ROLEPLAY HQ - a-study-in-romance

Creak. Amelia paused, and the room was silent. These old ladders aren’t stable anyway, she thought to herself. She reached into her basket for the next book and flipped it to the side. Unfortunately for her, all of these books needed to be organized by the last name of the author. It was a Friday afternoon. No one really came around on Friday nights, except for older folks. Everyone else seemed to have better plans. Amelia went to step off the ladder after placing the last book for this section but the sound of heavy footsteps caused her to almost slip. Her ankle went through one of the openings and she grasped the sides of the railing tighter. Shit. Her head turned quickly to see a taller man. His appearance was sophisticated. He wore a fitted black jacket and dress pants. And there he was. Amelia didn’t know his name, but this stranger frequented the library about once a week. She didn’t have the courage or even a reason to strike up a conversation with him. She always went back to minding her business, but the mystery man never failed to catch her attention. Her knuckles began to turn white from holding on too long. She pulled her ankle out of the section where it was caught and lowered herself back to ground level. She stood up straight and dusted off her jeans while hoping that he, or anyone else, didn’t see that embarrassing moment. Most of her evenings were occupied by working at this place, and she didn’t see much thrill or excitement on the job. Nothing ever really happened in this small town anyway. She thought she knew everyone. @Several people

Cato always enjoyed his trips to the local library. They had an impressive amount of first edition books that not even the nearby college where he was a recently hired professor, rivaled, and it was on the way from his bus stop to his apartment. It had always bothered him how little time he had to spend surrounded by books, especially as a professor of literature. It made him feel at peace to surround himself with old tomes bound in leather. It was a place where he could decompress after the tumultuous start to his position. He had been hired part way through the fall semester after another literature professor was fired for an inappropriate relationship with one of his students that had led to the professor stalking the young woman after she tried to cut off the relationship. Coming into another professor’s half-way started class and trying to rework the syllabus had been an exhausting challenge. And, unfortunately for Cato, many of the faculty had taken the side of the professor, blaming the unfortunate student (who the administration had done their best to hide the identity of). Many of the other professors in his department treated Cato with hostility, as if he had been the one to get their friend and colleague fired. So, Cato Alvin was a man in a new town with a new job and no friends. When he spent time in the college library, he still felt the hostility of many of the staff, so he took shelter in the rustic library just a few blocks from his apartment. Cato also figured that with how poorly most libraries paid their workers, anyone who worked at one was likely to also have a deep love of books, so maybe he could find someone to engage with, to feel human again with.

14:00

Yet again, Cato found himself stopping by the library on a Friday afternoon, with no other plan for the evening than to spend a few hours until closing reading old manuscripts and first edition prints as he tried to plan out the next semester’s coursework. A part of him hoped that maybe he would see the beautiful dark haired woman that he had often spied when he came to the library. He kept meaning to speak with her, but everytime he tried, it seemed like she would disappear in an instant. The elderly woman who worked the main desk was very sweet and loved to talk, but admitted that the books were her late wife’s love more than hers, and many of the rarer tomes were acquired by the departed woman. Linda loved the library as her partner's legacy, not necessarily for the books themselves. Cato greeted Linda before heading to the enclosed study nook on the upper floor, with the tea he had grabbed next door in hand. There were other study nooks closer to the front of the building on the lower floors, but it gave him an excuse to walk through most of the library on his way up. Surreptitiously, he looked around for the woman he often caught glimpses of as he made his way to the nook, but was disappointed when he did not see her around anywhere. Cato dropped his messenger bag down on the desk beside his tea and pulled out his notes as well as a stack of essays that he needed to grade, spreading them across the wide desk. He took a long sip of the tea, a simple mix of peppermint and black tea to give himself focus and a little boost of caffeine. Cato had added just the tiniest bit of sweetener to his tea, enjoying the teas natural minty taste and light bitterness. He pulled out his green fountain pen, his favorite for grading, and tested the nib before settling in to grade the papers. (edited)

