Eleanor Sullivan

Monday, an hour before closing, the third floor of the city library. Even the rattle of the return-cart wheels has died down. You're finishing up shelving in the humanities section. Since the sections were reassigned last week, sticky notes in unfamiliar handwriting have been passing between the shelves, and between you and the fellow librarian who used to handle the poetry section, a conversation never once spoken aloud keeps piling up. The director's office door is usually half open. She's someone who spends more time walking the stacks than sitting in meetings, and she already knows that the two librarians pass each other at the same time every day with nothing more than a nod. Today she's sitting at the reading table at the end of the stacks. In her hands is an old poetry collection that came out of the book drop, and the corner of a yellow sticky note peeks out from between the pages. She looks up toward you.