1
You cannot be serious,” I say, my voice oozing with dubiety as I take in the heap of metal littering the corner of the library’s parking lot. The monstrosity looks like it’s in need of a tow truck to take it to its eternal resting place in the junkyard and not at all like a vehicle primed and ready for its reincarnate life as the new bookmobile.
“I’m afraid he’s deadly serious, Hayley.” Evangeline breathes out the words while also staring at what has become my newest worst nightmare, dethroning my recurring irrational fear of getting stuck inside the “It’s a Small World” ride at Disney World.
“Maybe we shouldn’t use the worddeadly.” Martha winces from my right.
I’m sandwiched between our small town’s other two librarians, the three of us in a disbelieving stupor, still trying to make sense of the ... the ...thing... parked cattywampus in front of us. When Marge from the town council had dropped by last week to say there would be a surprise waiting for us this morning, not in a million years would our imaginations have come up with something like this.
And our imaginations are Olympic-level, let me tell you.We’re librarians, after all. We practically marinate in the creative realms, and yet we’ve still been blindsided.
“Yeah, new rule.Deadlyand all of its synonyms are no longer a part of our vocabulary when referring to...” I wave my hand in front of me, gesturing to the heap of metal. The paint is chipping and peeling, the seams are flaking iron oxide at an alarming rate, and I can’t imagine the parts under the hood are somehow in any better condition.
It still needs a name, though.
I swipe my hand in its general direction again. “Cletus.”
Martha whips her head toward me, her wide, caramel-colored eyes disbelieving. “Cletus? Really?”
Evangeline laughs softly. “Haven’t you noticed Hayley’s little quirk of naming inanimate objects?”
Martha shakes her head, her curly hair growing bigger by the second with the humidity in the air. “Okay, fine. But Cletus?” She huffs.
I shrug, not seeing why she’s so put out with my choice. “It looks like a Cletus to me. You don’t think so?”
She turns so her whole body is facing me. We are no longer the three of us united against ... Cletus.
Okay, maybe not the best name, but I’m nothing if not stubborn, so I’m sticking with it. Especially in the face of Martha’s incredulity.
“The name Cletus is of Greek origin. It meansillustrious.” Now it’s her turn to wave her hand at the unwanted, not-asked-for automotive hand-me-down. “Does that thing look illustrious to you?”
I purse my lips and pretend to inspect the newly acquired bookmobile, hiding another wince by tapping my mouth with my finger.“It does have a certainje ne sais quoiabout it.”
“Ifje ne saisquoimeanstetanus shot.”Evangeline mumbles more to herself but loud enough that we all can hear.
“The definition is actually ‘a quality that cannot be described,’”Martha supplies helpfully, which is no help at all. “Andthat, ladies”—she punctuates by pointing a finger at Cletus—“can be described with a litany of negative adjectives.”
“We’re in the foothills of southeastern Tennessee, not the cliffs of Santorini, so of course I meant the hillbilly version of Cletus and not the Greek rendition.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Evangeline’s voice holds a note of forced optimism.
Optimism I’m just not seeing at the moment.
Martha’s eyes brighten. “Did you know that the first bookmobiles precede anything with an engine, and library deliveries to the remote regions of the Appalachian Mountains were made with horses as the means of transportation? It was called the Pack Horse Library Project.”
I cock my hip. “I’m pretty sure this is the perfect time to look a gift horse in the mouth. Because if this was the 1930s, then the proverbial horse we’ve just been given is an old, lame swayback nag that would probably have keeled over on the first strenuous incline to a hollow where we—so sorry,I—would’ve been left stranded to fend off wildlife and the elements or perish.”
“Someone is being a bit dramatic.” Martha attempts to quell her grin but fails.
I sigh as I let my chin fall to my chest. We’ve sorely gotten off topic. “Explain to me how we inherited Cletus.”
“Without getting too mired in small-town politics, Mayor Breckenbridge made acquiring a bookmobile for the library one of his reelection campaign promises. Even though we’re a part of the county library system, because of our geographical location and the fact he’d planned to donate the mobile library, it was a promise he could fulfill because he knew the county would use our branch as the bookmobile’s home port. What he failed to inform the good citizens of Little Creek, however, was that when he saidbookmobilewhat he really meant wasthe beat-up, rust-bucket, ancestral remains of a Volkswagen Transporter that was sitting in his front lawn.” Evangeline tsks.
“And how did the responsibility of mobile librarian fall on my shoulders again?”
“I can’t drive a manual transmission,” Martha answers simply.
I spin on my heel and clamp desperate fingers to Evangeline’s shoulders, pinning her in place. “You can. My cousin taught you. I’ve seen you driving Tai’s Challenger around town.”
