Reading Vignette

Ayelet Schrek

FYI: This vignette uses the book The Book Thief by Markus Zusak as its base. The narrator in The Book Thief, death, is the narrator I'm using here.

Today it’s a girl, about thirteen or fourteen. I’ve seen her before, about three times if I were to venture a guess. The same amount of times I’ve seen the book thief. She reminds me of her. Of course, in almost every way, she is very different. She is clean, where the book thief is grubby, she lives in a completely different time, where I, at least in her part of the world, must be more subtle. The books she reads are not stolen. And, of course, she chooses me, not the other way around. Yet she has a certain gleam in her eye, a perseverance that I very well know.

I remember the first time I saw her. She gazed around, unseeing, unsure. This world was new to her. I was new to her. She knew of me, but she had never met me up close and personal. For which I am glad. I take no pleasure in what I must do.

The next time I saw her, she knew what she was looking for. She found me immediately, but she couldn’t look me in the eye. And when I beckoned her forward to begin my tale, her steps were slow, nervous and eager. Nervous to be eager.

This time she looks me right in the eye. I gaze straight back. She gives me a small, hesitant smile. I do not smile back. I can’t. But she understands. I pat the ground beside me. She sits down next to me, crossing her legs on the way down so she ends up sitting with them folded, never letting her hands touch the ground to steady her. She then looks up at me, expectant. So I begin.

First the colors.

Then the humans.

That’s usually how I see things.

Or at least, how I try.

I study her face. Her eyes are closed. Throughout my entire tale, they stay that way. Yet I know that this isn’t because she wants to block out the images I am giving her. This helps her see.

I speak very quickly, for this is how she wants me to. I dare not stop. I do not want to make her open her eyes. She is happy this way, and I am calm. Even as I rush to be in too many places in too little time, she calms me. And as I tell her the last line in my story, she sighs. I do not understand. Why does she rush through it if she does not want it to end?

But she opens her eyes, stands up. Thank you. And then she is gone.

I wonder when she’ll be back.