The Book Store was a crypt of whispers, pungent with the air of yellowed pages and dusty dreams. The shelves stood as tombstones, with their cracked and peeling spines, and the grandfatherly light from an angry grayish window was throwing jagged shadows onto the floor. Mann lingered by the poetry section, finger grazing a worn volume of Rilke, when the silence became an intruder: a faint hum, fleeting, three notes rising and one falling, the thread of music snatching at his heart and pulling."She turned, and there she was: three aisles away standing in that dust-blue beam of light, the aged streak wedging her hair into a river of ink and gold. She wore a green oversized sweater that was frayed at the cuffs, while the jeans hugged her thighs like a second skin. Her fingers excitedly played along the fiction shelf, trailing the books with a tenderness that made him draw in his breath. In a well-loved copy of The Bell Jar, she spoke half-gently to herself: 'I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.' And with that whisper, Mann felt his world crumble and rediscover itself in the shape of her."Cassette," he silently named her, the word kindling sparking through his veins; a promise he would mutter later on. A melody that had been haunting him for years in silence, a tape to be played until it returned."He could see her running her raw-cut fingers along the edge of the book's cover, and he imagined those hands on him-exploring him, claiming him, unraveling him."Her presence was a hymn, and he was already its apprentice.
He stepped closer, with boots muffled by the warped floorboards, the Rilke forgotten behind him. Some shadows in Plath's book obscured her sight; he enjoyed thieving away that unguarded moment of hers, with lashes fluttering slightly and breath forming a thin mist against the cold. As he edged closer, her scent wafted to him-lavender and ancient paper; the scent snaking up to his throat and kinking. He positioned himself with a foot's distance away from her by pretending to inspect a row of novels, but his eyes feasted on her: the leathered surf of her body against the shelf edge, the strand of hair burningly falling across her cheek, pleading for his caress.Then, there was an interruption. A man burst in confidently, his footfall clashing with a drumroll, a voice that dented the hush. Broadly built, he stank of cologne and bravado, carrying a law textbook like a trophy. "Hey, you're cute when you're brooding," he cooed to her in predatorial splendor, his teeth bright against the dark. "And babe, I don't know what you're reading that depressing shit for."
The hum instantly stopped. She recoiled, the tension rippling through her shoulders, and Mann saw the storm flare in her eyes: irritation, unease, a hint of fear. She gripped the book tighter. Her voice came delicately sharp. "It's not depressing. It's honest."The student laughed, leaning toward her, his shadow consuming her light. "Honest, huh? How about I buy you a coffee, and you tell me all about it?" His hand brushed against her arm, and Mann saw red. My pulse sounded like a war drum in my ears. He is so irritating, thought Mann as he twitched towards the switchblade in his pocket. A scratch on her song. I'll carve him out.
But she didn't need him yet. She stepped back, chin raised, and replied, "I'd rather drink bleach than talk to you." The words cut, precise and perfect, and the joy in Mann's heart sang-Cassette, my fierce little refrain. The man cursed softly and walked away, but Mann knew the echo of that would remain in her ear as an ugly stain against her peace. He would wipe it away.
She sighed, the tension leaving her, and reached back to the shelf. It was now or never for Mann. He grabbed a copy of The Bell Jar that had just been blessed by her fingers and let it drop, the thud punctuating the silence. "Oh, crap," he said, on purpose loud enough to wake her up.
