In the margins and inside the covers of dozens of books were Coin's messages to Mush. Some were silly, others pointless, and towards the end…most were gut wrenching. Because of Mush's livelihood he was able to read the young girl's scrawled penmanship inside the musty books. It took him weeks to finish the simplest of books, the same ones Coin read when she was half his age, but he did do surprisingly well. She smiled as he nodded and bit his bottom lip, trying to understand what was going on.
He hated every single story, plot, and character. He thought she read depressing books. She gave him books where everything was horrible and no one ever did right. But he read them for her and for those little scrawled messages tucked away in the musty margins.
The smell made him think of how lovely Coin smelled and how her hair fell perfectly off her shoulders.
It had to be love, according to the boys.
"If ya're reading books then dis girl has got to have magical powers," Race declared, flabbergasted that Mush was reading and that it wasn't headlines.
"Either dat or she's really good looking," Blink laughed. A chorus of boys responded making suggestive comments.
It actually angered Mush.
"She's my friend, so juss SHUT UP about her!" yelled Mush. The whole room fell silent.
"Damn, she must be special," Race called out and the room fell back into an easy murmur again; the whole incident forgotten.
For weeks the boys teased him, and Mush just stepped forward. Nothing could stop them. From…from…
Well, neither of them were exactly sure of what was going on.
Obviously, love was there. Neither of them liked the term or the idea at first. It was there, almost looming over their heads, but they ignored it. They wanted to be friends; they wanted to not hate each other in the end.
Coin's parents fought constantly. She was convinced that marriage and love is what did it to them. Her brother, who was a priest in Ireland until he was murdered by the British Army, was relatively happy before his death. He had always been smiling, sweet, and compassionate. But her parents were always in sour moods, glaring at one another across the dinner table. She considered being a nun but they always hated children and Coin didn't want to put anyone through what she had to go through at St. Mel's. She figured life went like this: you either get married, then hate someone your entire life or you completely remove yourself from that and end up dead or an evil-doer to children.
Basically, everyone was doomed in Coin's assumption.
Any doubts she had on her theory were gone the day she saw a group of nuns on their off time in the school office of St. Mel's. Coin had forgotten her mittens and her mother was desperate to know how she could forget such an important necessity to life.
"THEY ARE YOUR MITTENS COIN. YOUR MITTENS. HOW COULD YOU FORGET THEM?"
"Because without them I'll die of pneumonia, right?" Coin sarcastically remarked.
Before her mother could smack her with the wooden spoon, she left the apartment.
Coin ran the whole way back, through the gates, up the steps, down the corridor and to the cloak room. As she tip toed back to the front door, her hands now warm and her lungs safe from pneumonia, she heard the cackles of a group of middle aged women having a good time. She followed the sound of every horrible teacher's voice to room 116 (where Coin had religion every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday first thing in the morning) and saw the nuns, even Sister Mary Aileen was giggling.
Nuns, the most evil people on the planet, were having a good time. Coin then understood. Nuns hated children because they couldn't have any of their own so they didn't know what it was like to be a kid. Or to love children unconditionally. And nuns were happy when they weren't around because that missing link wasn't always on their minds like love was always on people's minds. They weren't bogged down with love and how it makes you despise the person who makes you out of control. Hence, the carefree laughter emanating from room 116.
Coin cried the whole way home. She wasn't sure why but her guess was that knowing that she'd never be able to laugh like that again tore her up inside. She didn't hate Mush, he was perfect in her eyes, but she'd never be carefree again.
She wiped the tears as snow began to fall. And then went home to the borders around the words she cared for so much. She wrote little messages to Mush, because it stopped her from choking on her tears.
"It's odd to write about love" Coin scribbled in the margin of a book where the heroine threw herself off of a building in the last chapter, "because it always sounds…stupid. But, this isn't stupid. Is it?"
"No, it isn't" Mush replied out loud.
He was the only one on the fire escape. The city's only reply was yells and horses clomping down the cobblestone.
Shout outs & love to Buttons, Dimonah Tralon, Lyra, & C.M. Higgins