‘There’s only one other person who checks it out,’ I say quickly before I can lose my nerve. ‘Too Good to Be True, I mean. Can you tell me anything about that person? Anything at all?’
His expression changes, his eyebrows drawing together. He opens his mouth to speak, then closes it. His eyes dart side to side and I can tell he’s suddenly deeply uncomfortable.
Why?
After another second, Mack turns away, returning his intense gaze back to the computer. ‘I’m not allowed to share details about other members,’ he tells me curtly.
‘Of course,’ I sigh, swallowing my disappointment.
He harumphs. ‘But of courseyouthought you were above the rules of the library, like you always do. Always bringing your mates in here and using this place like it’s your home office or something.’
‘Oh, get over yourself!’ I snap, starting to walk away. ‘I just wanted a fellow reader’s name for god’s sake! It’s not the crime of the century.’
He snarls to my retreating back, ‘If he wanted you to know his name, he’d tell you.’
I keep going, but I heard it, my whole body flooding with adrenaline.
He saidhe–his. It’s a he. A him! Something surges through me as I stomp away to the desk area. So itisa man! A man who reads and enjoys romance novels. What if… no. It would be stupid to let myself think…
I pause by the stacks, watching across the room as a handsome guy enters through the automatic entrance doors, heading for the thriller section. Maybe he’s…?
For a moment, I allow myself to drift off into a daydream. What if thishimwrites back? What if itisthat man over there? I study him for a moment and decide against adding him to my fantasy. He’s too good-looking, too muscled. He looks like he spends seven hours a day in the gym. He’s probably only getting a book out to leave beside the weights, to help him pick up women.
No,myfantasy book boyfriend doesn’t care about looks. He’s kind and thoughtful. He laughs generously and is sweetand funny. He loves the same things I do and enjoys early nights with a book. And he would fancy the absolutepantsoff me. He’d look at me under dark eyelashes, watching me with intense longing.
I’ve never really been looked at with longing. Definitely notintenselonging.
Horniness, yes, a few times. But I want what the men do in books! I want them to – I dunno –drinkme in. I want them to desire me and hold me and kiss me from head to toe. I want to be desperatelywanted.
Across the room, Gym Man catches me looking and eyes me critically. He frowns with apparent contempt as he takes me in head to toe and I scuttle away to my writing desk in the corner. I need to stop obsessing over this note writer. He probably won’t even write back, not now I’ve been so full on with my latest message. I have to think about other things. Like work! I need to catch up on some transcribing ahead of another meeting with my mountaineer next week. I have to focus.
But how can I, when this feels strangely like the start of something huge?
PART TWO
Narrator:
Hi!
OK, I’m going to start by apologizing. I can’t believe I began my first ever narrator job earlier by saying… ‘gosh’.
I’m so embarrassed!
Honestly, I’m not even usually a gosh kind of person. It just came out. I don’t want you to judge me or think any less of me. I want us to carry on our professional relationship as narrator and reader without even THINKING about that gosh. Please? Promise me?
Anyway, let’s get down to business.
Gosh, wasn’t all that exciting!
Who is the mystery man writing letters to Jemma? Who is the mystery man Clara ran away from in America? Why are there so many mystery men in their lives? Can’t we have some mystery women? #ImWithHer #YknowHerBeingThatMysteryWoman. Personally, I’m super intrigued by that Anita woman at the library. Like, why does she wear Christmas jumpers all year round? Did something momentous happen in her life that made Christmasimportant to her in some way? Can she not face the rest of the year for some deep, dark reason? #MysteryWoman
For now, let’s return to the aeroplane, where our Jemma is holding that unopened envelope in her hands, ready to finally reveal the identity of her book boyfriend.
I’m zooming in on her now, exactly where we left her earlier, one finger still in the jagged, now-opened edge of the envelope. The women either side of her – the MYSTERY WOMEN, I might add – are still watching on, completely entranced.
And, predictably, Jemma freezes.
‘I can’t,’ she whispers, voice trembling. ‘I’m too scared.’ She stares down at the envelope forlornly.
