Library Books (and Lovers I Can't Keep)

The books and women …I never really kept but still can’t forget. Somewhere between fiction and reality.

Damn.

In a contemplative moment post-coitus [beating my shit] or what the internet calls post-nut clarity … I realized I like my lovers the way I liked library books.

Bare with me . I’m going somewhere with this.

Growing up in a third-world country… Shiiiiit, just growing up poor, I’ve lived long enough in the U.S. to know poverty is a universal bastard. It unhinges families. Doesn’t matter if you’re in Clarendon or Cleveland. It's a kind of bitch slap handed down by capitalism’s aborted children.

But back to library books.

My parents couldn’t afford to buy me all the books I wanted. Still, they were great at parenting. My mom made sure I was enrolled at our local library. That little building became everything. It felt almost criminal—walking in, pulling three books off a shelf and leaving … under one condition.

It must be stamped !

The sound of that date stamp hitting the page? Man. That was sex before I knew what sex was. My virgin body and slutty mind, still only knows sex in theory but if you spot the contradictions -- let me know.

I read everywhere. On verandas. At bus stops. While boiling water for tea. I read about everything. Cows, Clinton ,Calcutta , clitorises, and culture. I remember this red-covered copy of Moby Dick. I borrowed that book four times. Maybe five. I read it already, but I kept taking it home. I didn’t just like it. I needed it.

Eventually, the librarian—Ms. Watson, rest in peace—asked if I wanted to keep government property and reminded me of the overdue fee.

Shit I panicked and stashed my lunch money to cover the fee.

She told me, “If you love it that much, maybe give someone else the chance to fall in love too.”

That stuck with me. So I returned it.

And now, on this lazy June morning, with the sweltering heat banished by the coughs of the air conditioning unit, I look at the book beside me. Her pages open. Her spine curved. Her story already told, maybe too many times. And I think about how my fingers traced her lines. I think about the smudges I left in the margins.

I think about the peace I feel figuring out the difference between an expresso and a pink pony club. I learn tenderness. I learn bed slippers keep sneezes at bay . I learn women fart just as loud and hands held at breakfast tables watching SpongeBob reruns are a form of therapy. I learn this might be my White whale and call me Fu..bloody Ishmael.

Follow me.

I used to love Toy Story—still do. That idea of leaving your toys behind? Of them feeling sadness when you outgrow them? Freudian bullshit and psychosis, maybe. But it always felt sad as hell.

There’s a difference, though. With lovers, I’ve got principles. I return them to the shelf. Even the good ones. Even the ones that deserved to stay.

But this morning, it’s hard to reshelve this one.

This mystery-thriller-ass woman in theory. This awe-filled, god-written novella. As if she was ghostwritten by John Green, James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, and John Grisham—all of them—and then Stephen King came in and wrote the preface and the epilogue with a cigarette in his mouth and pain in his bones.

I read her a year ago. She kept reaching for me even after I closed the book. That voice she had? Achingly visceral. Familiar. Like something I’d hummed in the womb. I understood every single note in that strange little song. I agreed with all of it. But books that get returned must stay shelved.

Gotta give somebody else a chance to get wrecked by her.

My friend Jason - well I don't know if he's still my friend- would say “all rise for the national anthem” then play ….

https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxpJc6CIPBOKq0Waci96TNTKjmVHr7VcGi?si=1LNSjZfR3QfsKcQc

But here I am a year later. I find my curried stains, my jackfruit-sticky fingerprints on her spine. I smell the Perry Ellis I wore back then. I see the folded corners romantic as hell—still tucked in like I was saving my place. Her chapters still move like waves. She had dust on all the right places waiting for my breath and cleansing.

This book dreads the heat of Kingston the dreary Bookshop life. This book has Hobbit dreams. This book don’t wanna be filed away. She wants to burn down all the libraries that ever held her captive. And here I am again. Running. Like that little nigga from Toy Story.Except his name wasn’t Andy. His name was Luke.

The Black boy they never animated.The one who always gave his favorite things back.Even the ones he loved so bad it hurt.What happens when on looses their favourite library book ?

Let’s keep this bookshelf messy. Hit ❤︎ if this felt like you. Leave a comment if you’ve got a book or body you never returned.