Alice had never been denied books before and so she didn’t know how enraged she should be at these circumstances. Politeness took over her and she delicately repeated,
“But I’m going to be starting here after the Summer, so -,”
“As I’ve already said, it is only available to current students.”
“I can’t get books out from my school now though.” Alice persisted, speaking in an urgent whisper. “Please? I really don’t want to go to the community library.”
The thought of the lack of the books they had there made her shudder. The librarian sighed, turning to another customer, obviously growing bored of Alice. She stared sadly at the three books that sat on the desk – one on paranormal activity, one on planting and The Invisible Man.
“You can take them out on my card.”
Her head flicked in the direction of the voice and saw an older boy not even looking at her properly. She wasn’t used to speaking to older boys apart from Matt and his friends, so she didn’t even know how to take part in the conversation.
“Oh, no, I can’t do that.” She replied with an awkwardly polite laugh and a shake of a hand.
He finally looked at her and Alice was taken aback by the fact that not only was he an older boy, he was beautiful. She never really had an interest in boys before this, but could always appreciate someone’s beauty and he possessed beauty in abundance.
“No, really, it’s fine.”
He spoke in a low voice, but a little louder than Alice’s whisper.
“No, I mean, that would be against the rules.” She said with slightly raised eyebrows, smiling all the same. “But thank you.”
He smirked at her and the librarian turned away from her computer, speaking in an even tighter whisper than before.
“You are 160 days overdue on this book. The charge is £75.”
There was a silence and Alice looked between this boy and the librarian with great bemusement.
“What?” He said with no attempt at speaking in a low voice now. He laughed. “I just found this in my room and thought I was doing a good thing.”
An uncontrollable giggle left Alice. The librarian gave her a stern look causing Alice to try and get a handle on her laughing, but all she really noted was that the boy was looking at her with equal levels of bemusement. Now she was left with an uncontrollable blush.
Embarrassed at the colour, she pointed at the books, picking them up to return them to their correct places.
As she was placing the last of the books, The Invisible Man, back, she jumped at a face appearing behind the shelf.
“Sorry, sorry, I just wanted to let you know I’ve paid my debt to the library.” Alice smiled, turning her face down and away from him.
“Quite a high price tag for a book. I hope it was worth it.” He let out a small laugh.
“Can I speak to you without the shelf between us?”
They now had less space and shelves between them as Alice walked out the library, not wanting to break any more rules in her little place of worship.
“I’m Jay, by the way. Or JJ, lots of people call me that.” Jay announced when they were outside the library with the sun hitting his face and making it comparable to a statue in an art gallery glistening in the light. She took a breath.
Despite them living in a tiny village, she wasn’t familiar with this older, mysterious boy.
“I’m Alice. You can call me Al, but not many people do.” He laughed at her poor joke and it made her heart beat wildly.
“Like the song?”
Laughter sang between them and she nodded wildly.
“Just like the song.”
let’s hear it for the boy – july 29th
“A boy? A boy!”
All that George received for that was exasperation from Alice.
“Yes, a -,”
“Oh, shut up, George,” Millie hit his arm and turned back to Alice. “Tell us EVERYTHING!”
Normally it was Millie telling them everything about a boy she had met at a party or George privately telling her about his undying love for Millie. There was never anything Alice had to say about other people, it was always about her books or subjects or tea or music. This was so very different and she didn’t even know where to begin.
“Yeah, start with what boy it is.” George continued, rubbing at the spot where Millie had hit him.
“Well, his name is JJ and -,”
“JJ? As in Jay Jhaveri?” George asked, looking more alert.
“You know him?”
“Know him? He is dreamy and so much older than us – Ally, you like an older boy? Where would you have met him? At a party? If you’ve gone to your first ever party without me then I will SCREAM -,”
“Mills -,”
“We met at the library.”
“That day you were supposed to meet us at the library?”
Alice provided George with a sheepish smile, them both knowing now that she had ditched their planned true crime documentary marathon, so she could spend the day with JJ.
“So it’s been two weeks?”
“One week and three days?” Alice responded, carefully trying to sound like she hadn’t keeping track.
“What have you guys done? Are you still a virgin?”
“Millie, heck, of course I am!”
Millie shrugged.
“Being older he’ll want sex sooner than guys our age.” She said matter-of-factly. She turned to George, “How long would you wait?”
“I’ve been waiting 16 years. I’m good at waiting.”
Millie raised her hand as if he had proven her point.
She wondered if Millie was right. ‘Boys’ was not something Alice had any knowledge on. Maybe she should find a book on them.
“Anyway,” She changed the subject, suppressing her fear on how these things worked. “You both know of him? What do you think?”
George filled his air up with cheeks and puffed them out slowly.
