from somewhere brought him back to earth. He looked up to the shelves and rows of books.

"Sorry... I'm just... Erm... Sorry."

It was a small girl.  No, a girl with a hoodie on.  No, a girl with a hoodie on her face and shorts.  She has quite a look on her face... as if she just ran a few hundred miles before this. Where did she come from? Had he not notice when she came in?  There was only one exit. He stopped staring.  At least, not practically.

"Erm... I'll just leave then," she said even when she was sliding away.

Then she stopped and turn back to him.

"You got something in your eyes. Whatever it is, try not to fall that steeply. Even if you do, get yourself back up," she said and get back to her running.

He blinked, clearly puzzled.  What's in his eyes?

As he did so, a tear rolled down from his eyes to his nose bridge. Oh.

He wasn't going to cry.  For that matter, he always thought of just crying out loud there and then but for some reason, he doesn't think a library was a good place to do that. Besides, he would disturb the lady librarian. He looked at her big black-framed sunglasses. She looked as though that face belongs to a sister somewhere he had and hadn't. He decided not to think about family.

He looked at the book on the table in front of him. Quite a thick one.  With a legend on that makes someone thinks it was some serious book about some serious thing.  Well, it's not.  Actually, it was a storybook.  The kind with no pictures at all.  The author's name emboldened in gold on the spine of the book and the title was black against the red-dusty surface.  Somehow, he had pick that one out of all the other books.  He didn't have any idea what he was going to read but he picked one up randomly.

He picked it up, went to the nearest shelf and put it back.

He read it... somewhere long ago. He hadn't forgotten what it was and what it meant to him. He hadn't forgotten the characters name and the villains and the beasts that somehow seemed so real in his mind eyes. He didn't forget that it was he himself that bought the original.  He had a smile on every time then.

After setting it on back, he got out of the rows of books and decided to get out, back home, probably. He was hungry and there was no mother back there to cook for him.  Nor a father that would feed him when he says he was hungry.  The lady next door would give him tons of food and he was reluctant at first but then, he would need them sooner or later. He's not a little boy anymore.

As he passed the counter, he read a stuffed sniffle beside him. He looked up.

The lady librarian was tearing up in her eyes. There was a soft gurgle somewhere in her throat.

"What's wrong?" he asked unconsciously.

The lady looked up from her book, surprised to even see someone there. Of course, it was midday afternoon and work hours are rolling by fast.  There ought not to be somebody there. But the lady looked quite pleased to see that someone was there.

"Oh. I thought there was nobody here," she said with a cute voice. Probably not old, not young either. She wiped the tears with her long sleeve.

"I've been here until a while ago. Did someone die?" he asked.  His mouth wasn't working anymore on what he wants.  Why did he ask that?

The lady looked shocked for a moment. Then, she shook her head. Her glasses went everywhere.

"No, that's not it. It's just this book. I know the author. She was a close friend of mine and... she's a long way now. I miss her," she said with a longing look at the book.  The author's name was kind of blurred like she had cried on it and slept on it for too long.

"Oh, sorry. I just thought that someone you love died," he said.  His mouth was still not working properly.

"No, it's okay," she said. "I lost someone I loved back. But she left me a gift that reminds me of her everyday. I thought she wouldn't want to see me crying and sad. So, I stopped. I still think of her everyday but I think she's in a far better place than me now. She was a really good friend. And before that, I had another one of my beloved died. He was my lover. Funny that he always thought of me as a strong little girl even when he's actually a lot stronger than I am. He... left a gift too."

With that, she touched her glasses. The tears are back in her eyes. He thought that must've been done unconsciously.

Silence rolled in.  Even the lady librarian was quiet. The library wasn't big but it's big enough to fill the silence that was building up.

"Don't worry," he suddenly said. Damn mouth.

"I won't," she tried to smile.

"There's always someone there to replace them,"

"Yes, I believe that too."

Marcus took another look in her big blue eyes.  Surely, he had seen her somewhere in his life.  He decided not to ask though. He smiled and went to the exit.

Somehow, he wasn't as sad as ten minutes ago.

He realized that he doesn't even know her name.

-to be continued

Her name is...... probably you would know if you look clearly enough.