Submitted to The Europe Challenge 2024: Writing Competition

How a Library Changed My Life.

May 2024.

The Book Club

The book club met the last Thursday of the month, 7:30 to 8:30pm in Blessington Library. Sheila was running late. Not that it mattered, as Sheila wasn’t officially a member of the book club.

The ladies were already seated in a corner of the library. Sheila pretended to browse before slipping a random book off the shelf and heading for the study area closest to them. She took out her notebook and flicked to where she had made notes on “Beartown” by Fredrik Backman.

The ‘leader’ of the book club, Reenie, was calling the group to order, peering out over her reading glasses waving her copy of Beartown back and forth.

The ladies settled, reading glasses were donned, Kindles fired up and notebooks were slapped down on the low coffee table to the centre.  Sheila noted, as usual, that one woman, who might be ‘Laura’, had a well-thumbed book decorated with many colourful sticky notes. She would give anything to read the notes on those stickies.

“Did we all finish the book?” Reenie began.

Two of the women shook their heads.

“No, I just cannot read about sport, sorry” said one of the Kindle ladies (Susan?)

Sheila looked down at her notebook… ‘not about sport’ was her first bullet point.

“Pity” Reenie said “as it really wasn’t about sport. How many did read it?”

All the other women raised their hands.

“What would we say it was about?” Reenie asked.

“It’s about toxic male pack-mentality and how that inevitably gives boys a false sense of entitlement and authority over women” said Glenda or ‘Goodreads’ as Sheila called her as she always spouted opinions she’d clearly garnered from that review site. Sheila suspected that Goodreads never actually read the books.

“Ok” Reenie said “Anyone else? Any other themes emerging?”

Carol was up next. She always had the most considered opinions. Perhaps a little superior in tone. Sheila enjoyed listening to her take on characters, plot, sub-plot, genre. She took her time, waited until the others had said their piece and then she’d pick up her copy of the book, never a Kindle, and gently flick through the pages while delivering her verdict.

“The game of life” Carol said, pausing and looking around at the group nodding to herself until everyone else was nodding with her, Sheila included.

“This is most definitely a book about sport, the sport of everyday struggles, wins, losses highs and lows. It doesn’t matter if it’s a hockey team, a declining community, a migrant mother and son – it’s about teams, how they behave, how they ultimately deal with their wins and losses.”

Sheila, forgetting herself, stared at Carol as she broke down the novel for them, told them how they should have interpreted it, how they wished they had.

Next month’s book was ‘The Spinning Heart’ by Donal Ryan. Sheila hung back to order it but as she made her way to the Librarian’s desk, something caught her eye – bright and fluorescent under the coffee table. She used her stick and dragged Laura’s copy of Beartown out. There were at least fifteen sticky notes marking different pages. Sheila had longed to see what notes Laura had made on previous books, but these notes on Beartown were not at all what she had expected.

Sheila heard the door opening behind her. She dropped the book into her handbag and started writing a shopping list in her notebook. Laura walked around the table and peered underneath. Finally, her search over, Laura sighed. Sheila looked up from her notebook and their eyes met.

“Hello”. Laura said.

“Oh.” Sheila answered, blushed and returned to her list.

Meetings

Sheila had been ‘attending’ the book club for nearly a year. She had seen the poster in the library and had considered joining up. She imagined what it would be like – having a date in the calendar by which to read the book. She would be expected to have opinions and to share them, to look people in the eye. Sheila practised on her cat, Lois.

“I really liked this book because…”

Lois padded her paws into Sheila’s generous middle and purred.

 “Why yes, I was particularly taken with that prose style Lois. It was quite original”

Lois pressed her furry cheek to Sheila’s and meowed gently in her ear. 

If the library corner was full of agreeable cats, then Sheila would have no problem. People. People were the problem, and that calendar date would taunt Sheila for an entire month. There was no point joining if one hour a month was going to worry her into a state of paralysis.

Sheila never removed the date from her calendar and on the appointed night, a reminder pinged her half an hour beforehand and she found herself saying goodbye to Lois and heading out.

That first night, they had been discussing ‘The Bee Sting’. Sheila sat close by and soaked it all up. She noted the next book pick and found herself back at the study area the following month and the month after that until she changed the calendar entry to ‘repeat on the last Thursday of the month; indefinitely’.

Sheila started seeing the club members around the village. She saw Goodreads in the grocery store with two toddlers in one of those special trolleys. Goodreads was struggling to keep them in check and get her bags of vegetables weighed. Sheila wondered how she ever found the time to read even the reviews. In her bubble of toddler, Goodreads dropped a bag of carrots into her trolley, but she hadn’t put the price sticker on the bag. That would be a problem for her at the till. Sheila tore the sticker from the machine and tagged the carrots when Goodreads was distracted. One less battle for her today.

