28. Local warming

They all said the same thing. “Mmmmm. It’s warm in here!”

Compared to the chilly streets of winter Canberra, it was summer in Ounce Books, and customers were inclined to linger, browsing through the books, patting Grace the cat, or just chatting about books they had read or wanted to read or might be persuaded to read.

Grace lapped up the attention while Ann sipped on her second cup of cooling coffee. She wondered who had made them. Barista Ben had never failed to charm her with a heart-shaped arrangement of powdered chocolate on the foamed surface of the coffee.

Just like these two mugs today.

But that didn’t mean that he couldn’t have taught the skinny blonde how to do it. They could have stood side by side, his hand guiding hers as he showed her his perfect heart.

Ann could do with someone standing beside her. Or walking hand in hand, sharing the back seat of a taxi coming home from dinner, looking at her over a glass of something. Anything, really.

She bent down and rubbed Grace under her glossy black chin. The small black cat closed her eyes in happiness and began a low rumbling purr. She rolled over for Ann to tickle her tummy, legs stretched out in contentment. Ann would swap places in a moment, if she possibly could.

Instead, she sighed, slipped back behind the counter and selected her “comfort music” playlist on the docked iPod. Heavy on the Grateful Dead songs of her youth, the music took her to happy times and places. Golden Road to Unlimited Devotion was first on the shuffle.

California, early Nineties, camped out on a secluded beach for a week with a floating population of fellow students. Surfboards, joints, pretzels and Anchor Steam. A big black ghetto blaster chewing up D-cell batteries and cassettes. Nights around a driftwood fire, working out how to save the world. Days in the sun, salt in the hair, clothing minimal or non-existent. Sleeping bags zipped together at night with a computer science student whose grand vision of the future had turned out to be far short of 2009’s reality.

Dawns were cramped, sticky and sandy, but oh the closeness of their embraces, the sleepy eyes and tousled hair! Morning dips in the freezing surf, breakfasts of cold pizza and instant coffee. And love, barefoot and warm in linked fingers, slow caresses and shared looks. Ann’s Grateful Dead Skeletons from the Closet tape had been their soundtrack.

Somehow they had drifted apart. Last she’d heard of him, he was married with kids in some development south of San Jose, walking his poodle on weekends and cheering the Sharks to victory from season ticket seats in The Tank.

And here she was, alone on the other side of the world. Maybe she’d see him again in October on the way to or from the BookCrossing convention in Kansas City. Maybe he’d have a friend…

The door opened and a customer entered, bringing a blast of cold air with him.

“Ahhh, warm in here!” he said, automatically seeking out the heat vent.

Two weeks ago Ann had been in Edinburgh for the annual British BookCrossing UnConvention. “Un” to mark it out from the official world convention in New Zealand. Edinburgh had been grey and delightfully mediaeval. Rain in torrents giving way to watery sunshine. But a warm escape from Canberra’s winter. She had walked down Scotland Street in the New Town, poked her nose into the miniscule front room of the Oxford Bar, renewed friendships with the cheerful British BookCrossers – and a couple of visiting Aussies – and lugged home a bag full of books scooped up from the groaning table that marked every BookCrossing gathering.

Not a great deal in the way of unattached males. Not like Christchurch in April. And Tom.

Ann’s mind wandered off again. She and Tom had found a great drift of autumn leaves in one of the city parks. They had been hiding from a criminal lawyer at the time and had contrived to submerge themselves completely under the red and gold pile until the danger had passed. For the next day they had picked fragments of leaves out of their hair, their clothing, their ears. But it had been fun…

“This one of your books?”

It was the customer, holding out a book with a picture of a countdown timer on the cover. No wedding ring on his hand, Ann noticed.

“Ah, no. That’s a free book. See, there’s a BookCrossing label on the front. You can take it away with you.”

“I saw that. I mean, is it a book that you registered?”

“You know about BookCrossing?” Ann inspected the customer with more interest. Business suit, perhaps a little more charcoal-grey and snappier than the average public service manager. Somewhere around thirty, dark hair, lean face. And a pretty good body. She straightened up and drew her shoulders back.

“This book has caused a great deal of trouble. Do you think it’s wise leaving books around where they shouldn’t be?”

Ann gasped. That was the whole point of BookCrossing. She stood up even taller. “Maybe not wise, but a whole lot of fun! They’re just books!”

“Yeah. Well, this one cost a lot of people a lot of money.”

The shop phone rang. Ann glared at the man. “Excuse me.”

An elderly voice on the phone. “Hello? May I speak to Ms Ounce, please?”

“Speaking.”

“You wrote a letter to The Canberra Times about the new Commonwealth office building.”

“About the magpies.”

“Yes. I liked the point you made. That’s why I’m calling you. There’s a group of concerned residents meeting tomorrow for a public information evening. We’ve invited someone from the government to come along and answer questions. Would that be something you might be interested in?”

Ann considered this. It wasn’t that she was having a wild night on the town. A can of diet soup in front of the box, more likely. “Yes, please.”

“Good on you. Six-thirty tomorrow at the Ainslie Football Club. Sorry about the short notice, but it’s important we get things going promptly. The room’s booked under the name of Kern, but we’ll have a sign up showing the way.”

“Thank you for the invitation. I look forward to it.”

“I’ll see you there, then. Goodbye!”

Ann put the phone down. She was becoming quite a public figure! Letters in the paper, invites to meetings. Maybe there would be a television crew in attendance, and she could tell the world about the magpies.

She looked up. The man with the BookCrossing book had gone while she was talking. But he’d left the book on the counter. Neatly ripped in half.

Copyright © 2009 Peter Mackay