Downtown

After lunch, the girls made their way into town, the cruel October wind cutting through their skirts, painting their shins with cold. An annoying pale grey sky hung overhead with the unfinished idea of rain like the sky, itself, taunted these stupid brutal winds.

“Race you!” Megan dared, jogging off. As they entered the town, they slowed down and caught their breath. There were very few buildings, here: a general store, the post office. A small church set back from the street next to a nondescript brick structure displayed a small courtyard with a few trees. The brick building had the words Town Hall stenciled in concrete over the door.

Meg and G approached the Stull town hall to get out of the cold and decided to just go ahead and enter, if only to find out where they would need to go to find the nearest library. The tiny one-room building looked more like a storage shed than a town hall. They approached the counter where an ancient bespectacled hen sat practicing her needlepoint. Megan cleared her throat. Twice.

“Oh, hello, there,” the woman crooned. “Can I help you?”

“Um…” Megan stammered. “Is this the library?”

“Deary, it’s whatever you want it to be,” she answered, smiling.

“Okay,” spoke Meg, still hesitant. “We’d like to register for library cards, please.”

“Library card?” she laughed lightly. “We don’t do library cards here, Deary.” The girls looked at each other briefly. Different.

“Can you tell us where the library is?” Megan asked plainly.

“Deary, this is the closest thing we have to one.” She gestures a withered hand towards three tall shelves to the right loaded with pulp westerns and reference books. “Topeka Public sends a truck once a week and we keep a few on hand here for the townies. We don’t have much, but we can always file for a request, if you know what you want.” The woman examined them closer.

“So does that mean we can check books out with our Topeka Library cards?” Meg asked, encouraged.

“We don’t use library cards, here, Deary,” she snickered. “We only got about twelve families in town, but…” she paused. “Something tells me that we might now have thirteen.” She pieced it together in her mind for a moment, then snapped her fingers. “You must be that new postmaster’s girls. What’s his name?”

“Dale Gustavson,” G chimed in. “That’s my Daddy.”

“Gustavson, that’s right,” she sighed in satisfaction. “And what’s your name?”

“Greta,” G beamed, "but everyone calls me G."

“I’m Megan,” Meg added.

“Well, aren’t you two just precious?” the librarian gushed. She folded her hands daintily in admiration. “I bet you two are just a couple of heartbreakers, aren’t you?” Megan fought the urge to roll her eyes like Jan told her to and just smiled, thankfully. “My name is Maryanne Masters, and I’m the Town Clerk. Anything you or your father need, I will do my best to help you out.”

“You mind if we check out what books you have?”

“Not at all.” Mrs. Masters escorted them around the counter to the bookshelves. “We got all the greats: Owen Wister, Zane Grey, Clarence Mulford, A.B. Guthrie, Jack Schaefer, Louis L’Amour…”

“Any Jane Austen?”

“Well,” she scoffed. “We don’t carry any garbage in here, if that’s what you mean.” Meg balked. Mrs. Masters looked around on the shelf for a moment. “We got some Dickens, here, and some Shakespeare histories, I think…” She searched the shelf. “But those might be checked out.” The girls were more than disappointed.

“This isn’t a library,” G whispered to Meg.

“Do you have any children’s books?” Meg posed.

“Not really much demand for that kind of thing around here, Deary,” the clerk answered. “If you want, we could wire Topeka Public and see if they can get you something, though.” She stood there for another moment while the girls glanced through to the reference books, most of which were religious in origin and in German. “A good portion of our town has German ancestry; Pennsylvania Dutch; so we’ve got a collection of German Anabaptist books. Some are translated into English, actually. That might interest you?” she offered, trying her best to sound encouraging. The girls looked back, confused. “I’ll just be over here,” she conceded, bustling back to her desk. As she returned, a young man, well-built, maybe mid-twenties walked in. His black trousers and suspenders complemented his neatly trimmed blonde hair, and it was evident that he was used to getting attention from all sides.

