Chapter 3

Miss O'Brian's Library Chapter 3

   Tracy triptrapped in like a ball of neon sunshine, decked out in an outfit that sharply contrasted with Miss O'Brian's conservative blouse and skirt. Evelynne looked her over quickly, bottom to top; beholding black tennis shoes with neon green accents, bright pink fishnets, and a black-and-neon hoodie over a tutu'd pink dress with black tulle at the trims. Neon tipless gloves and headband to match the shoes and sweater topped it all off, giving the whole thing gave a punk-ballerina-playing-tennis effect. It brought a kind of foreign presence to the antiquated little book-nook that made Evelynne shift in her seat a bit.

   "Welcome back Tracy, and pull up a chair." She said, shrugging off the awkward feeling.

   Tracy, of course, did so, crunching down the seat of her ruffly skirt. "So......." She said, as she emptied a couple packets of sugar into her cup, "Where do we start today? Any ongoing investigations I should know about? Any special rules?"

   "Tea first." Evelynne answered, "Then I can start to show you around. I haven't got any open cases right now.. but if you have any questions that weren't covered in the letter I sent you, feel free to ask."

   Tracy hesitated, taking a sip, before she looked up and spoke. "...Can I ask you about your powers?"

   Evelynne swallowed a sigh. She'd been deliberately vague in the letter she sent to Tracy. She'd stayed up a couple hours later than usual trying to carefully outline what to expect without doing more than hinting about what her exact abilities were. The truth is, she didn't like to talk about it. Only a handful of people really believed her, and they tended to either fanatically hate it or fanatically love it. Tracy didn't mean any harm by her curiosity; that she could tell. Still, Evelynne found herself choosing her words very carefully as she explained.

   "Have you ever seen something, and not known what you were looking at?" She began, dinging her spoon rythmically against her glass as she stirred her tea, "Like when you pull out an instruction book, and you just kind of stare at it for a few seconds before you figure out you opened it to the Spanish language section?"

   Tracy nodded along. "Yeah? I guess so.."

   "Well, it's kind of like that. You receive messages that you don't understand. Maybe you can pick out one or two words of them, depending on whether you know what you're looking for, but mostly it's just... it takes some doing. Just like learning a language. I don't know the whole language yet.. but it's there."

   "So.. you're not psychic. Well I mean you are.. but not all the way?"

   "Something like that."

   "So the zoning out.. the moving things.. the.... How did you word that again? 'Potential interference to surrounding parties'? What's that about? Is that because you're only, like, half psychic?"

   Evelynne shook her head. "That's different. That's a control issue. Noisy things like that don't happen as often as they do in the movies, though. I just don't believe in leaving out the worst case scenarios."

   They sipped their tea silently. Awkwardly. It was the closest thing to a social setting Evelynne had been in since.. she didn't remember when, and you wouldn't need psychic powers to sense that. She pulled herself up and cleared away the empty cups after they finished. Then, she pushed the table up on its hinge, locking it back into its panel on the wall. "Most of the work will be less glamorous; alphabetizing books, going into town for packages, scoping out unfamiliar locations. Of course it won't be completely without risk, so I'll be teaching you to shoot, and to moniter the security systems of the library. Do you have a concealed weapons permit?"

   Tracy blinked, with a blank expression on her face. "I.. I don't believe in violence.."

   "Good, neither do I, but there are some crazies out there who aren't quite as nice as you and me, and you know as well as me that a good few of them have an axe to grind against me. Better safe than sorry."

   "Miss O'Brian.. You didn't hire an assistant. Did you?" Tracy suggested cautiously, "You hired a.. a security guard!"

   O'Brian nodded slowly. "You didn't say no."

<< Previous

Next >>