No Books

A silly short story.

No books. That’s what her mother told her specifically. No books on the family trip. Her mother didn’t have time for her shenanigans, and it would not be tolerated. Any mishap would be treated with dire consequences. It will probably be the last one she tags along on as a kid. In one year, three months, and 7 days, she will be 18 and living her own life. You would think a parent would be happy to see their child reading, but Lilly isn’t your everyday child. When she reads, she occasionally teleports herself right into the story.
Oh, how shocked her mother was to call out her name that day and get no response. Frantically, her mother searched and searched for her beloved daughter. She called the police, but they required a 24 hour disappearance before they could formally do a report. How ridiculous! A 10-year-old could seriously get themself in trouble within 24 hours.
At the end of the day and with hope dwindling fast, she returns to Lilly’s room to feel the essence of her daughter. In between her bone shaking cries, she hears a tiny “Mom”.
Her mother holds her breath, her ears straining to hear. ” Mom, down here, help.”
She searches the room in haste but can’t pinpoint her location. ” The book mom, the book!”. Her mother looks down at the book and sees a miniature 2D version of her daughter failing her arms and jumping up and down on the page. Her mother takes the graphic novel in her hand and gasps.
“What are you doing in there? How did you? Get out of there right this instance!”
” I can’t, I don’t know how.”
Her mother faints, crashing hard onto the floor, the book tumbling beside her. It lies open beside her and Lilly cries in hopelessness.
It took her mother almost a week to find the right person to extract Lilly from the book. That is, after she came back to consciousness, the second time. After that, she made Lilly swear she would never do it again. But how could she stop something she didn’t even know how she started? Her mother even tried banning her from reading altogether, but the longing always drew her back in. She would steal her brother’s books from his room, or snatch a discarded newspaper on the way home from school. Anything that had more than a few paragraphs she would stuff away and hide. Then secretly read under her blanket at night while everyone else was fast asleep.
It has happened a total of 5 times since then. Each one a different story. One moment she’s reading so fast the words form a movie playing in her mind effortlessly. Then, she forgets she is reading as the movie plays out letter by letter, scene by scene. The next moment she is right there in the story, literally. The feel of the grass, the smell of the air, the sting of a bee, the taste of hot buttery sweet rolls. Each time her mother has to run and get their dear friend George to pull her back out.
It really is amazing how she was capable of finding such a man. How do you search for a profession of pulling people out of books? Need a car pulled out of a ditch, no problem. Call a tow truck. Need a tooth pulled, easy peasey, call a dentist. Need a 10-year-old little girl pulled out of a fictional book and made big again. What would follow? Apparently, that answer is a bibliopegist. Who knew?
He seemed appalled when Lilly praised her mother for her accomplishments of finding him. “I fix books. You are not supposed to be in that story, therefore you broke it. It now needs fixed. Why would you not think bibliopegist?” She found him really snarky, but was grateful for his help. Especially when it wasn’t a single occurrence.
Now George shows up for thanksgiving dinner and has become an integrated part of their family. Every Christmas he shows up with elaborate wrapped books in shiny wrapping paper. All hand bound and engraved with intricate detail. Each one tailored to each person’s personal taste.
At least Mom doesn’t faint anymore. That hasn’t happened since the first one. She does get very angry and revokes her privileges to the car. She hates it when her mother is angry. Her mother is all she has. All she wants to do is make her mother happy and proud.
” Wow, what is this place?” Lilly asks.
She stares down at her  new attire. Gone is her purple polka dot pajamas, only to be replaced by a form fitting gray bodysuit.
She scales up the massive infrastructure that stands before her. Floor after floor climbs higher into the sky until the top becomes unseeable in the clouds.
” Oh no, oh no, oh no, this can’t be happening! Mom is going to be so mad. I’m going to be grounded until I’m 18. I promised I would never go into a story again and here I am. Go back, go back!” She pleads as she desperately tries to reverse whatever craziness this is. She looks around, searching for a way out, hoping she can fix this before her mother comes looking for her.
“Fantastic, you are early. I like when people are early.”
Lilly turns to see a woman many years older than her wearing the same outfit approaching her.
“Ummm, hi.”
“Follow me and we will get started.”
“Started on what exactly?”
” It’s your first day at your new hobby, right? Let me show you around and start your training.”
Lilly stares at her perplexed
” No, that is not right.You have me confused with someone else.”
“Nonsense, you are just nervous. Follow me. I don’t see anyone else standing here waiting for me.”
“I really need to go.”
Lilly tries to pull away, but the strange woman has a death grip on her arm. Her smile is intense and mincing. She forces Lilly to follow.
Just inside the double door, the woman stops.
“Welcome to the entertainment industry. Today you will receive your itinerary which you will follow precisely.
Lilly glared around at the lobby before her. Grey and white seem to be the only colors that the interior designer knew existed. A huge reception desk lines one wall with overstuffed chairs positioned randomly around coffee tables. She follows Lilly into an elevator. Inside, the buttons cover every available wall. ” Each floor is a different leisure pursuit. You will be on floor 55. You will be assisting our team of 15 people in crafting the finest automobiles known to namkind.”
“Namkind, 1000 floors in a building, what kind of world is this? She thinks to herself. Obviously, she assumes I am here to start a new position for a job. This is insane. I have to get out of here. Why would I pick such a weird book to read? I knew better than this. I will just go along with it until I can sneak away unnoticed and figure out how to get back home.”
The elevator stops at the 55 floor and the doors open to an industrial shop floor. It appears to be massively big despite being inside of a skyscraper. Machines with fencing encasing them line up one after another, row after row with robot arms in the middle. The noise of compressed air and the machining of parts fill the air. Self driving carts buzz around premeditated locations and deliver various parts to different locations. Robots lift, tighten, torque, drill, and lathe each product into its destined  place. People wearing gray bodysuits bustle around like clockwork, operating everything that cannot be achieved by robotics.
“Wow, this is a cool job.”
The lady’s face turns anger with disbelief.
“What did you just say?”
She smacks the close elevator door button a little too hard.
“You’re lucky no one heard you say that.”
“Say what?”
“Are you psychological? You will not speak of such obscenity or you will be banned from your hobby forever.”
“I do not understand. Will I not get paid for doing this work?”
The lady puts a hand over Lilly’s mouth. “This is your last warning. Yes, you are compensated for the time you spend doing your hobby.”
“This is not a hobby. A hobby is something you enjoy doing in your free time, and can often be done with family. You are not paid for doing recreational activities.”
“I have family members that have hobbies here and I assure you I thoroughly enjoy my hobby.”
“No, no, this is an obligation. This must be done to obtain food and shelter. Hobbies are done by choice. They are fun and creative. Not this. You guys have it all wrong.”
” I assure you, I am rarely wrong. I also choose to be here every day and typically have a wonderful and pleasurable time doing my avocation. It’s not like I am handcuffed and dragged in here daily. I arrive at 4:00 AM. Indulgence of the pastime begins at 4:30. I play until 7:30 PM, where I go home, eat, shower and go to bed.”
“15 hours, you’re kidding me. How do you have time for a life or a family?”
“Why are you acting like this is a foreign concept to you? This has been a reality for a very long time. Are you broken or something? You know what, maybe you would be better off in the pillow stuffing plant. Surely I can get Janet in scheduling to alter it.”
“How do you have time for anything outside of here?”
“What more does one person need? My hobby family is here and I love my hobby.”
” What about kids? I am sure the ummm captains would not want you to copulate here.”
” Don’t be ridiculous, that is always scheduled promptly after the evening shower and no longer than 30 minutes. Everyone knows that. Once the mother becomes pregnant, she works until going into labor. After delivery, she has 16 hours to rest before she is asked to join the team again. The child is promptly placed into leisure camps throughout the day to prepare the next generation to be expert hobbyists. Once they are grown, they choose their choice of entertainment. Then death. Surely that answered all the questions you could possibly have.”
“How does one find a spouse with so little free time?”
“The same way you plan to,I would say. You have a program on your phone that instantly matches you to possible suitors. Once you select one, you meet after the evening shower and decide whether to have babies or not in 15 minutes or less.”
“Birthday party, how do you do birthday parties?”
“Well at our entertainment stations of course. We are all family here, we celebrate together.’
“That’s not even enough time to get 8 hours of sleep.”
“8 hours, that’s preposterous, who sleeps 8 hours.”

