Like that awful cover ofPersuasionthat looks like the man-eating plant fromLittleShop of Horrorsis planning on having Anne Elliot as its next meal.
I turn my head and look at the bookmobile’s interior. On the whole, not quite as scary as the outside. There are neat little shelves for us to display and transport books, and it has nice flooring that looks fairly new. Thankfully Mayor Breckenbridge did that much in his bequeathment. Although I’m not sure who’s going to want to come inside with the outside looking the way it does.
Even though I know my initial reaction was one of obtuse disbelief and immediate denial and fear, the idea of a bookmobile is growing on me. I can be the librarian edition of Christy Huddleston, bringing books and knowledge and literacy to ourown backwoods, rural communities like Cutter Gap. And who knows? Maybe there’s an opinionated and painfully honest yet compassionate and sympathetic—not to mention ruggedly handsome—Scottish doctor waiting for me on my future book route. Hook me up, Catherine Marshall.
I’m catching the vision, seeing the inside of Cletus filled with tomes and paperbacks and board books. Little kids with big imaginations waiting to be swept away to places like Hogwarts and Narnia. Their parents on the hunt for new recipes, escape reads of their own, and the newest releases in nonfiction as well. People who don’t currently have access to all the library has to offer now given the opportunity to reap the benefits of free Wi-Fi and media.
I turn back around in the seat and pat the dashboard affectionately. “I take back what I said and sincerely hope you won’t hold my snap judgment against me. We’re going to end up being a good team, you and I.”
It’s more reflex than conscious thought that has me reaching into my purse and pulling out a small notebook not much bigger than the palm of my hand. I flip to the next blank page and jot down the day’s date. Next, in neat handwriting, I writeDrive Cletus, then stop myself before adding a check mark since I haven’t actually driven him yet or done anything that impacts someone else’s life. Which means I need to be on the lookout for my Good Samaritan moment to add to my list for today.
My thumb slips, and the previous pages in the notebook fan open, marking at least one inscription on each page. I randomly select an entry and trace the words with my fingertip.
Give away my umbrella in a downpour
I grin as I remember that one. It had been raining cats and dogs when I’d come out of a store and noticed a mother with a toddler in her arms, huddled under the awning. I could tellshe was weighing if she should wait the weather out or make a mad dash to her car even though it would mean both her and her child getting soaked. I’d opened my umbrella and handed it over, then raced out into the storm myself.
I flip to another page.
Take a CPR class
I haven’t had to use these acquired skills yet, but knowing that I can jump in and potentially save someone’s life seems like one of the bigger things I’ve done.
Leave coupons next to the item in the grocery store
Let someone cut in front of me in line
Give an extra tip along with an encouraging note
Play pinochle with the nursing home residents
Help Tai and Evangeline realize they’re perfect for each other
My list varies in scale and weight of importance. Some days I can only manage to do something small and relatively insignificant. Other days I can almost convince myself I’m making a difference in the world.
I’m sure a psychologist would have a field day with my notebook if one ever saw it and knew when I’d started recording my acts of kindness and why. I get what it looks like when given the full picture, but I swear I’m not trying to repay a debt. How can I? It’s my life. My literal life. Brain-synapses-firing, heart-pumping, breath-in-my-lungs life.
Or, I guess more specifically, blood-cleansing, bile-producing, metabolizing-proteins-and-carbohydrates life. Which, if you don’t know, are the three main functions of the liver, although the underrated organ is responsible for so much more. Which someone realizes the moment it refuses to function properly.
Ask me how I know.
It was three weeks before my twelfth birthday when my liver decided to go on strike for good. Acute liver failure, the doctors had called it. Before that, I’d thought the worst thing my body was going to do was put me through the rigorous torture of puberty.
If only.
Instead of worrying about being called Rudolph because of a large pimple on the tip of my nose, or the uncomfortable development of inconvenient breasts that did nothing but get in the way when I was playing sports, or dealing with my first menstrual cycle that of course came at school when I didn’t have any hygiene products in my backpack, I had to come to terms with the fact that I might not even live to be a teenager. Without a new liver, my life expectancy had been whittled down to a couple of weeks, tops.
The day I was wheeled into the operating room to receive a transplant...
There aren’t words. Not even the most poetic of authors could describe the kaleidoscope of feelings that were contained in my pubescent body. I no longer had an immediate death sentence hanging over my head. You simply cannot repay someone for saving your life. It’s impossible. Especially when that person had to die to do it.
But you know what youcando? You can make every day that you weren’t supposed to live count. You can try every day to impact another person’s life for the better, even if your attempts are only a fraction of the influence yours was given. And that’s what I’ve been doing for the last seventeen borrowed years of my twenty-nine-year-old life.
A knock on the window scares the living daylights out of me, and I grip my throat, trying to stuff the scream leaping out of my esophagus back down.
Tai stands on the other side, a mischievous grin on his face.
I reach for the door handle, then push the door open with enough force to catch my cousin in the shoulder. The hinges give off a loud squeak in protest, allowing him time to dodge the full brunt of my attack.
