Ghost V
Full disclosure, I’ve been hit with a wicked case of writer’s block. So after much delay…
Ghost V
Jake and Alison continue to meet in public places. Alison summons Jake repeatedly with hidden messages – written inside a pizza delivery box, a voicemail sent from one of the few living payphones left in the city, handwriting on the back of the hold slip from his library book. Jake can’t figure out how she knows his movements so well, but he thinks about asking her for detective advice.
Jake develops a sense of responsibility towards the journals. He designs a plan to keep them secure. He buys a large box of fish sticks, removes the sticks and uses the box for storage. He places each journal into a large Ziploc bag when slides them into the fish stick box, glue-sticks that shut, and places it in the freezer. He doesn’t tell Alison exactly how he has secured the journals but assures her they are safe. She appears to believe him.
It's early spring by the time they sit and talk in the laundromat. Between wash, dry, and fold cycles, she tells him what she knows about the history of the librarians, admitting that she doesn’t know for certain what’s fact vs lore. What she knows of the story goes like this. In the 1980’s, there was a librarian in rural Colorado whose daughter came home to escape a relationship. This librarian was a protective dad and he was afraid when he learned of the abusive circumstances that brought his daughter back to her hometown. His daughter also had a little kid, his granddaughter. And so there he was, completely torn because he knew that the best way to protect his daughter and granddaughter was to make them disappear. So he connected with another librarian in another state who also had a connection with someone who worked at social security. He disappeared his girls. He was heartbroken and frustrated. And the story goes that shortly thereafter another librarian, someone he didn’t know, reached out to him about relocating a women to rural Colorado. And the exchanges continued and grew into a network of librarians across the country who could help rename and relocate people through messages sent in interlibrary loan documents.
Alison gets up to put her clothes in the dryer. Jake can’t believe it. Interlibrary loan. When Alison sits back down, he asks her if there is a way to send a message to L? She responds surprised, of course there is but it’s up to her whether she writes back. Jake repeats his question, can he really just write to her and have the letter forwarded. Yes. He can’t believe it! He asks Alison why she didn’t tell him this in the beginning. She reminds him that he never asked. He helps her carry two laundry baskets to her car. For the first time, she says see you later.
That night, Jake eats fish sticks with tater tots while he pens a letter to L. He spends way too much time trying to introduce himself and feels deflated that there isn’t much to say. The letter explains that K has hired Jake because he hopes to find her, that K seems sad and hurt. He doesn’t talk about the journals, deciding it is too risky, but does allude to them with acknowledgement that he has connected with Alison. He can’t remember the last time he wrote a letter. How and when is he going to get this letter to the librarians? He decides to go for a walk and when he walks out the front door of his apartment, as though he willed her to appear, Alison is standing across the street leaning against her car, with a smile.