The Dark and Magical Forest of Books

Jimmy knew he was not supposed to be here. Barely twelve years old and locked in some dark library with no idea when someone would come to help him. It was all because of his stupid friends Paul and Sam and their prank.

It all started Wednesday at lunch.

“I have it all planned out” said Paul a little too excitedly. Paul, like Jimmy was also twelve years old and in the sixth grade. He was short, scrawny, and was very excitable. He had a bad habit of “talking with his hands” and making wild gestures while speaking. This made his wild stories very hard to follow, yet still entertaining in their own right. Pieces of loose leaf paper with crude blueprints drawn on them were spread across the table like a scene from a heist film, each one depicting the Harrisburg Public Library and all undoubtedly doodled during class instead of doing schoolwork.

“Just before closing time we go in through here.” Paul motioned to some incomprehensible combination of shapes labeled ‘back entrance’.

“When they start turning out the lights at six o’clock we leave through this door,” continued Paul, pointing to another amorphous blob.

“But we use a penny to jam the lock so that the door can’t be closed! It’s foolproof!” exclaimed Paul a little bit too loudly while gesticulating wildly. This outburst almost betrayed his own warning to “keep this on the DL” made moments earlier.

“A penny? That’s stupid” said Sam from across the table. Sam was quite possibly the scariest person that Jimmy had ever seen. At six foot 1 and almost 200 pounds, he looked more like a high schooler than a sixth grader; however, his intimidation was not solely reliant on his build. Sam backed up his stature with a hot temper that almost constantly got him in trouble. Trouble that has kept him from channeling his anger into sports like football, which he was thrown out of in less than a week for being too rough. In third grade he attacked his dad because he refused to pack an extra apple juice box in his lunch.

“Yeah, My brother told me it would work. He said that if you put a penny in the lock of a door the door will still close but it can’t lock” replied Paul very matter-of-factly.

“Okay, assume the penny works. What do we do when we get in the library? Catch up on our English homework?” Asked Sam sarcastically.

“No you moron,” replied Paul “we use these.” He then reached for his backpack, obviously heavy and overstuffed with something Jimmy knew wasn’t school books.

“Ta daaa!” Paul explained as he pulled out a large metallic can with a blue cap and the words “STRINGY McGEE” written on the side in electrifying print. Jimmy recognized the can as the off brand silly string sold by the corner store by his house.

“We’re gonna string up the place!”

Normally Jimmy would not have gone along with such a ridiculous prank, but being friends with Sam and Paul can make one do ridiculous things sometimes. Jimmy, much like his friend Paul, was fairly small for his age. Unlike Paul, Jimmy lacked energy and outspokenness and had a hard time making friends because of it. Jimmy spent the first ten years of his life with no friends at all other than his parents. This all changed one year when his parents forced him to go to a summer camp sponsored by the school that was geared towards “children in need of companionship” where they hoped Jimmy would finally make some friends.

At this camp Jimmy did in fact make friends, but not in the way in which his parents hoped. On the first day of activities in the camp, the campers were instructed to go find a round rock for a team building activity. The rest of the kids rushed off to find their rock with Jimmy lagging behind. By the time he got to the camp proper, the only rock he could find was a large stone hanging from a tripod in the center of the camp. Assuming this stone was a part of the activity, Jimmy untied the rope holding the stone to the tripod and hauled it back to his cabin, hiding it under his cot.

By that afternoon, the entire camp exploded with activity. Campers and counselors alike ran around yelling “Where is the rock?”,”Someone stole the rock!”, “Where did it go?” When supper time came along, the camp leader announced that someone or something had moved the camp’s special stone from its place at the center of camp. He explained that the stone had been a part of a sacred ceremony in which the camp participated in every year. He continued to explain the significance of this stone in several Native American rituals relating to the bond of friendship. He said that as long as someone anonymously returned the sacred stone by that night, nobody would be in trouble. While the man was making this speech Jimmy grew paler and paler. It soon became clear to him that he had inadvertently stolen the sacred stone and was in serious trouble. Options raced through Jimmy’s mind. Should he give it back? No, that would not work, he saw on one of those crime shows on TV that they could dust the rock for finger prints. Should he just get rid of the stone? But where?

Soon Jimmy made up his mind. Dinner concluded with some jubilant song about friendship and Jimmy made his way back to his cabin. He burst through the door and looked under his cot. The rock was no longer there. He bolted around the small cabin, flipping over everything, and sending paper and sleeping bags everywhere. In his haste he did not see the two dark figures entering the tent.

“Looking for this?” Questioned the tall figure as he held up a large object. Jimmy’s eyes soon adjusted to see two boys, about his age, standing in the doorway silhouetted by the small bit of light entering through the open flaps of the tent. The larger one held up what was undoubtedly the sacred stone. Expecting to be chastised for his actions, Jimmy began speaking very quickly. He pleaded, made up excuses, and tried to apologize for his actions. His words all ran together in a combination of adrenaline and fear.

“Whoa, cool down motormouth.” Interrupted the smaller boy, waving his hands at Jimmy.

“We’re not here to snitch on you.”

Jimmy stopped his incessant apologizing when he heard this. His fear turned into relief which soon turned into confusion.