“I think this is so cute! You seem like an unlikely couple, but if you like him – we need more details! Spill, spill, spill.” Millie squealed, but Alice kept her eyes focused on George causing Millie to turn and stare at him too. He felt both sets of eyes on him and waved his hands wildly.
“Yeah, well, he is cool, I guess… but he is much older than us? What, like eighteen?”
“Nineteen…” Alice said in a small voice. “Nobody else knows about us right now and I’m only telling you two, because we know about the age gap. When I turn seventeen, which is very soon, then we won’t hide it. He’s just… lovely.”
George eventually nodded.
“Well, if you’re happy.”
i think we’re alone now – august 3rd
They skipped the song by Joy Division and it went to Africa by Toto. They only listened to the happy and silly songs together.
One earphone each.
Her head was resting on his shoulder with his arm wrapped tightly around her. The sun was beating down on them. This was how summer slipped away – in the space between his arm and torso.
“Can I ask you something?” She softly edged her head up so he knew she was listening. “If the rules were different with the library, would I have even stood a chance with you?”
She laughed so much that she shook his chest and then his laughter shook her. That was how they moved, one after the other.
“Maybe in a parallel universe I did get those books and we never even spoke.” She mused softly and he let out a long sigh.
“Oh, I’m glad I live in this universe then.” He shifted slightly, moving to his bag. “I did note though that one of the books was this? Hopefully it was this anyway.”
She pushed herself up to be leaning on her elbow and took The Invisible Man out of his hands.
“I didn’t realise you were paying such close attention…” She stared at the book in amazement.
“Yeah, yeah, you’d think I just wouldn’t remember anything about the day I met you.” She laughed again, feeling suddenly shy and embarrassed.
“I think even in the parallel universe where I get those books, you would still have an overdue book and I would still laugh at you…”
“So I wouldn’t be replaced with a library?”
“Wait, no, nobody replaces a library for me. Libraries are my holy ground, my church, my safe place. All people are second place.” She laughed lightly, leaning back into his chest, feeling something tighten in his body ever so slightly.
“I don’t really have a safe place like that. I guess my flat is now, but it’s not really a home.”
It made Alice feel sad. Very, very sad.
He just wanted a home.
She understood that JJ had a hard life and it was one she would never be able to relate to. She also knew there were rumours about the life he had been leading and company he was keeping, but again she couldn’t relate to that. She did know that the person he was with her was who he was or wanted to be and sometimes people were put in hard positions in life.
She put her hand on his chest and circled the general area of his heart.
“This can always be your safe place. Right in the middle of a field, listening to music and, if you like, being with me.” She looked up at him and watched as his eyes moved to focus on hers. Something told her that the answer touched him.
She could never understand a life as difficult as his, but she wanted him to know an easier life even if it was just when they were together.
drive – august 16th
She had never even touched herself before and now his hand was on her. It felt like pure ecstasy and she didn’t want the feeling to ever end. Eventually her hand was gripping at his shirt and her eyes were closing, the last image of his lovely face in her head, as she moaned out, shaking out the feeling of the joy. Her eyes opened again and she was gasping again.
“What the heck?” She asked all breathy and bewildered. He searched her face, his smile reaching his eyes as he kissed her softly.
“You uh… liked it then?”
She shook her head, still unable to get over the shaking in her toes.
“I… have no words.”
He removed his hand from underneath her summer dress and touched her tingling skin.
“Are you cold?”
“A little.”
He kissed her again and rolled over pulling a sweater out for her. She sat up, pulling it over her head. Another present from him.
He groaned putting his head in his hands as she untucked her hair from it.
“What’s wrong?”
She furrowed her eyebrows in equal parts confusion and amusement.
He peeked out from his hands.
“You have no idea how perfect you look right now. Ugh… I just… I like you in my sweater.”
She laughed.
“I like being in your sweater.”
“I’m sorry, my place does not deserve to have you in it.”
She took his face in her hands and shook her head.
“I’ve told you before, I think it’s charming.”
They stared at each other, their faces so close. It was something they were doing more frequently these days. Staring at each other in intense silences. Whenever they did it Alice was tracing the outline of his features so she could remember them perfectly for when she went to sleep. She liked to think he was doing the same.
“I want to make you feel as good as you made me feel.”
He groaned loudly, breaking all the silence.
“Ah fuck, Al, I’m going to take you home before I get carried away.”
Alice bit down on her smile. She had never spoken like that before and felt suddenly powerful over him. She did really want to make him feel good as well, even though she had no idea how to do that. His reaction made her want to try.
-------------------------------
As they sat in his car, parked around the corner from her house and with the windows all steamed up from them kissing, she was sure nobody would see them.
He pulled away and then moved back in for another kiss and then another and then he finally sat back properly in the driving seat with his hands on the wheel and shook his head.
“You really should go in, because I don’t want to be the guy who keeps you past your curfew.”
“Okay, okay, dad.”
