07-15-2008, 02:09 PM
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It was a tan, leatherbound volume, two hundred pages thick; each one was blank and yellowed, but still crisp along the edges and smelling of dust. A dark green cloth bookmark was held between the cover and the first page, just as it had been when a store worker had placed it on the shelf so many years ago. It was a journal comparable to his original, not that it really mattered; no one had ever seen the original other than himself anyway, and it might be the same for this rewrite. He looked up instinctively when a shadow fell over the window but could see nothing but a dark silhouette outlined in the sun. The air in the store was dead and his senses were too clouded with old corners and molding wood to pick anything out.
Nevertheless, he could tell the stranger was a young woman, and that she was staring at him. Perhaps it shouldn't have been so surprising, with his collection of scars and coyote appearance; she was a wolf; perhaps she'd been in the war. Still, Laruku didn't like it. He took the empty journal one hand and started towards the door.
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It was a tan, leatherbound volume, two hundred pages thick; each one was blank and yellowed, but still crisp along the edges and smelling of dust. A dark green cloth bookmark was held between the cover and the first page, just as it had been when a store worker had placed it on the shelf so many years ago. It was a journal comparable to his original, not that it really mattered; no one had ever seen the original other than himself anyway, and it might be the same for this rewrite. He looked up instinctively when a shadow fell over the window but could see nothing but a dark silhouette outlined in the sun. The air in the store was dead and his senses were too clouded with old corners and molding wood to pick anything out.
Nevertheless, he could tell the stranger was a young woman, and that she was staring at him. Perhaps it shouldn't have been so surprising, with his collection of scars and coyote appearance; she was a wolf; perhaps she'd been in the war. Still, Laruku didn't like it. He took the empty journal one hand and started towards the door.
Can I help you?It was ironic, of course, that he should come out of a bookstore sounding like an employee, but he couldn't think of anything else to say.