Library of Unrequited Love Read Free Page A

else to do. Because I don’t go round with those earphones bombarding tuneless rubbish straight into your brain. Not my cup of tea. Not at all. On the bus, I see all these zombies. One with his iPod, another on his mobile, number three fiddling with his tablet. None of these morons reads a book on the bus. Never. That would be too much effort. And then you expect them to come round here looking for education? No, not a chance, just look at them, brains switched off. As it happened, luckily, Martin was walking ahead of me without a mobile or earphones. I noticed that right away.Yes, that was a good point, I admit. I hadn’t seen his face yet, but I was already imagining that he had a high forehead, dreamy eyes and a determined mouth. When we reached the market place, he didn’t turn off to the shopping centre: no, he kept on going towards the library, like me. Then I realized it was the back of his neck that had captivated me, right from the start. Because is there anything more fascinating about a person than a beautiful neck seen from behind? The back of the neck is a promise, summing up the whole person through their most intimate feature. Yes, intimate. It’s the part of your body you can never see yourself. A few inches of neck, with a trace of down, exposed to the sky, the back of the head, the last goodbye, the far side of the mind? Well, the back of Martin’s neck is all of that. His square shoulders are a perfect setting for the upward sweep of his head, his curly hair caresses those few inches of skin, as if to soften his apparent solidity: a gentle and promising balance, so one already senses the strength of the body and the intelligence of the soul. How I admired him that day. Then, of course, I got to see his face. It’s a marvellousface, if a bit severe: I like boys with strong eyebrows, they’re reassuring. When he comes in here, Martin sits on this chair. He’s right, it’s the calmest, quietest corner of the room and you get a bit of natural light. Between us, it’s just “good morning”, “good evening”, nothing else. But I admit, this boy seems to me … how shall I put it? Well, it’s not really physical, no, he’s very polite, and I like that side of him too, but, well, he just seems … very intelligent. That’s it. And exactly the kind of intelligence that I appreciate. Someone who spends his time reading books, taking notes from books, selecting books, and all that so as to write another book, it’s really admirable. At the same time, he’s not pretentious, not at all. Very modest. I’d be quite ready to invite him home for a cup of Darjeeling. Why not? He could sit on my sofa. That’s what sofas are for: sit down, drink a cup of tea, talk about literature. At least that’s how I see it. I’m sure he and I have heaps of things in common, I just sense it. Like me, Martin isn’t very high up the hierarchy, he’s a foot-soldier of research, another assembly line worker, an anonymous toiler in the vineyard. But alas,I don’t dare invite him. I’m afraid I never will have the courage either. I don’t want to disturb him in his work. And anyway, he doesn’t come all that often, about once a week perhaps. The rest of the time, he must be at the University Library. Well, naturally, a local council library isn’t a cultural El Dorado. Mind you, we’ve done well to get this far: more than two hundred thousand books available to borrow, it might never have happened. To get a public library in a little provincial town like this took centuries. And his nibs the Mayor isn’t over-fond of us either. We never see him here, in fact, or anyone from his family. So apart from people like you, who are capable of falling asleep in a reading room, who comes here? Not that many people. They’re so ungrateful. When you think of all the trouble it took to reach this point. Because if you