“Hi, Gam-Gam,” he blurted, catching himself a bit too late to realize that there were visitors. He sallied up to the counter and leaned down to kiss her cheek before he noticed Meg and Greta standing beside the counter staring at him. “Oh, I’m sorry,” He stammered. “I didn’t know anyone else was here.” He blushed, embarrassed.

“It’s fine--,” Meg started.

“—Oh, these are just the two Gustavson girls,” Mrs. Masters offered, standing. 

"Say, ain't y'all related to Deuce Gustavson out of Topeka?" he inquired.

"Yeah, he's our grandpa," G explained.

"I listened to him since I's a kid," he confessed. "You might be celebrities in these parts." Gam-Gam noticed Megan's gaze and continued.

"They were just looking over our book selections. They’re the new postmaster’s kin.”

“Oh, well, how about that?” the young man smiled. “Be nice to have some younger faces in this town.”

“Well, we’re certainly happy to have them, aren’t we?”

“We sure are,” he agreed. He approached Megan and stood with his hands on his hips, feet planted directly beneath each broad shoulder; like a superhero, Meg thought, smiling back. “I’m Johannes Masters, town deputy. Folks around here call me Joe.” He brought his feet together, dropped his arms, and bowed slightly, offering a hand to Megan.

“Pleased to meet you. I’m Meg,” she stammered, offering him a hand in return. “This is my sister, Greta.” His gaze shifted to the younger girl.

“And how old are you?” he asked.

“Eight--,” said Greta, at the same time Megan answered, “--Seventeen.” Meg laughed nervously. In actuality, Megan wouldn’t turn seventeen for another month.

“I’m eight,” Greta announced, staring at Megan.

“Well, that is a shock,” replied Joe, glancing back at Meg briefly. “I would have sworn you were at least ten.” He smiled at Greta. “You look like such a lady in your nice clothes.”

“My daddy got me this coat just before we moved from Topeka,” G explained. “I wanted the green one, but he got the blue one ‘cause it was on sale from Monkey Wards.”

“Monkey Wards, how about that?” he chuckled.

“Leave it to a postman to get the best deals through the mail, right?” Meg added.

“Welcome to the town of Stull, population 112,” Joe offered. “We don’t have much, but what we do have is good folks with good hearts. Hope can find something worth reading, here, but if you can’t,” he gestured back to Gam-Gam. “This here is my Grandma, and she’s more than happy to help you out.”

“And what brings you by on this fine, fine day?” the clerk asked.

“Aw, just checking things out. Bored to tears down at the station.” He walked back to his Gam-Gam and leaned on the counter. “Henry Miller’s dog got out again gobbled up a chicken down at Snyder’s Farm,” he added.

“That dog is nothing but trouble,” she replied. “How many is that this year, five?”

“Seven.” Joe pressed his lips together and raised his eyebrows.

“Worse than a coyote, I’d say,” she continued. They went on chatting casually about the ongoing saga of the Miller’s miscreant German shepherd. The girls went back to looking through the weird collection of German religious books, Greta looking more and more bored as each second passed.

“Can we go?” she whispered to Megan, who was obviously trying to listen in on Joe’s enthralling conversation.

“Just give it a minute,” Meg responded. She pretended to be interested in a translation of the books of Genesis and Exodus from German to English, picked it up, and pretended to read. Joe was talking about dinner. He didn’t mention any girlfriend or anything, she noticed, but he did talk an awful lot about the townfolks’ dogs. He guessed that there just needed to be more fences, higher fences, something.

“This is boring,” G whispered, “I wanna go home.”

“Okay, fine.” Meg strode over to the counter and placed the book on the counter. “I think we’ll take this one,” she mentioned.

“A Bible book, good for you,” Mrs. Masters stated. Megan filled out the borrowing card. Joe spoke:

“It was nice to meet you ladies. I’ll see you around, I’m sure.”

“I’m sure you will, in a town this small,” Meg acknowledged.

“It was a real pleasure meeting you two,” Mrs. Masters agreed.

“You too, Gam-Gam,” Greta blurted, smiling. Meg glanced back forth for a moment, opened her mouth as if to speak, pressed her lips together and grabbed her sister’s hand, hustling her out the door.