Simon

From the "Curious Books" short story collection

Just one damn credit stood between the real world and me. After taking five years to earn a four-year degree, I was ready to be done. As graduation approached, I got a letter from the university. I could walk at commencement. But I needed to pay two library fines, about $170.00 in parking tickets, and earn one more credit before they would send me a sheepskin.

I turned to my closest professorial friend for help. Barry Robertson wasn’t much older than I was. Unlike me, he was focused, smart, and results-oriented. He had earned his Ph.D. in the time it took most people to finish a master’s. And he loved to teach. “Most tenure track docs are doing research, publishing, and sucking up,” he told me. “After six years of studying crazy people, I think I’ll teach them for a while.”

His I-don’t-give-a-shit vibe appealed to my know-it-all state of mind, and we bonded instantly.

So, who better to help spring me from academia than Dr. Barry?

“Let’s set you up with an independent study.” He reeled this one off without taking his eyes off the computer screen in his cramped office.

Barry was a great multitasker. While he tapped my name into the university’s registration system, he played chess with a friend in Frisco, reviewed a master’s thesis, and held virtual office hours on his Facebook page.

“Go spend a day with Simon at Curious Books. Watch the people who come into his store. And write something about your impressions.”

That one felt easy. I knew enough about the kind of papers Dr. Barry liked. I could whip one up with relative ease. And the idea of studying the people who still frequented used bookshops appealed to me.

Curious Books. It was a hole in the wall on the main drag that paralleled the university. Two floors of well-seasoned parchment and printer ink, books, magazines, comics, from pulp fiction to pop culture.

I was in.

The place didn’t open until 10AM, another plus for a student who ended a typical day at 2AM. And so it was that I grabbed a legal pad and a handful of Bic pens and took off to meet Simon Purtier.

To most people, Si was a cipher. He was a journalism student who had taken a part-time job at Curious Books and never left. When the original owner died in 1971, he had left the lease, the name, and two floors of inventory to his one faithful employee. Si kept the store open seven days a week, hiring a string of part-timers to free him up to peruse estate sales, library closings, and rare book shows whenever he felt like it. He lived in the basement of a house in the student ghetto, which was within walking distance of work. When he went hunting for literary stock, he would cram his treasures into the back of a 1965 VW Microbus.

Si wasn’t exactly welcoming. He had dedicated customers but didn’t seem to have any close friends. He answered direct questions but didn’t volunteer anything beyond “hello” when you walked into the store.

Over the decades, Curious Books became a required experience for everyone who went to the U, a place of pilgrimage for alumni, a hiding place for introverts, and a cave where both trash and treasure could be found in abundance.

“Dr. Barry sent me,” I said after Si’s nonplussed greeting.

He looked me up and down. “One credit short, eh?”

I wasn’t the first to do psych field research here. I nodded.

“There’s a stool behind the first edition display case. Make yourself at home.”

Si produced two paper cups filled with hot water. He had his own tea concoction, something that came with monthly regularity in a package with Chinese characters on it. Somebody over at international studies had brought him this bare liquid offering, and he had accepted it with the gratitude of a monk who was receiving alms for his begging bowl.

Si raised his cup. “To illumination.”

Traffic was brisk. Most people responded to Si’s disinterested welcome with a wave. But sometimes, someone would ask for advice. Si would size them up with a Sherlock Holmes intensity, purse his lips in and out like Nero Wolfe used to do, think for a moment, and then direct them to a single book title. The effect was hypnotic, and the customer would invariably buy whatever Si suggested.

One of the things we psych majors enjoy doing is creating a backstory for passers-by. Many a date night, I would sit beside a girl, point out a person in the bar, and weave an elaborate tale of their past, present, and future.

On the rare occasions when that pickup routine worked, it attracted my favorite kind of woman: A Monty Python fan who liked Alfred Hitchcock movies, Thai food, and the Kama Sutra.

“What do you see when you look at a person?” I asked him.

Si considered me with a practiced eye. I imagined what the cracked mirror in my apartment might have reflected. The exterior was 6’2” tall, about 185 pounds, and disorganized brown hair with a poor attempt at a mustache. My uniform of the day was a ratty Jacksonville Jaguars jersey with Mark Brunelle’s number on it, belt-less, well-worn jeans, and flip-flops held in place by toes that badly needed nail clipping. I didn’t think he could see the jade Buddha that hung from a leather necklace around my neck or the Timex Iron Man Triathlon watch on my left wrist. But I was getting the uncomfortable feeling that he had a pretty good idea of what was going on inside my head.

“People come to me to be judged.”

The way he said it sent a chill down my back.

“I give them an opportunity to become aware of where they are headed.”

I began to think this assignment wasn’t such a good idea after all. Was this Dr. Barry’s idea of a practical joke? Sending me to write about customers when it was the proprietor who was the basket case? Or was Si just fucking with me?

“How can you know what books to recommend?” I asked.

“I know every story in this place. Chapter and verse.”

That felt like a boast. “How many titles do you stock?”

“Two thousand seven hundred and fifty-three as of this moment.”

I looked around the counter. No computer in sight. Just an old-school battery calculator and a cigar box that doubled as the till. “Two thousand seven hundred and fifty-three?” I tried not to sound incredulous.

Si shot a glance at the front door. A tall, skinny white male crossed the threshold. They locked eyes.

“I got a doctor’s appointment,” our patron said, “and need a quick read. What do you have in the dollar bin?”

I watched Si regard his customer, and I tried to do the same. The patron didn’t look too different from me, except for the NRA T-shirt and the Smith & Wesson Border Guard 2 knife that printed a bleached silhouette through his left jean pocket. I looked at his fingernails. There were traces of red. Not the dark red of clotted blood. More like a bright tomato red. I noticed the same hints of color painting a pattern around the edges of his shirt. I decided he was a cook, and it was the apron that gave the impression of a poorly executed screenprint job.

“Selected Short Stories by Eldridge Endicott,” Si said. “Second aisle, halfway down, top row, fifth book from the left. Read the fifth chapter.”

Tomato Stain, the nickname I used to categorize this customer in my notes, frowned as if he didn’t like what had just happened. But then he seemed to change his mind. He nodded and disappeared into the stacks, returning a moment later with the Endicott, tossing a buck onto the counter.

He gave Si an icy stare. “You don’t have much of a life, do you?” he said.

“Not much,” Si answered. “Have a nice day.”

The customer left.

“Second aisle, halfway down, top row, fifth book from the left,” I repeated what I had written down. “Sounds like a magician’s trick.”

“That’s where the book was.”

“And what about that ‘fifth chapter’ stuff?”

“That’s the one he needs to read.”

“And you know that story?”

“Yes, by heart.” He had to be shitting me.

“So, tell it to me.”

The store was empty. The only other sound was the hum of the student FM station whispering Captain Beyond singing the opening verse of “Sufficiently Breathless.”

Si nodded… and began.