Excerpt: Presently Untitled

“Excuse me. Excuse me! I’m looking for Jane Eyre. I need a copy for my niece, but I can not seem to find it on your shelves. Honestly, I can’t figure out your organizational system here. Could you just find it for me?”
Lucy answered patiently. I’m helping this customer right now, but if you go into the back room and look to the right, you should see all of the Brontes we have in stock. I’m sure it is there, ma’am.”
“Ma’am? Why did you call me ma’am?” the woman asked.
“I’m sorry ma’am...err....miss...ugh. I’m sorry. I was raised to say that out of respect.”
“Well it’s not respectful. In fact, it’s insulting. So you should stop that.”
“Yes ma...um..well, yes, thank you for that kind advice,” Lucy said, swallowing her pride. She got this response a lot, and had not yet been able to shake it. She was not really sure that she wanted to shake it, quite honestly. It was a sign of respect for her, and for everyone she had ever known before moving to Boston. Why should she change her vernacular for the time she was here? Wasn’t it a part of who she is? Why couldn’t everyone else just get used to that?
“At any rate, I looked right where you told me already, and I can not find it there. What do you suggest I do?”
“I would be glad to help you in just a moment. Feel free to browse until I am done here,” Lucy replied.
The woman walked off. But Lucy could feel her glaring back in her direction every now and then. Lucy would look up, when she sensed it, and every time, the woman was there...trying to pressure her into leaving her other customers. She tried not to care. Lucy looked back to her customer. It was one of her favorite regulars, Mr. Collins.
“I’m sorry about that Mr. Collins. Is there anything else I can help you with this afternoon?” She had been helping him look for a philosophy book, and had finally found one that he was excited about.
“No, sweetheart. You have done just fine today. This will be all,” he replied.
“I’ll put this on your tab,” she said smiling.
 “You’re a doll,” he said bowing his head.
His ‘tab’ was a code word that he never asked about and she never explained. His tab was billed straight to Lucy. She added it up at the end of the week and put it on her debit card. Mr. Collins, as she lovingly referred to him, was not well off. In fact, the clothes he wore and the mild odor he carried told everyone he was homeless. He was like no other homeless person Lucy had ever met. He was brilliant, not ignorant. He was not rude or pushy-- in fact he was friendlier than most people that came in her store. She’d had long and meaningful conversations with him on many occasions that he came into the store.
“When can I see a draft?” she asked him.
“When I have one, you’ll be the first to read it. And I am going to count on you for trustworthy editorial feedback.” he replied, winking at her.
He was writing a life philosophy. His own life philosophy. And she could not wait to read it. He was her philosopher, and she was quite sure that his writings would be fundamental to her own life philosophy. She had encouraged him to start writing it. He always shared his wisdom with her when he came to the shop, and she thought others should benefit from it too. It was always a different kind of perspective than she was used to...but it was so valuable. Mr. Collins was not how you would picture a homeless man if one was described to you. He was educated, for one. He graduated from high school and college. He had taught in Boston Public Schools for years before he was asked to leave over some confusing accusations that he had never figured out. It seemed as though they had come out of nowhere, and he was not sure whether it was a student or a fellow teacher that had perpetrated them. He was asked to pack up and leave. He could not pay rent and could not find a job. He was not allowed around the children that he had dedicated his life to teaching. He was kicked out of his apartment when he got too far behind on his rent, and had no choice, he said, than to live on the street. She secretly questioned his statement that he had “no choice.” She felt that somewhere inside of him he wanted to abandon all of that which he had known, and that the streets were a comforting change. She felt this...but she couldn’t ever ask him, as she felt it would insult him. She worried about him, but he seemed really happy, so she couldn’t suggest other alternatives. Any way, he was now quite happy to be working on his book. She supplied him with paper and a pen, and he was coming in occasionally to find other philosophy books to use as models for his own...not that he would share their philosophies, but that they were models for the kind of books he did not want to write: rigid, boring, and impersonal. Mr. Collins was all but impersonal. He loved his friends. He cared so much about people. It was probably that caring spirit and conviction about everyone’s worth had cost him his job and his reputation. He worked so hard for his students. He had stayed after school to help them with their work. He had built completely new curriculums around their special needs. He had fought for them at the school board, when their electives were taken away in place of more “academic” class time. Mr. Collins believed that life’s worth was found in his interactions with people, and he wanted his philosophy to display that.
“When am I a going to see a draft of your book,” he asked Lucy.
“Oh.” she blushed. “You know I haven’t started any book yet, sir.”
“I know you haven’t,” he followed, “but I’m still waiting for it.” He turned and walked out the door, slipping on the new wool coat she’d found for him.
He was such a meaningful part of her new life in Boston. Back home everyone in the town was some one she could talk to. Here in Boston she had a hard time connection, a hard time understanding the cultural norms that they abided by. It was like coming to a new country in a way. But he, Mr. Collins, threw a lot of those social expectations out the window. He had learned that they were not worth as much as everyone thought. That was another part of his book.
She felt the glare again. She looked up. The Jane Eyre woman was standing right there at the counter. “All I could find was this Emily Bronte...I haven’t found any Charlotte at all!” she whined.
“I’d be glad to help you,” she said, stopping herself before the ma’am came out. Walking around the counter, the woman followed her. Then they did an awkward dance around each other in the small bookstore, backtracking to the small room in the rear. Lucy was sure there were about three copies of Jane Eyre back there. She’d see them during the inventory last week. And as she walked in the room she saw them immediately. “Here you are. There’s a used copy, and two new ones.”
“Oh my,” said the woman,”you were right all along. I wonder how I could have missed that.”
Lucy wondered too, but smiled with a fake reassurance. “Sometimes they just seem to hide from us, don’t they?”
“That’s right, they do.”
As Lucy rung the book up the woman went on about how she had been telling her niece that she needed to read this book. “It’s fundamental to a girl’s understanding of life’s possibilities, don’t you think? It’s such a fabulous narrative of the oppressed pushing through the limits life give them, and succeeding. Oh...I just love this novel! Charlotte did it again!”
Lucy smiled inwardly. This woman confirmed to ideas she’d been tossing around. First, people here were so progressive thinking when it came to social issues. And second, people in her bookstore could be so strange. Of course there were the normal book lovers, a category into which she placed herself. These were the people that loved a good book, and found it meaningful to their lives. Then there were the ones like this woman--several of whom came into this store every day. They lived books. They considered the authors their friends. They were just a little bit nutty, really.
“I’ll take that an ring it up for you,” Lucy said, adding, “if you don’t need anything else?”
“Oh no dear, that will be fine.” I do have a question for you though, “Who was that man at the counter earlier? I was standing over their watching just to make sure he didn’t pull something funny on you. I wasn’t sure you should trust him.”
“That was Mr. Collins,” Lucy said trying to hold back her anger. “He is a friend. And he is not dangerous in any way.” Lucy shoved the book back towards the customer.
“Well, be careful. You’re not used to the way things are up here.”