“What?” Was all Jimmy could manage to say.

The smaller boy introduced himself as Paul and his friend as Sam. He then explained that he had noticed a bulge under Jimmy’s cot and decided to investigate.

“We think what you did was pretty cool.” Said Paul.

“Yeah, you’ve got the entire camp pissed at you” Added Sam.

They explained that they were planning on stealing the sacred stone that night, and that Jimmy had beaten them to it. They asked Jimmy how he managed to pull it off. Needless to say, Jimmy did not mention that stealing the stone was an accident. He made up a harrowing story involving him sneaking past several counselors in the middle of the night. Paul and Sam bought this story and quickly inducted Jimmy into their group. Jimmy knew what trouble the two were, but he decided to stick with them. Having two bad friends was better than having none at all, right?

Two years later, Jimmy began to regret that assumption as he hid in the bushes behind the Harrisburg Public Library. One hour earlier, Paul had ‘pennied’ (as he chose to call it) the side enterance. Jimmy, Paul, and Sam watched as the final librarian closed and locked the now useless door. She walked off to her car with the false sense of security that normally accompanies the assumption of penniless locks. The three waited for her to enter her car and drive off before they stealthily made their way to the door. Jimmy held his breath in hope that Paul’s penny trick would not have worked and they would have to go home. This hope was crushed as Paul easily popped open the door with a surprised smile.

“See? I told you it would work.” Whispered Paul as he slowly stepped into the empty library. Libraries are usually fairly pleasant places. Jimmy enjoyed their silence as well as their privacy. The whole idea of a place to sit down and read undisturbed brought comfort to Jimmy. The comfortableness of the library seemed to disappear when viewed at night. In fact, in the dark the library was downright creepy. Jimmy shivered as he reached into his backpack, full to the brim with silly string, and grabbed a flashlight. After turning on the light, Jimmy breathed a sigh of relief that he had been holding in since entering the building. There was no one around and the light reminded Jimmy that he had been in this place thousands of times. Paul quietly barked out orders and assigned Jimmy to the far end of the library, the children’s section. Jimmy tip toed over to his section and began emptying his first can of string. After the third can Jimmy began getting into it. He started jumping around and attempting to get string in every spot possible. Maybe this prank would turn out to be fun.

That thought was just leaving his mind when another quickly appeared. What was that beeping noise?

“ZZZT! Security system armed. ZZZT!” chirped the library’s overhead speaker in a robotic monotone fashion. Jimmy heard two yelps from the other side of the library followed in series by several more noises. The first being the easily discernible sound of a can of silly string being dropped upon the ground. The second was the sound of two pre-teenage boys barging out of the front door as quickly as possible. The third and possibly the most disconcerting sound was a quick chirp coming from the front and side door that almost resembled the sound of a locking library door. Jimmy calmly walked to the front door and confirmed his suspicious with a futile yank on the door handle. He was locked in.

Jimmy tried everything he could. The library phone was dead. That might have been for the better, who would he call? The police? His parents? He could imagine that conversation.

“Hey Mom! You know that library just down the street from us? Well my friends and I broke into it and defaced it with silly string and now I’m locked in. Whats that? You’re coming right now? And I’m getting a raise in my allowance and a new puppy?”

Jimmy tried all the doors and windows he could find. All of which were under the spell of the library’s surprisingly thorough security system. He even tried climbing through the vent in the bathroom. That bright idea not only did not allow him to escape, but it also added a broken toilet seat to his ever growing crime spree. His only choices remaining were to wait for Paul and Sam to come back, which seemed rather doubtful, or wait for morning and try to explain himself.

Jimmy spent the night in that dark library. In the morning the head librarian found him reading a copy of Macbeth while sitting on a pile of discarded silly string cans. She yelled at him for a bit, only pausing to call the police and his parents. When his parents arrived, they yelled at him for a bit as well. When the police came, they did not have much to say. Other than the Miranda Warning of course. They drove him downtown and sat him in a cold white room in an uncomfortable chair and asked him question after question about that night. Jimmy resisted the urge to demand a lawyer like he had seen in almost every cop drama and answered most of the questions truthfully. The only lie he told was that he had been alone in his actions. For some reason he felt it was only fair to not snitch on Sam and Paul. Their act of selflessness and anarchy in that tent several years ago inspired him to keep quiet.

In the end is was possibly for the better that Jimmy was caught in that library. He stopped talking completely with Sam and Paul, both of which dropped out of high school a few years later and are now very likely in jail somewhere. He also found another outlet to make friends. Instead of pressing charges, the head librarian only wanted Jimmy to volunteer at the library every weekend for a year, Jimmy ended up doing it for five. He loved walking through the walls of books, dusting and sometimes alphabetizing. But he especially loved when he was tasked with reading to the young children at the library. He would give fanciful presentations and would sometimes even show up in costume. Jimmy made countless friends through his weekly readings.

Jimmy still visits the library when he can. Being an adult with a wife, kids, and a job can sometimes be a bit of a time drain. But sometimes he manages to make time to come in and read to the kids. And maybe, just maybe, if you behave and ask him nicely Mr. Jimmy will tell you the story of the three naughty boys in the dark magical forest of books.


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