The moon was just a silver on the horizon and without the street lamps I would have been gliding along in a darkness only broken by the occasional pair of headlights. It was a weekend holiday with no school on Monday and everyone had left campus on Friday to go camping or get out of town. My best friend had left for Vegas which meant I was on my own – again.
Not that I was complaining. I had two exams on Tuesday so I was perfectly fine with spending another one of my precious weekends – in the prime of my life – scouring notes in the library. And that's precisely what I had been doing just a short time earlier. The library was full of people in parkas sipping at hot coffee with their laptops in front of them. I had managed to nab my favorite seat overlooking the front of the library and my prime piece of real estate managed to elicite several envious stares from passerby.
"Not again, Chrissy," my best friend Megan had said with a sigh when I told her. She looked like she wanted to tear her platinum blond hair out – doubtful since she'd just paid a fortune to dye her roots. "But I'm offering you a free room. You have to get out of here. It's not healthy."
I just shrugged, sunk lower behind my chemistry textbook. "It's a sorority thing anyway, isn't it? Kappa kappa gamma gamma whatsit whosit…"
"Just don't forget to let loose sometimes, Chrissy," she said, getting up and shrugging on her coat.
"I let loose all the time. Look at me, I've got my drink sitting next to this library book. Do you know how crazy that is? One careless move and my drink could spill all over the pages and then the librarians would all run up here with their ninja stars and take me out and then…"
Her hand reached out in a flash and turned my cup around.
"Chrissy! I thought we said no more double shots of expresso! You don't handle the caffeine well."
"I handle it well enough to ace all my organic chemistry quizzes," I grumbled but she just smiled, her glossy pink lips turning upward in a sad sort of way.
"Goodnight, Chris. Don't stay up too late. See ya next week."
"Have fun in Vegas," I called over my shoulder and she waved in reply, her Prada outfit vanishing behind the elevators.
Studying Calculus turned into a herculean effort after that conversation; I found myself doodling cosine waves in my notebook instead of finding the derivative of some moving object's speed like my math TA was expecting me to for homework. Finally, I just fought my thick, curly hair back into a precarious bun that I figured would lose about a curl a minute because that's my hair – stubborn and unmanageable – before slipping my laptop away and heading towards the elevators myself.
I was stiff, my ankle boots killing my feet after a day of walking around campus, and all I wanted was a bagel for dinner and a quick shower maybe. Onion and chive on the bagel, or maybe lox… It wasn't until I was walking out the door of the library that I realized I'd left my coat on the back of the chair where I'd been sitting.
With a curse that sent the eyebrows racing up on a nearby librarian, I attacked the stairs, arriving on the third floor in severe foot pain and a general state of irritation. The library was still busy, even at eleven at night, and I wove through tables with study groups pouring over open books. When I got to the table overlooking the window with a view of the grassy mall, my coat was gone – snatched, stolen, purloined.
I texted Megan.
Someone absconded with my coat.
My phone dinged instantly.
How do you know these words? And how did that happen?
I forgot it on the back of the chair and it's too cold to leave without a coat…
OMG, Chris. You forgot those headphones last week and they got stolen too.
Caffeine is the common denominator. I was drinking it in obscene amounts when I lost the headphones.
Take the elevator to the fifth floor. Ask for Louise. You be fine
I tried asking her what she meant by it – and who the heck is Louise – but apparently our conversation was over because my phone was silent after that. Grumbling like the grouchy person college had turned me into, I squeezed into the elevator with a gaggle of frat boys. They hooted when I stepped off on the fifth floor and tossed me a flyer.
"Party next Friday at our house!" one of the pleasanter ones said. He smiled, honey-colored hair framing his face, and I felt my heart respond with a small flutter. Or maybe it was the caffeine wreaking havoc on my vitals.
The door closed again and I walked down a long row of books and periodicals, the invitation already pushed deep down in the pocket of my pants – like I'd ever have time for a party.
Fighting back an unfamiliar feeling of longing for something besides homework, I glanced around my new surroundings. I'd never been on the fifth floor before. I couldn't hear any hushed whispers here, no rustling pages – nothing. The lights up here seemed dimmer and the only book carts around were abandoned without a librarian in sight. My feet didn't even make much of a sound on the carpeted floor so I startled pretty badly when a finger poked me directly in the shoulder.
"Do you need help?"
Part of me was disappointed to see a tiny woman behind me, pink knitwear pulled unthreateningly around non-existent shoulders and secured with a pearl brooch. She looked like the grandma on the cookie packets they sell at the student union.
And I thought my life was starting to get exciting too.
"Are you Louise?"
"Yes, yes – do you need help?"
