An Imperfect Librarian - Elizabeth Murphy [63]
Folio is more comfortable on the warm hardwood floors in the living room than on the ceramic tile in the porch. She likes it when, every so often, I lean forward in the rocking chair to rub her belly with my foot. After two glasses of wine, and forty pages of Alice in Wonderland, I don’t feel like rubbing anymore. I close my eyes again and hope that Norah will soon arrive. There are no sounds except for the woodstove’s fan and Folio’s snoring. I stop rocking and rest my feet against her warm stomach. She jerks up suddenly and digs her teeth into her fur to chase fleas then barks and runs along the hardwood floor to the porch door.
Norah said she’d be back around nine o’clock. It’s only seven. I run my fingers through my hair and tuck my shirt into my trousers. I open the door but there’s no sign of Norah. I call the dogs. They crowd into the porch around their food and water. I leave the three of them behind the porch door then go up to the peak. I can smell her scent off the blankets. I prop myself up with pillows and pick a book from the pile on her bedside table: Using Images To Improve Your Memory: 100 Mnemonic Techniques. I return the book to the pile and close my eyes. There’s no commotion in any corridor, no gurgling sounds of flushing toilets from a room above me, not a peep from the wind – nothing but a faint whisper of lazy waves trickling through beach rocks before they’re swallowed up by the ocean. I count the seconds between ebb and flood. I fight to stay conscious, like someone treading to stay afloat. It’s cold but I’m too tired to get out of bed to close the window.
When I wake later, Norah’s naked body is lying next to me. The moonlight shines in through the window and off her hair. I shiver, then curl up against her warm body. She turns round and kisses me. I reach one arm under her neck and the other around her waist to draw her close to me. Outside, the wind is forcing the snow to fall horizontally. There are no stars to watch through the star-lights. I draw the blankets over our heads and take shelter in her desire.
It’s almost early morning before I fall asleep again. As usual, Norah is up before me. She operates on the dogs’ schedule and they’re up at sunrise. I go downstairs in my bare feet. “Bacon and eggs? Can I help with the cooking?”
“You must be tired after a long trip,” she says. “Let the dogs out then have a seat.”
Octavo and Quarto go outside. Folio smells my clothes then my pocket. I leave her in the porch. Before we eat, I show Norah the Jabberwocky and other Poems by Carroll that I bought for her in Norway. “I didn’t know if you had it in your collection already. I would have bought you something more expensive or–”
“It’s the thought that counts. Thank you. Jabberwocky and I have a long history.”
I sit at the table while she fills my plate with strips of bacon. I go to the counter for a napkin. When Norah’s not looking, I slide a few strips inside it then poke it in my pocket.
“You’d be surprised how many people have never heard of Jabberwocky,” she says as she takes off her apron and sits at the table with her back to the porch door. “Sometimes they know it’s a famous nonsense poem. I’m impressed if they can recite ‘’Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe.’”
“There’s a movie by that name isn’t there?”
“That’s Jumanji, not Jabberwocky.” She passes me the salt and pepper. “In third or fourth grade, I promised some kids I’d give them five dollars if they could tell me what Jabberwocky was. That was a fortune in those days. When they couldn’t, I said, ‘You’ll never be any good except to fish.’ Some of them cried. Their parents warned them not to play with me. They’d chant rhymes about me: ‘Yer fadder’s a queer, yer mudder’s a whore and you’re the runt yer parents bore.’ I invented my own rhymes: ‘Burn your books and rot your brain. Leave the school, learn