The Library, Submission 10 by Ryan Wrenn

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         "What if there really are ghosts?" she says and tip toes down the mystery section, her hand lightly brushing along the spines of the books.

         "It's a brand new building," I respond and watch her darkening outline reach the end of the aisle, peering around the edge into the main hall. We would've brought flashlights


         "That doesn't mean anything."


         "Doesn't it?"


         "No, it doesn't."


         "Seems like someone would've had to die here for there to be ghosts."


         "That's not how it works," she says and turns to face me as I slowly walk toward her. She's a shadow, slim and tall and somehow still seeming as pale as she is in the light. She practically glows.


         "Well how does it work then?" I say as I reach my hand out as if trying to feel my way through the blackness, brushing against her breast in so doing. She laughs and pushes my arms away, turning again to the hall.


         "The building isn't what's haunted, it's the area of space that's haunted," she begins, a whisper now that she's facing the wideness of the hall in front of her. It stretches down another twenty aisles to a set of windows that look out into the night. "So a princess could've lived in a castle that was once where this library is now, but she'd haunt the library instead of just going away with the castle."


         I walk out ahead of her into the hall. She follows me out, her slippers making a soft thud with each step. "What if they had built a KFC here instead?"


         "Then she'd haunt the KFC."


         "Seems kind of inglorious for the likes of a princess."


         "Well she still thinks it's the castle though."


         "So her haunting is confined to the area of the building she died in?" I ask and turn to face her in the dark. She stops just short of running into me.


         "Yes."


         "So in theory she could haunt both the KFC and the Radioshack next door."


         "Well there is no KFC, or Radioshack. It's just the library," she whispers. Through the light of the emergency fluorescents I can see the unblinking stare she's deployed, the utter sincerity in her face. I pretend not to notice.


         "So where will we find this princess?"


         "Not here. There wasn't a castle here."


         "Not all princesses die in castles though," I reach around her waist and pull her closer.


         She sighs but doesn't push away. "You don't get it."


         "I think I get it pretty well," I say and kiss the area where her neck and shoulder meet.



         "Well you think it's a joke."


         "I promise that if there were a ghost princess I'd be terribly concerned for her," I say, raising my head and meeting her eyes. More like looking through them. They sink into shadow beneath the pale luminescence of her skin.


         "You wouldn't be."


         "And you would?"


         "No. No, I guess I wouldn't be. I mean she's not really a person. Just a spectral instant replay on infinite loop. An echo. Walking the halls of her castle night after night. Why that night in particular was singled out of all the ones she lived through I can't be sure. Maybe she died before she got to where was she going and that's why she's condemned to walk the same uncompleted path again and again and again."


         I kiss her softly. "And where was she going?"


         "To meet her lover? To get a cup of water? To go to the bathroom? Who knows?


         "Jesus I don't know what I would do if I was not only condemned to haunt the deep fryer at a KFC but also to spend eternity not being able to find the pisser."


         "My sweet, eloquent knight," she smiles and leans into me, raising her mouth to meet mine.

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