Tears dropped from PaigeSaga's dark brown eyes onto the papyrus before her. She turned the page slowly, her tears trying to choke her back from continuing the beautiful book cracked on its spine in front of her. Blurry eyes scanned the words of the last page of a book she'd read many times before coming to the last two sentences that she'd committed to heart: "As he lay there taking his last breath, a smile crept across his face. He'd lived his life for her, even if she'd never know it."
Paige closed the book a smile working its way across her own face. The worn smoothing of the rosewood cover barely showed the title of the tragic romance novel any more. Instead it showed that despite care, the book had been well used. She got onto her hooves picking the book up gingerly with her teeth, careful not to let her lips touch it. The wooden floorboards creaked under Paige's weight as she made her way towards the equally creaky staircase to the bottom of her most recent home.
The cobwebs were already starting to form. She'd only heard the clock chime twice, but already the spiders inhabiting the Clock-Tower were hard at work reconstructing their homes in hopes of catching something a bit smaller than a pony in their webs. Try as she might Paige couldn't duck and dodge them all. Reaching the bottom of the stairs she set the book down on a smooth patch of ground and shook her head vigorously. The tears that had rested on her cheeks flew off with any spiders that might have crawled their way into her silver mane. She picked the book back up again, and pushed against the clock tower's hardwood door.
Paige winced and lowered her head as she stepped into the harsh glare of the noon sun. She shuffled her way slowly across the dirt roads of ponyville and made her way to the singular library. A closed sign had been hung on the library's door handle again. Paige sighed heavily and rolled her eyes. She reached into her saddle bags and pulled out a small key.
Once inside the light tan mare inhaled deeply. The smell of the library filled her nostrils, exciting the skin underneath her fur. She shivered, exhilarated by the smell of the many tomes around her.
"Do you do that every time you come in here?"
Paige jumped high into the air, landing with her legs in a tangled mess underneath her and her silver mane smothering her face. She peaked an eye out from under her hair to look up at a purple and green baby dragon.
"Oh no, I just..." she trailed off and her eyes wandered to the floor.
The baby dragon looked around the room and let an an exasperated sigh. "Great, Twilight's gonna kill me if she finds the books like this."
Spike walked over to one of the piles of books that had fallen during Paige's leap and started re-shelving them. Untangling her legs, Paige regained her hoofing again. Hair still a mess she quickly shuffled over to spike's haphazard re-shelving. "Oh no, that's a Starswirl the bearded book. That should go in the non-fiction section," she commented.
Spike retracted his arm away from the shelf, book still in claw and looked at it again. "Non-fiction section? Twilight always organizes the books alphabetically." He furrowed his brow and looked at her inquisitively.
"Right, but that's not the way to do it. You organize them by type, so fiction or non-fiction, then you sort them alphabetically by title within their section." Paige smiled at the small creature. "It makes it lot easier for everypony to find. Often ponies have different preferences of books, even more so among fiction readers. Imagine if you wanted a horror book, but didn't know the name. It'd be very hard if the system was just alphabetical. But if the system had categories and then alphabetized within those categories," she paused for a moment, expecting the dragon to finish her sentence. When he didn't she finished it herself, "then everypony would be able to read much easier. After all, have you ever walked into a Library, wanting to pick up a book you've never read before and said to yourself 'Lets read something that starts with the letter 'A' today'?"
The baby dragon gave a slow nod only partially following her. "Here, just let me help out for a bit ok?" She picked up a book from one of the piles on the floor. A grin washed across her face and the soft-tan horn on her head began to shimmer silver. She placed the book back onto a shelf and the sparkling glow of her horn faded.
"Why don't you just use your magic to put them away, it's a lot faster," Spike asked rhetorically, picking up a book and tossing it behind him, immediately picking up another book and examining it's cover. Paige winced at the sound of the book colliding with another pile of its kind.
"That's easy. If I do it manually I can read the book. If I do it with magic, my magic is too busy picking up the book to help me read." Her grin faded as she mouthed another book, mutating into a sad frown. She quickly placed the book onto a shelf, and dusted off the label on the shelf that would once more hold only tragedies.
"There, all done!" Paige announced. Only minutes had passed and already the books were on the shelves in their new order. Paige picked up the last book on the floor with her mouth. Her horn declined to glow this time. The smell of the rosewood filled her nostrils again as she carefully placed the book onto a small cart of other returned books.
