The Book Woman Novels & Stories

They had turned their backs on me, with joined hands. My eyes fluttered open, I sat up quickly, and I saw a lady in a gold glistening gown, she had a tight smile on her face. She gestured to me to come close to her. She looked like she was in her late 30s, still very young with brown skin and jet black hair. Everywhere was cloudy as though we were in the sky, walking on clouds. I walked towards her, trying to see if I would fall. Oh… I forgot I’m already dead.

For the whole week I’d been here, we had explored every part of his mansion, but this was my first time stepping into his study. This was where he worked, where he probably kept important documents. He must have trusted me deeply to bring me in here. My eyes trailed over the bookshelves, my fingers brushing lightly across the spines of neatly arranged books. Then I saw it—a framed photo of a woman. Before I could stop myself, I picked it up. I stared at it, frozen. The woman in the picture smiled brightly, her eyes full of life. My heart skipped. Was this… Dominic’s late wife?

She looked up. A woman she had never seen before. Older. Maybe seventy. White hair cut close. The posture of a woman who had once been someone significant and had never quite stopped, the particular uprightness of a person who carries themselves as if the space they occupy has always been theirs by right. She had a book in her own lap. She looked at Sophia for a moment, then looked down at it. The library was quiet. "You are running out of time," the woman said. Quietly. Without looking up. "He has decided to stay."

I thought about the six books. I thought about Arthur. She'll know that. I thought about a woman reading to feel less alone for twenty-nine years and the specific and worn spines of the books she had returned to and the receipt used as a bookmark and the full and attentive quality of a person who was genuinely inside a book, genuinely finding in it the thing she had gone looking for. I thought: she opened the first one. I thought: she is telling me she opened the first one. I thought: she is telling me she knows.

Blood spread beneath him in a slow, dark pool. In his hand, a white envelope. Security rushed forward, voices sharp, urgent. James moved at once, his entire demeanor shifting into cold command, “clear the area, now.” The envelope slipped from the man’s grasp and landed face-up on the polished floor. Bold black letters stared up at her. Mildred, her name.

He looks completely broken. "What did he say?" I ask. "He wanted to know your name," the woman says, turning her cold gaze back to me. "He knows you are not his wife. I told him you are just a visitor living in her meat." I blink. "You told him the truth?" "Why wouldn't I?" "The books say you are ruthless," I say, my voice dropping to a whisper. "The stories say you are a liar who tricked him." The woman takes a sharp step backward. Her face goes pale. "What else do your books say about me?"

His wife and kids were abroad so he lived alone, while she came for housecleaning she ceased the opportunity to go through his books, at first they were too hard for her to comprehend but considering she had been a science student at her secondary school, she quickly grasped it and everyday after cleaning she sat down and read the chemistry and biology text books One Saturday, he had called for her duties and when she hurried over, it had been to clean his lab which was always locked, she was fascinated by the place, it was the feeling one had after watching a movie, then seeing an actor from it live. Every single chemicals she had read about and seen in the books were right in front of her

“Yes, that is true. Now, come with me and I’ll show you where this book will be placed so you can refer to it as needed. You will use it to teach the women what is written in these pages, and the men as well, and begin a new nation of equality for our sex so that no other woman will have to make the choices, or be forced to make choices that are not of her own mind. For your children, and their children and their children.” Anna watched Vashti place the book into a box and then under the loose floorboards near the front door. She found a comfortable spot on the couch and curled up to sleep. She hoped that first light Vashti mentioned would come through her top floor balcony window in Santa M

The man supplied the fake name he had used in booking his room. Mary smiled seductively at him and replied to him. "Okay Adam." She said with a sexy voice and winked at him. "Do you want to see me tonight after your return? In your room to have me all to yourself?" She added ignoring those around her as she pointed to her big cleavage which she opened a little bit by the time she had finished her statements. She was a beautiful lady and has the shape of eight(8) that guys would love to date her.

She said getting off the bed. "What? You are leaving?; It's 10:07 pm" The woman told her checking the time and she was right. It's 10:07. "I can't stay here and I'll be fine, What is this place called?" Elsa asked. "Mid steak of San Francisco" The woman said. "Mid steak?! That way far from my house and I'll have to take a cab home." Elsa sighed. "What's the master's name and where is he? I need to thank him" Elsa asked again.