A Literary Life

This was written for a 48-hour short-story contest. It had to be 1,000 words or fewer, and it had to include fantasy, a library, and a remote control:

Moishele stalked into the library as he had every Monday through Saturday for the past 11 months.

The warm, cold fluorescent lights of the library comforted and depressed him. But what did he want? A waterside park to arise from the children's section? Perhaps a wet bar to open over in fiction? He pictured Miss Gupta, the librarian who looked a young 25 and acted an old 85, dancing in high heels atop the bookshelf.

"Mr. Gwynn?" came a voice from behind him.

He assumed it was Miss Gupta, though it sounded as if she had a cold. Not only was she the only one there with a British accent, she was also the only one who ever struck up conversation with Moisele, though it tended so toward either the mundane or the literarily analytical that Moisele would eventually find himself imagining grabbing her and kissing her, half because of her shimmering lips and that accent, and half just to shut her up. Of course, that was as far as even his imagination allowed him to go without embarrassment.

Moishele turned toward the voice. Instead of Miss Gupta, he was surprised to see a spring hare in a dressing gown on its hind legs, addressing him.

"Your reputation impedes you."

Moishele felt himself blushing. How awkward for this semi-literate hare, he thought.

"'Your reputation precedes you' is, I believe, the phrase you are grasping for," he said.

"Oh, that it does as well, sir, but that is not me intended message," said the hare. "I mean to communicate that your reputation, or, more accurately, your self-image, really, keeps you from realizing your full potential."

"Bollocks," said Moishele, surprising himself - he'd never considered British a medium in which his tongue was very comfortable.

"Most right, sir - that's the spirit! Never too late to change things for the better!" replied the hare.

"Why would I want to change things? And why can no one else see you?"

"Why would you think me invisible to them, sir? It's a library - it's rude to stare."

"But not to come up unannounced behind a bloke and accuse him of self-limitation?"

"Well, no, sir - that's just honest good-Samaritanism!"

"You're from Samaria?"

"North Samarsheffieldchestershire, near Trifle-upon-Avon."

"I'm afraid I'm not familiar."

"Quite not - they'd find you very strange indeed, sir. Strange but intriguing. But we have other matters to attend."

"What exactly are the matters?"

"The matters are myriad, but, in crude summary..."

The hare somehow held in his small, hairy paw a remote control of the most peculiar variety. It was purple with neon-green writing and trim. It appeared to have a raised glass prism near the upper-right corner in which a small gummiworm-like object seemed to rotate.

It had all the usual buttons - "Play", "Pause", etc. But it also had others, including one labeled "Viewer Selection", and that mysterious prism.

"It's like a sorcerer's TV remote," Moishele said.

"Give it a try," said the smiling hare.

"I don't have a sorcerer's TV."

"The world is your set," said the hare as he bounded off and disappeared into Reference.

Moishele looked the remote over. It was compelling. It begged to be manipulated.

The most alluring part was undoubtedly the prism, but, If I start there, where is there to go? thought Moisele.

After much deliberation, his fingers hovering over the "Fast-Forward" button, then "Rewind". Finally, pointing it at an elderly patron, he pressed "Play".

Nothing happened.

He pointed it at the bookshelf and tried again.

This time, one of the books spontaneously shook, fell off the shelf, and opened.

Above it appeared something like a hologram, but dreamier. A pirate ship rocked on storm-stirred sea.

Zoom into the captain's room, where sat a pirate and a beautiful maiden on a rickety bed. He tore at her clothes, and she at his.

Moishele looked around, embarrassed. But no one else seemed to be paying the least bit of attention to the half-naked grope-fest unfolding before his eyes.

Still, he didn't want to risk it. Panickedly, he pushed "Pause". The figures froze in a skinful embrace.

That wasn't much better.

So Moishele pushed "Stop". And the figures disappeared. And the book closed. It still lay on the floor, however.

Moishele went to put it back. As he did, he saw the title for the first time: Pilfered Passions.

He pointed the remote at An Annotated History of the Crimean War and pressed "Play". The book fell open and atop it appeared a mishmash of sword-fighting horsemen. It looked as if England were trying to take over Turkey. The noise was deafening.

Still, no one batted an eyelash.

He pressed "Stop".

The war ended. Or, at least, disappeared.

Too numb to be astonished, Moishele wanted to know what the glass prism did.

He was about to touch it when he heard footsteps approaching.

"Hey, Moishele. Oh, what you got there?"

Miss Gupta was there, a thick tome under her arm as usual, staring at the remote. Moishele handed it to her.

"Well, now, what's this?" she continued. "'Viewer Selection'?"

She moved the viewer selection dial from "1" to "2".

"It's beautiful. It looks so high-tech, yet this prism reminds me of something I read about in a Victorian novel."

"I'm still figuring it out myself."

"Well, you'll have to tell me what it does when you're mastered it," she said, handing it back.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "I think a little of the library dust has already begun to blanket that beautiful crystal. Let me just…"

She placed one hand on the remote to steady it and blew on the crystal.

Where she and Moishele had stood, only the tome that had fallen from Miss Gupta's grasp remained. Open to page one, it read "Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans. Sing as well the confusion of Moishele Gwynn, son of Ira, and Shama Gupta, daughter of Anil, thrust into a war not theirs…"