"I lost my coat and –"
"Say no more," she said, grabbing one of the abandoned book carts. "Just follow me. I run the lost-and-found up here."
I wasn't even aware the library had a lost-and-found which was odd since I generally knew where all the lost-and-founds were around campus.
For being advanced in years, Louise kept a killer pace – I chased after her and her cart as we made our way down an increasingly twisty path through the shelves. We came out into a small open area like a meadow in a forest of books. There was a tiny desk built into the wall here with the words LOST AND FOUND painted above it in block letters. Louise sent the cart flying into the far wall where there were at least ten others parked and scrambled behind the desk where she smoothed her fluffy hairdo back and gave me a distant smile.
"Lost and found, how may we help you?"
Danger, danger, said a tiny voice in my head and I was starting to agree.
"Ummm. Like I said earlier – I lost my coat…."
"What color?" she said without skipping a beat.
"White. It's a long wool coat with gold buttons on the cuffs here and here," I touched my wrists and she nodded briskly, already digging through the bins behind the desk.
"Keys, lanyards, backpacks, water bottles." She paused. "One of the first ever smart phones – how long have we been in business?" She tossed the object back in with a bang and went at it again until I could hear her scrounging through clothing. "Tsk, tsk – no white coats, I'm afraid. But don't worry, dear. I'm not sending you out in just that flimsy turtleneck. Let me dig through the we've given up all hope bin." Three seconds later she pulled a long black trench coat out that was at least three sizes too big – and I think it was a man's coat. "You can take this, my dear. Keep it – the original owner is long gone."
Thanking her, I pulled my mahogany curls back from my face (the curls had already escaped their bun) and slipped into the coat with a little help. The thing was so massively large it completely engulfed me once it was on, a clean cedar scent filling my nostrils as the black wool settled on me.
"Rosin," I whispered to myself, lightly sniffing the arm of the coat. "It smells like rosin dust. This is the coat of a violinist."
"Just take the elevator on your right, dear," Louise said with a rosy-cheeked smile as she gently led me away from the desk.
We ended up in front of an elevator I never even knew was there. I thought there were only the two that went up from in front of the main desk. The doors slid open as soon as I pressed the button and as I walked inside, Louise gave me a little wave.
"And remember, dear, that coat is yours – and so is anything you find in the pockets."
It was past midnight when I got out of the library. The moon was a still a sliver on the horizon and I sighed, trying not to trip in the over-sized coat. I missed my old coat – it was a gift from Father some long ago Christmas when we used to perform in the city square, him playing the violin and me singing, my lungs burning as I sucked in the freezing air. Thinking about him throwing an arm around my shoulder, trying to teach me how to slide the bow across the violin strings with the same elegance he had. Spinning me around and taking me to a pastry shop where we'd share a croissant with mugs of hot chocolate…
Jeez, after seven years you'd think you could get tough. I brushed a quick tear from my eye, my fingers moving towards the coat pockets. I'd rummage through them, hopefully find a tissue inside that had never been used.
My fingers hit something hard and small – a little booklet of some sort. I stopped under the orange glow of a street lamp outside the administration building – the halfway mark on my trip back to the dorm. A few people shuffled past, their breath hanging in the air and suddenly I was grateful for the warmth of the strange coat. It was a booklet inside the pocket, or maybe diary is a better word. The pages were yellow with age and the writing was in gorgeous calligraphy. The words inside were interrupted occasionally by music bars dotted with dancing notes, some hollow and others with little flags. The words were in a foreign language – French, I think.
Something stirred in my memory then – something from before. There were no words written to this music, but I began to sing the notes, my voice thin from disuse. To what would have been the pride of my third-grade music instructor Mr. Delaney, I managed to hit high A without much of a warm up. It was a short piece, but powerful. I savored the way it resonated deep within me, warming me from the inside out. The notes faded and I stood there, my thumb stroking the frayed edge of the paper before slipping the book away again.
It was an almost instantaneous change. The air suddenly felt colder and I shivered despite the thickness of the coat, a sudden gust of wind splaying my curls out across my face and blinding me momentarily. And that's when I knew there was someone behind me. I could sense him there, trailing not far behind.
I picked up my pace, cutting across the deserted lawn that stretched across the main half of the university. I cursed the fact that my pepper spray was somewhere else – in my old coat pocket, actually – and started to run, my breath lingering in the frigid air.
Someone had heard me singing.
I could sense him right behind me, an intimidatingly tall presence with smooth, even strides.
A sharp pain in my abdomen told me I wasn't going to be able to run much longer and I let out a startled scream as a hand grabbed me from behind and another covered my mouth.
"Christine," said a voice that sounded like liquid silver, like the color of the moon emptying out and spilling down to earth.
And I blacked out.