After the carrot incident, Sheila found herself spotting book club members all over the village. She had let Carol out of a side road, just waved her through when she saw her perfectly poised behind the wheel of her Audi. She was probably listening to Lyric and considering the latest book. Sheila switched to Lyric too.

She had seen Laura collecting a little boy from the Primary School.  One time, Sheila followed them. They went to the library and sat together working on his homework.

Every time Sheila settled down to read that month’s book, she thought of those women – all of them travelling together in this new story.

A Lost Boy and a Strange Woman

Theo was the boy’s name. Sheila met him in the village outside the phone shop sometime after Beartown. He was alone and based on how he was looking around and wringing his hands, Sheila decided that he had lost his mother on the way to the library.

“Hello there, have you lost your mam?” Sheila asked.

Theo looked suspiciously at Sheila’s stick.

“Were you on the way to the library?”

The boy looked over to the shop window and nodded.

“We were with Juliet. My mam and her mam were talking. I only stopped for a minute.”

“I’m Sheila and I know your mam – Laura, from the book club. Let’s get you to the library.”

“I’m Theo.” the boy said as they moved off.

“Lovely to meet you Theo. What class are you in?” Sheila asked.

“I’m in second class. I have Miss Gaynor. She’s nice but I preferred Mr. O’Hara. He used to let us go out to the yard all the time to move”.

“He sounds like fun. Does Miss Gaynor give you lots of homework?”

“Yes, especially Irish and I’m not good at that.”

Sheila and Theo were nearly at the turn for the library.

“What about English?” Sheila asked.

“Oh yes, it’s my favourite.” Theo said.

“Theo!”

Sheila looked up expecting to see Laura but to her surprise it was Carol.

“Where on earth have you been?” she said tugging on Theo’s arm and giving Sheila the once over.

“Granny, I’m sorry I was looking in the window…”

“Your mother is worried sick; she’s gone back to the school to look for you.” Carol said as she led Theo to the library steps. Theo stopped and looked back at Sheila who was still leaning on her stick at the corner.

“For goodness’ sake Theo, you know not to talk to strangers” Carol said as they disappeared into the library.

We meet again.

Sheila worked mornings on reception in the veterinary hospital.

In the period between Beartown and The Spinning Heart, the practice had a visit from a class in the local primary school. Michael, the Vet, would regularly give the children a talk about safety – don’t give the dogs chocolate, keep your cats in at Halloween. This day it was the turn of Ms. Gaynor’s second class.

“Hello again. Remember me?” Theo said, appearing at Sheila’s desk.

“Well hello there. Yes of course, I remember you Theo.” Sheila said.

“I’m sorry about my Granny, she was very cross. She made us go home early. I told her you’re not a stranger; you’re mummy’s friend. Do you work here? What’s it like?”

Sheila was still processing Theo’s updates and questions and trying to pull the treat jar back from a determined child.

“That’s not for humans young lady. Yes, I do work here, it’s wonderful – you get to meet all sorts of animals. I met my best friend here, her name is Lois and she’s a cat.”

“Your best friend is a cat?” Theo asked. “That’s sad”

Michael appeared in reception and corralled the children.

Sheila and Theo stared at each other until he finally edged away from her desk and joined his class.

Sheila found that her right hand was still wrestling the treat jar away from the girl.

“Oh, have one if you must.” She said and the girl grabbed a handful of dog treats and stuffed them in her pocket.

Sad. That was a new one.

The Deal

Sheila needed to return Laura’s book to the library to avoid a fine. She removed all the stickies and put them in her handbag. She made her way past the librarian’s desk to the machines. As she was setting up, she heard a familiar voice behind her at the desk. It was Laura. Sheila froze.

“Can I help you?” the librarian asked.

“I’d like to get an audiobook but I’m having a problem.” Laura said.

“Of course, what book is it?”

“It’s The Spinning Heart by Donal Ryan”

The librarian took Laura’s tablet and started tapping.

“That looks like it’s worked now. Sometimes it can be a bit temperamental” the librarian said, handing the tablet back.

“I’ve reserved the book too, I think you might have it for me?” Laura said.

The librarian pushed a few books back and forth on a trolley and handed the book to Laura.

“You’re all set” she said.

Sheila hoped that Laura would leave but she didn’t, she found herself a comfortable chair and settled in.

Sheila scanned the first book she was returning; the machine beeped encouragingly. She slid Beartown onto the scanner – it did not beep. She dragged it back across the scanner. The screen was now displaying a series of dots and then -ALARM- -ALARM-  ‘Please proceed to the librarian’ appeared. Sheila looked around, both the librarian and Laura were staring at her.

“I’ll take that here” the librarian said.

Sheila picked up her bag and moved towards the librarian, shielding the book from Laura who was still watching her. In her haste, Sheila had forgotten her stick and halfway to the librarian’s desk she stopped and looked back at it. “Oh dear” she said.

