Always the Bridesmaid

Part XIII

The cat's name is Henry. The Librarian doesn't know why he chose that name; it just suited him somehow. Henry must have thought so too, because the second the Librarian settled, the cat manifested a collar with his name on it and a little bell that would let the Librarian know where he was at all times.

Suffice to say, the Librarian has been haunted by the sound of bells for the past several days. He's been haunted about the cat for several reasons, but the moment his mind fixes on a solid thought, the godforsaken jingling breaks his concentration. When it's not the jingling, it's the cat himself, jumping onto the circulation desk and knocking over books or crawling into his lap or, in general, being an absolute fur-covered nuisance.

This isn't to say he hates the cat. In the quiet of his nights, when the patrons leave and the Library nudges its keeper towards getting some rest of his own, the company is appreciated, even just a little. And the added routine—the feeding, the water, the hour spent reading on his own with the cat lounging in his lap—adds an extra beat of normalcy to the day, an extra something to keep each moment from blending together the way they had before, even with the silver watch in his pocket.

Still, the jingling, the cat, the routine—all of it bothers the Librarian. And he knows it's because ultimately, everything hinges on something the Librarian knew to be true up until Henry dropped down onto his counter.

The Library cannot create life. It can only take that life from someplace else.

So, that begs the question: where did the cat come from?

This question hangs heavily over the Librarian's head, even through his patrons. He reads their books and their words and looks straight at their faces with a smile, but in his head, all he can think about is the cat winding his way around his ankles. At night, with the cat in his lap, all he can think about is its weight and warmth and how impossible it should be, even though his mind desperately wants to cling to the words on the page.

Sadie, on the other hand, has an entirely different reaction the second she sees him.

"It's so cute!"

Henry's eyes go wide, but he lets Sadie remove him from the comfort of the desk.

"Hey, baby!" she coos. "Look at your little face!"

She hadn't been in the Library for more than two minutes. In the first, she approached the circulation desk to say hello to the Librarian; in the next, she swept the cat into her arms.

"Where did it come from?" she asks. "When did you get a cat? Oh!" She looks up at the Librarian. "Did you take my advice?!"

He doesn't know how to respond to this at first. How can he tell her that this cat came to be because of her? How can he tell her that this should be impossible? Or, rather, how can he do these things without giving in to the temptation of asking her a million questions of his own? The questions were the worst part of the weeks between her visits. The more they piled up, the more heavy suspicions about Sadie grow in the back of his mind. And now that she's here, he doesn't know where to start. He doesn't know how to tell her that something about her now bothers him in ways he can just barely explain.

"I. . ." He takes a deep breath. Then, he slowly tells her one truth. "Yes. In a sense."

Sadie places the cat back on the circulation desk and rubs her hand from the top of his head all the way down to the tip of his tail. Henry, meanwhile, cranes his neck, reaching his head up to press it against the bottom of her chin and the top of her shoulder, purring loudly all the way. The Librarian watches, analyzing every tiny movement the cat makes and coming up with more and more questions. These questions weigh like lead on his chest. They make his innards twist, and they leave a sick feeling in his stomach, all from the mere sight of Sadie.