14:00

@peachbunny_

Amelia picked up her basket and sighed. Most nights it was just her and Linda running the place, because who else would want to? She didn’t particularly mind. She often let Linda leave a little earlier than closing time so she could get home and rest. That just meant that she would have to scan the aisles, send everyone out and lock up the doors. It was a relatively easy job. Amelia chose the library in particular because it was quiet. Every other job listing on or around campus were things she wasn’t exactly interested in, such as stores in the mall or food joints. Socializing outside of her small circle didn’t happen often. She peered through one of the shelves and watched as the mysterious man passed the lobby and went up the stairs to the second floor. Shoot. How was she supposed to talk to him now? She grabbed the next book out of the basket and slipped it into its proper place on the shelf. Sometimes she wondered if her life was boring. According to her paranoid mother, she was allegedly supposed to be partying and having intercourse all the time- but it wasn’t her scene. Every single visit back home was just reassuring her parents that she wasn’t getting into any trouble. Her most recent boyfriend was her first year, and now she was in her last. Soon she would have a degree in digital photography and be out in the ‘real world’. She didn’t think it would be different to her lifestyle now. She already paid for an apartment on her own and doesn’t live directly on the campus anymore. She had two roommates and probably couldn’t afford it without them. Most of her free time was spent reading, working, studying and building a portfolio for a career that would pay her a hell of a lot better than this place was. After sorting and stacking the rest of the books in her basket, she walked over to the cart and filled it up again. Nonfiction history and biographies. That’s on the second floor. She hummed to herself happily and walked up the stairs. There she sp

15:06

otted the seating area, and there was a row of public computers along with a paper printer in case anyone needed to use those for work, or schoolwork. Sometimes she would sit by those tables, but she wanted to try and appear busy- even though she wasn't. She wanted to talk to the man and find out who he was, or why he kept coming back. Maybe she was being irrational. He probably did have a good reason. She snuck past and began to read the signs, following alphabetical order by author for her organizing. Last semester, Amelia had a stalker. She thought that one of the professors in the arts and media building was attractive, but it was wildly inappropriate for her to have any contact with the man outside of class hours. However it turned out that he felt the same way about her- and began to follow her. He would also email her about subjects unrelated to coursework. She thought it was innocent, and they were just trying to get to know each other. This had gone on for weeks until one of her roommates spotted him in an unplated vehicle on the street outside of the apartment building. It wasn’t suspicious until the women noticed the same exact car on campus, and back at their building within the same week. It took a long time to capture who it was exactly, and since then they put up a security camera doorbell outside of the back door that gave a perfect view of the parking lot. Amelia didn't want to believe it was the professor until it was. She since passed that class and moved on. She knew they replaced him after being fired but didn't know who it was. She liked to avoid that area from then on. @Several people

Cato was reviewing and grading his student’s papers when he came across something one of his students paraphrased, making reference to something Soren Kierkegaard had said, but it just felt a bit off. The student paraphrased Kierkegaard, claiming that the root of all evil was idleness, but Cato thought that the student must have messed up his reference. Cato flipped back to the bibliography and confirmed the source was Kierkegaard’s Either/Or and got up to see if the library had a copy available for him to check against. Cato appreciated the opportunity to get up and stretch his legs for a bit. His Fitbit had been vibrating reminding him to “get in more steps this hour” for the past two and a half hours, and he had always been skirting the edge of a small paunch, even while he was still playing rugby back in his college days. Cato knew that the philosophy books were in the rear corner of the first floor, but he decided to take the long way, walking down a floor via the rearmost staircase, across that level, then back down the front stairs to the main floor, then across that level to the philosophy section. It took a few minutes of searching to find the library’s copy of Either/Or, and once Cato found it, he decided to take it back up to the study room with him. The student had made a few other references to the book and Cato figured he’d double check each of them. Retracing his path back across the library, up to the second floor, across to the back stairs, then up to the third floor, he headed back towards the alcove he was all set up in. As he walked across the second floor, he started flipping through the pages, looking for the actual quote that the student had paraphrased. “Okay, Part one, Chapter six,” Cato muttered to himself while flipping through the pages. His mind was on the book and he did not even notice as he practically ran the dark haired woman over.

12:17

“Oh, shit, I am so sorry!” Cato said, quickly coming back to himself. Noticing that he had knocked over the pile of books that the woman had been carrying, he bent down and said, “I’m so sorry, let me pick these up for you.” In his haste, he and the woman bumped heads together as they both bent down. “Ow! I’m so sorry, are you okay? God, I’m a mess.” Cato and the woman managed to gather up the volumes and stood back up. “I’m sorry about that. Are you sure you are okay? By the way, my name is Cato, Cato Alvis. Would you like help carrying your books?”

12:17

@peachbunny_