He rested his head on the wheel watching her carefully again and she thought they might fall back into staring at each other, but then he spoke.
“I meant what I said earlier, you know. You’re fucking – I mean, you’re perfect. You’re just an angel and I don’t know what the… heck… what the heck you’re doing with me, but you are.”
“JJ, you’re -,”
“I love you, Alice Banks.”
She stopped and stared right into the face of this beautiful boy and this felt like all the romantic classics she had read and read and now it was happening to her.
“I love you too.”
you can’t hurry love – august 25th
“You want to take it outside?” Matt was in the doorway of her room pretending to punch the air. When she looked up from hurriedly hiding away her lip gloss that she had been applying, she saw he was holding a book in front of him.
“Mmm… I can’t today – I’m going over to Millie’s for this thing.”
Matt let out a low whistle, stepping further into the room.
“You know you’re the world’s worst liar, right?”
Wringing her hands in her lap and then hitting them against her forehead, she nodded.
“I am completely aware of that fact.”
Matt took a seat next to her, almost giddy in his energy.
“Well, I thought I was coming here for a traditional summer afternoon, so you now must pay the price of your secret.”
He spoke in a dramatic voice and ended it with an evil laugh. She rolled her eyes.
Taking a deep breath, she readied herself for telling him the only secret she had ever had to keep.
“Firstly, we just got back from our holiday two days ago, so I am not buying the disappointment,” She took another breath, looking at Matt directly, so it didn’t look like there was any reason to be nervous. “Secondly, I’ve kind of been dating someone this summer and -,”
Matt gasped.
“George?”
Alice’s face contorted into pure confusion.
“What? No?”
“Come on, that’s going to be the natural assumption.”
“Hmm… I don’t see how… Anyway,” She had to ready herself again. “I’m dating this boy called Jay, well, JJ, and he’s -,”
“What?” Matt’s face was now far from being excited about this news. Maybe George was the only acceptable person for Alice in his eyes. “JJ?”
“You know him?”
His face tightened and he took some time to reply.
“I know of him. He’s the guy who hangs around Owen Summers?” He put his head in his hands and sighed.
Alice did know that he was friends with him as she had looked at his Instagram and there was that time when her Dad was driving her back from Millie’s one night and she saw JJ and Owen in a car. She had noticed him immediately and he looked like a completely different person to the one she knew from summer walks and bedroom talks, but then he saw her and softened around the edges. She smiled at him then and he did the same, getting softer still.
“How did you even get caught up in that?”
She looked down into her lap, feeling small all of a sudden.
“And how old is he?”
“I’m going to be turning seventeen in a week; it’s only a two year difference.”
“Yeah, sure, that makes it all fine!”
Alice shook her head at Matt getting up from the bed in anger.
“Matt, he’s a good person, no, a great person. Just because he has a few bad friends doesn’t make him a bad person – he’s not like that. I love him and I thought you would be able to trust my judgment. Have I ever been wrong about someone before?” She stopped, pleading with her eyes, imploring Matt to respect her decision. “Do you know something about him?”
Matt sighed, turning away from her and then immediately coming back, kneeling at her feet.
“No, no, I don’t, I just -,”
“Then listen to me.” She spoke with a firmness that she was sure Matt wasn’t used to hearing from her unless they were in a heated political debate and it was never directed at him.
He nodded his head slowly.
“I will, I trust you.” He softened, pulling her in for a hug. “Come on, you know it’s my job to protect you.”
love will tear us apart – august 30th
She walked up to JJ in the playground that surprisingly didn’t have any children in it despite it being a hot day. There was an unshakable giddiness in her stomach at all of this. It was the first time they were meeting in daylight so close to possible people who could see them. How could she not think of their future together and how this could be them all the time? It was almost her birthday and she was hoping he would come to the celebration with George, Millie and her family.
He was sat in the swings as she practically skipped up to him.
“Hello, beautiful,” She giggled, delicately taking one of his hands. Suddenly she felt very shy being in public with him.
“Uh…” He looked up at her and her face immediately changed to one of concern.
“What’s wrong?”
There was a silence that could have lasted a little while longer for Alice. In the silence, he was still hers.
“I need to talk to you.” She let go of his hand and took a step back. How could she not see this coming? “I just… I don’t want to be with you anymore.”
It didn’t make sense.
There could be so many reasons why he would want to end it or the reasons why he couldn’t possibly want to end it, but she could only think of one.
“You said you loved me -,”
She was already crying.
“I didn’t mean it.”
She exhaled sharply. He wasn’t looking at her. There was nothing else she needed to hear from him.
He didn’t mean it.
With tears she didn’t try to wipe away, she turned and stormed off. He didn’t deserve to hear anything else from her and she didn’t deserve to be lied to by him.
“Alice, I -,”
At the faint sound of his voice calling after her, she walked faster so she couldn’t hear what he was trying to say.