“Allow me” she heard as Laura stood up from her seat and recovered the stick. As she turned to hand it to Sheila, she stopped and stared at the book in Sheila’s shaking hand. Sheila stumbled towards the librarian’s desk where she just saved herself from falling over. Laura was still staring at Beartown alongside the contents of Sheila’s bag which had fallen to the floor. Those fluorescent stickies really did stand out against that pale blue carpet.

Laura picked the book up and then then the stickies. Sheila’s heart was pounding against her chest. Laura glared at her.

“Now where is that book that caused all this trouble?” the Librarian asked, smiling at the two women.

Laura put the stickies into her back pocket handed the book to the Librarian.

“It’s that book that I reported lost. My friend found it and we thought she could just return it using the machine but looks like you’ll need to manually check it in for me.” Laura said.

“Oh that’s good news. I knew it would show up. I’ll get it checked in. Thanks!” the Librarian nodded to Sheila.

“Let’s go” Laura said, and Sheila had no option but to follow her out of the Library as Laura still had her handbag.

“Would you like to explain?” Laura asked as Sheila caught up with her.

Sheila did not want to explain. She wanted to grab her handbag, get into her car and head home to Lois.

“You took my book after the last book club. You saw me come back and look for it and you said nothing. You kept it and the stickies” Laura stared at Sheila, arms crossed.

There was no question that Sheila could discern so she continued to stare at Laura.

“I know you. You think we don’t notice you every month sitting beside our book club, watching us, listening. You told my son we were friends.  What do you have to say?”

“You can’t read.” Sheila said.

Laura stepped back as if Sheila had stuck her, a red plume working its way up her neck.

“Excuse me?” she managed.

“You bring Theo here after school to do homework so that your mother-in-law won’t realise that you’re struggling. She lives with you, right? You order the audio book of all the book club picks and the physical book. You can’t manage the ordering, so you get the Librarian to do it for you. You listen to the book and bring the physical one to the club decorated with fluorescent stickies covered in scribbles.”

Laura turned away from Sheila and slid the handbag to the ground. Sheila reached down for it slowly as her words floated between them.

“I can teach you” Sheila found herself saying.

“I don’t work afternoons; you could come to my house or I could meet you here. Maybe you have some of Theo’s old books. We could start with them”.

Still Laura didn’t turn around.

“I only told Theo that I was your friend so that he’d come with me to the library. I thought that if he knew we were friends, he’d be ok about walking with me. I didn’t mean any harm. He’s a lovely boy.” 

“He’s passed me by now” Laura said, turning around.

“I was able to keep up for the first few years. I even learnt a bit along with him. Recently, he’s gone ahead of me. I knew Carol would realise if she heard me doing his homework. I thought she was on to me a while ago.”

“That’s why you joined the book club. You were able to talk to her about the books thanks to the audio versions.”

“Yes. I thought I was so clever. I even started adding my little notes to pages. She never looked too closely, she’s really only interested in her own opinions. I’m not stupid.”

“Oh goodness of course you’re not”. Sheila said. “But you need some help”.

“As do you” Laura answered.

“The only reason I took the book that night was because I couldn’t bear the thought of having to talk to you. I know that sounds crazy but there you have it. I love listening to you all and I love knowing that we’re all reading the same story during the month, sitting in our beds, living in those same worlds together with those characters for a while. Do you know what I mean?” Sheila asked.

“I do.” Laura said “… and I think we can help each other.”

Sheila wasn’t entirely sure what Laura meant but she felt lighter although she couldn’t say why.

Lessons

Sheila and Laura booked the library meeting room from 1:30 to 2:30 three days a week. On the other two days, Laura met Sheila at her house after school. Sheila helped Theo with his homework while Laura did her work in another room.

After homework, Theo played with Lois who seemed happy to have a new friend.

“So I’ll see you this evening?” Laura asked as she helped Theo into his coat one Thursday afternoon.

Sheila stared blankly.

“The Spinning Heart? Tonight.”

Sheila had completely lost track of the days with the new routine.

“I’m not sure” Sheila started.

“You’ll be there. That’s the deal Sheila. You help me, I help you.”

Sheila’s heart started drumming in her chest. This was not what she had planned at all. Laura and Theo were wonderful company but there was no way she’d be able to expand that circle.

“Did you ask her?” Theo said to Laura.

“Oh, I forgot. Theo is wondering if maybe any stray cats might be looking for a new home? He just loves Lois. I said I’d ask you” Laura said.

“So that I can have a best friend too.” Theo said.

Spinning Hearts

“Ladies, ladies. Let’s start our meeting, I think everyone is here.” Reenie said, waving The Spinning Heart in the air.

“Well, how did we get on? Who would like to start us off tonight?” she said peering at the members over her reading glasses.

The ladies were not looking at Reenie, they were looking at the lady behind her, leaning on her stick, looking a little lost.

“Oh Sheila!” Laura said, sliding across and patting the seat next to her.

“This is my friend everyone, this is Sheila. She’s joining the club.”