"Uh, thanks!" Spike smiled. "Guess you're a bit faster than I am." He scratched the scales on the back of his head.
"You'll get the hang of it eventually. I did this for a long time," she stated it as a matter of fact.
The dragon looked at her again. “What Library did you say you work at?”
“It doesn't matter.” She assured herself as much as she was assuring the dragon. “Mind if I read this here?” She pulled a book off of the 'Mystery' shelf and levitated it in front of the baby dragon's face.
Spike stood there dumbfounded as the brown maned pony curled up on the floor and cracked the book open. He had a small debate with himself about crawling back into bed. Not realizing how much time had passed, his stomach decided to break the silence that had previously only been punctured by the sound of the occasional page turning.
“Err, sorry.” He stared at the bookcase on the pony's flank before turning out of the room to return to his bed and grab a much needed meal. He dug through a few of the gems he kept around as food finally settling on a delicious looking emerald. He held it close and let a warm breath flow onto it then polished off the fog. Thoughts of the Pony in the main room crossed his mind as he looked at the gem. He took a deep breath and marched into the other room.
“No thank you,” the tan unicorn said before spike could even open his mouth. She turned another page.
“Huh?” once again Spike was dumbfound by the visitor.
“You were going to offer me lunch yes?” Paige asked without turning away from her book. Another page turned.
“Yeah, how'd you know?” he furrowed his brow.
“Just a guess. I don't eat gems though, care to eat out with me instead?” She closed the back cover of the book and rose to her hooves. She turned to him and flashed him a bright smile.
They walk passed quickly, and chat was scarce. Spike spent most of the time trying to figure out who the pony he was eating lunch with was.
“One daisy sandwich.” Paige chimed as the waited quickly took her order.
“And for you sir?” the waiter turned to Spike.
“How about.,” he paused to look at the menu. “I'll have one ruby mounted in gold please.” The waiter glared at spike, clearly not appreciating his joke. Spike shifted uncomfortably. “Just an orange juice,” he sighed.
Paige bit into her sandwich and chewed slowly. “So Spike, you enjoy working at the Library?” she asked between bites.
Spike shrugged. “Not really. I'd much rather sleep all day. But Twilight insists that I do chores,” he grumbled. “Wait a minute. I never introduced myself,” his voice took on a tone of suspicion. He leaned into the table and glared at her, raising an eyebrow.
“Everyone knows who you are Spike.” Paige giggled. “I'm PaigeSaga. I'm the...” She trailed off. She looked down at her sandwich suddenly no longer hungry. She pushed the plate to the center of the table. “I was,” she corrected herself. “I was the Ponyville Librarian,” she whispered.
“Wasn't the Library abandoned before me and Twilight showed up?” Spike took a large drink of his orange juice.
“No.” She shook her head. “I worked at the Library. But a few days before your arrival I got a letter from the princess telling me to find a new line of work.” She didn't bother mentioning how the loss of her job had also meant her eviction of her previous home.
The check came, and Paige placed a few bits into the tray, hopping out of her seat. “Look spike. I've got to go. Lots of reading to do.” She looked down at the ground. She slowly trotted away from the restaurant, leaving Spike at the table. Her light trot quickly turned into a full gallop as she raced home.
She rushed up the hard wooden stairs and into the dark room behind the face of the clock. She marched passed her bed and straight up to her mirror. She looked at herself, her lip quivering and already droplets of water starting to gather in the corners of her eyes. She knew she looked pathetic. The air of the room felt heavy in her lungs, and her stomach was letting her know it was dangerously close to ejecting the few bites of sandwich it contained.
She stomped her hoof at herself. “You're an idiot!” she screamed at the mirror. “You're dumb! You can't get another job and you're no good at anything but reading!” she continued screaming, working herself into a full blown rant of self loathing. She huffed herself into such a frenzy and she began to feel truly ill.
Eventually she dissolved into a mess on the floor, crying to herself. The light of the sun faded from the painted glass of the clock's front, casting the shadows of the clock's gears into an elongated state across the floor and walls.
The doorbell rang. She pulled herself out of her pool of drool and tears, trying to make herself seem presentable. “Coming!” She sniffled a few times before arriving at the door. Spike stood there, holding a book out.
“Look uh. If you want, I could really use some help with my daily chores. I have no idea how to organize books as good as you do.” He looked away from her, his eyes darting to the side.
“Thank you spike.” Paige pulled him into an embrace. “I'd love to.”
END