She blinked and looked up, and their eyes collided.Her eyes were grayish-green, like sea glass smoothed by a stirring tide, wide and searching. His gaze was dark, almost black, smoldering with hunger disguised by a lopsided smile. "Sorry," he said, crouching to retrieve the book. "I saw you with Plath and thought, here's a girl who knows how to cradle a wound. With clumsy hands, though. I'm Mann. Her lips twitched with mirth, and with her head tilted, she said, "You are a poet, Mann?" Her voice sank into the marrow of his bones, low and velvet scraping. And she did not give him her name—not yet. Cassette was sufficient for him, as it were. "Only when," he said, rising and holding out the book-the fingers of his hands grazing hers as she took it, a spark igniting where their skin met-hers warm, very soft, a promise he'd kill to keep-within him argued. "Let me buy you a coffee. Something bitter to go with the pages." She paused then, the gaze roaming him: scuffed, worn leather jacket; tousled, dark hair; and now the faint tremor in his hands gave away the want if only he could see. Then she nodded. "Okay, but only if you've read it too." "I have," he said, and it was true. He'd sat with The Bell Jar, by himself and an old flickering bulb, in a basement years before, wondering about the girl who would feel its weight. There she stood now, real and radiant. "Cassette, you're the song I didn't know I'd gone starving for." They came out of the bookstore, the bell overhead ringing like a dark omen, into a street that led to a café. Autumn's bite was sharp in the air, and she pulled her sweater closer around her as they took seats by the window, steam rising from their cups. "Dark, no sugar-like my soul," she quipped, and he ordered the same while watching her lips purse when she sipped, a ritual he would memorize.
They kept on speaking until darkness fell. She adored Sylvia Plath but would not mind John Keats with much beauty and rubbish on the subject. "Things which rot have something living in them," she said, fingers circling the rim of her cup, "like they're screaming to be remembered." Mann leaned forward, his knee brushing hers under the table. "I would remember you," he said, voice a low rumble. "Each note, every crack. You could never fade." It was a laugh that came bright and like sunlight, sudden and stabbing-in Cassette, my perfect reel. She said that she'd now been hiding in libraries since childhood, saving herself from a father's fury, and pretty soon, books became her first refuge. Half-truths were offered with his mother's absence; how he learned his skill from working with broken things; leaving out the basement, the blades, and the countless nights that he had starved for this. The empty café remained-they stayed, her hand lying close his.
He stroked his thumb over her palm, her skin a labyrinth of faint lines he'd die to solve again. "You have an impulse like a metronome," he murmured. "Steady. Strong." She didn't pull away but gasped as he bore down harder, feeling her life thrum beneath his touch. Most people don't notice that," she said with her voice whispering intimately like a secret. "But you...are different, Mann." Different. It conflagrated his chest, awesome and possessive. "I see you," he said, leaning close, their foreheads nearly touching. "All of you. The cracks, the hum, the ones you hide. I would worship them, if you let me." Somehow her eyes flitted shut, and he thought she was going to kiss him, lips so close that he tasted her coffee breath. Except she drew back, smiling faintly. "Not so fast, poet. We've got time."
Time. He hated it for parting, but he smiled. "As much time as you want, Cassette." This last she didn't hear—he kept it caged in his throat, a treasure for later. They left behind fading streetlights, leaving her bathed in gold and shadow. He walked her to her bus stop and memorized her sway while her breath fogged in the cold. "See you again?" she asked, turning, her eyes searching.
"Count on it," he said, and when the bus rolled away, he sent it away watching till it vanished, the silhouette then engraved into the soul. He lingered, hands in his pockets, the law student face flashing—with those crude words, that grazing hand. Noise, he thought, fingers curling around his blade. "I will fix it."
That night, he stalked the man's scent to a filthy apartment above the bodega, where the air hung thick with beer and hubris. He waited for the hiss of the shower and the steam enshrouded window before slipping through. The knife drove into the man's throat and blood sprayed across the tiles like a crimson arc; he crumpled, gurgling, and Mann knelt, whispering. "He will not interrupt you again; you deserve quiet when you read, cassette."
He gets to clean the blade, leaves the body behind, and walks home under a night sky devoid of moonlight, carrying her book on consummate form. In his apartment, he lit up a candle and opened The Bell Jar to her page pressing his lips against the ink. "And this is how it all starts, Cassette," he murmured, his voice a lover's oath. "You and me. Forever on repeat."
He cleaned the blade, left the body, and walked home under a moonless sky, her book under his arm. In his apartment, he lit a candle and opened The Bell Jar to her page, pressing his lips to the ink. "This is how it starts, Cassette," he murmured, his voice a lover's oath. "You and me. Forever on repeat."