Ink

This is a writing exercise. I tried to adopt a different voice than my usual sarcastic, slightly irreverent, Buffy-speaking, hyphen-filled tone. I was feeling content, so here is a moderately romantic short-story-type-thing that I hope you will all find to be nice. Just nice.
I intended to sit down and bust out a few paragraphs, but instead found myself absorbed in a world of my own making, and stayed up late transcribing this from the stray thoughts in my brain. As such, it's a little long. I apologise.
Also, it probably says something about me that this is my idea of a great relationship.



"We are part human, part stories."

Lucas pushed open the door of the library that time forgot, and paused to take in the scent. The musty aroma of old books and cardboard rushed to meet him like an old friend, and he was happy. As far as he knew, he was the only one who used the school's bookstore. It was a small room in which the school librarian stored the books nobody wanted to read.
That was, nobody but Lucas.
The room was Lucas' favourite place in the world. It was a room of books, nothing more, nothing less. He could stay there for hours just browsing, never opening a book, perfectly content simply to look and to feel and to smell.
It was his own personal space, the place in which he felt most comfortable. Tucked away in a forgotten corner of the school, he shouldn't really have been there at all. It was, technically, out of bounds for students. He certainly shouldn't have been skipping ninth-period Biology to go there.
The small section of school used for storage was truly forgotten, however, and there was little risk of being caught by a teacher. Even the cleaners left the place alone, for the most part. Besides the room he spent the most time in, there were several other rooms used exclusively for storage. One was for furniture, and it was from there he had taken the armchair which now sat in the center of the book-room. He supposed it had once belonged to a teacher, but he didn't care.
It was the best kind of armchair, the one that was old and broken and supremely comfortable. One of the legs was missing, but Lucas had remedied the situation by propping it up with a book of poetry. The cushions were busted and ripped, and they slid around quite a bit, so you frequently had to correct them.
Lucas loved that chair. Evidently, so did the girl that was curled up in its embrace, reading the aforementioned book of poetry. The armchair tilted to one side, and the cushions were dangerously close to falling off of the chair altogether. The girl seemed to neither notice nor mind this fact. She was curled up in the foetal position, her mouth silently forming the shapes of the words she absorbed from the paper and ink she held in her hands.
Lucas was surprised. He had thought he was the only person who knew about the room. Certainly, he had never seen another soul in there. The girl was wearing the uniform of the school, but Lucas didn't believe he had seen her around before. She was pale, with wispy, reddish-blonde hair and eyeglasses that were perched on the tip of her nose. She didn't seem to have registered Lucas' presence.
"Excuse me?" he asked quietly. The girl did not move, save for turning a single page. Lucas loved that sound; the rough noise as the pages caressed one another fleetingly. He repeated his statement, slightly louder this time. "Excuse me?"
The girl looked up in surprise and sat up slightly in the armchair. Her glasses still on the tip of her nose, she pushed them up in order to see who had disturbed her so. "Hello," she ventured.
"Hello," replied Lucas. Now that the conversation was initiated, he knew not what to say. There was silence for a while, and then the girl returned to the sanctuary of her poetry collection. She was not rude about it, and Lucas was not offended in any way. Still surprised by the very presence of another person, he went up to one of the shelves and removed the book he was currently halfway through. Settling down on a cardboard box filled to the brim with old science textbooks, he began to read.
The pair sat in silence, each enveloped in a world of words, until the end of school bell went. Lucas tore himself away from the allure of the pages he held in his hands, and made for the door. Remembering his manners, he turned to the girl.
"Goodbye," he said.
The girl, again, remained motionless, and made no indication that she had any intention of moving. Gently closing the door, Lucas sighed to himself.

* * *

Lucas went through the next day of school as best he could, attempting to pay attention in class, and trying to appear studious. No matter how interested he seemed, however, his mind was on other things. He still didn't know who the girl was. He had been keeping a close eye on every crowd he saw, scanning the corridors for a glimpse of that fiery hair, or a telltale glint of sunlight on spectacle lense. However, he saw neither thing.
After lunch, he could no longer stop himself from checking the room. Surely if she was not in the throng of students, she would be in there?
When Lucas reached the door he had seen so many times before, he did something he had never done before: he knocked. He did not expect a reply from the silent maiden of the room, but he felt a knock was fair warning. As he had expected, no reply came, so he entered.
Inside, he did not find the girl; instead discovering something altogether more surprising. Beside the chair he had moved from the other room was a different, equally decrepit leather armchair.
Despite himself, Lucas smiled.

* * *

A few weeks on, and Lucas and the girl had become firm friends. They had exchanged a grand total of twenty-seven words, and neither knew the other's name, but if you spend time with someone, even silent time, you pick up on their nuances and grow to know them well. Lucas had taken to skipping entire days of class in order to sit in the room.
Finishing a novel and setting it to one side, he reached for the next book. His hand was around it when the girl spoke.
"I don't think you want to read that one," she said. It was probably the longest sentence that had been spoken in the room.
"Why not?" Lucas questioned, surprised the girl had spoken unprompted.
"It's simply not very good." Lucas thought he picked up a trace of a vaguely upper-class accent that had previously gone unnoticed. "It's a bog-standard romance. The writer has an unremarkable style. The plot is clicheéd, the characters are flimsy and one-dimensional, and the sex scenes are badly written."
Lucas smiled. "I didn't even know it was a romance," he said truthfully, setting the novel back where he found it and picking up a different one. "I was just reading it for the sake of reading."
The girl smiled also. "That's the same reason I read it. How was that?" she asked, pointing at the novel he had just finished. "I was considering reading it next."
"I liked it," Lucas admitted. "I wasn't crazy about the ending, though. How's yours?"
"Decidedly mediocre."
They smiled at one another before blushing, and both resumed reading. They had realised simultaneously that they were having a proper conversation, and the thought had scared them just a little.

* * *

More weeks passed, and the conversations got progressively longer. They were always similar, but never boring. They were always about books, always. The pair had become remarkably close, and yet still didn't know eachother's names. The subject had never come up.
Mid-term break came, and Lucas found himself missing the girl and her silent company. He was grateful when the break was over, as it had felt more like a punishment than a holiday.
Upon returning to school, the first thing he did was head for the room. He reached it, but was distraught when he saw who was outside it. The girl was standing in front of the open door, tears welling up in her eyes but not falling. Lucas rushed over to see what the matter was, and was shocked to see that all of the books had been removed. The room was nothing more than an empty shell.
"I checked the other rooms," said the girl. "They weren't there. They're gone. All the books are gone. They cleared the rooms."
Lucas found his hand reaching for the girl's, and their fingers intertwined. He wasn't even sure he meant to do it; it just felt natural.
After a long period of silent hand-holding, he spoke.
"I'm Lucas," he said gently.
"Anya," said the girl, equally quiet.
"Look at me," said Lucas and the girl- Anya- looked at him. He wiped the tears from her eyes with his free hand, and smiled at her. "There's always the library, right? As long as there are books, we'll be fine. As long as there's ink on a page and words in our hearts, we'll be fine." And with that, Lucas pulled Anya into a hug, the first of many.



Author's Note: Feedback on my unedited melodrama would be much appreciated, thank you. How did you find the more sincere tone? Was it a bog-standard romance? Is my style unremarkable? Was the plot clicheéd, were the characters flimsy or were the non-existent sex scenes badly written?
Comment away, true believers.
(I, personally, dislike the second-last line. But, hey, I'm keeping it intact. It wouldn't be a writing exercise if you edited, would it?)