Lilly’s mouth gapes open in disbelief.
” Oh dear, you really are broken.”
“I’m not broken. Stop saying that.”
“Okay, how would you like me to refer to your complete lack of understanding of the simple happenings of everyday life? Are you not from here? If I am not mistaken, other countries have similar structures. Yes, I am positive Acirema is not the only one that has and maintains hobbies.”
” This is pointless. Can you direct me toward the restroom, please?”
Lilly slips inside a gray and white toned bathroom. She frantically looks around for a way out, but it’s all concrete walls with no windows. “Wait a minute, if I am old enough to have a job, I must be an adult. I can just walk right out of here.”
Despite the realization, the idea still makes her heart race. She is not accustomed to being a person of age and not under her mother’s rule. In a three two one countdown, she bursts through the door and runs as fast as she can past the old lady. The old woman anticipated her move and sticks a foot out, tripping Lilly. She flies through the air and crashes hard to the marble floor belly first. Quickly she jumps back to her feet and locates a stairwell. She begins to descend the stairs as quickly as possible, hoping she can be faster than the elevator. 55,54,53,52, she counts each floor as she passess it. After what seems like an eternity, she reaches the bottom, legs burning and breathless. She paused for a second to catch her breath. Then she busts through another door and races across the lobby floor, passing the receptionist desk to her right.
The double doors that the lady forced her through are right in front of her. Just a few more steps and she can get out of here and get home. The taste of freedom lingers heavily on her tongue. She glances behind her to see if anyone is following just as she reaches for the door. A glimpse of the old lady emerging from the elevator appears in her.
Smack, the side of her face and the front of her body smack hard against the locked door. The force of impact clatters her to the floor and glass shatters around her. She opens her eyes, and she is in her own bedroom on the floor, dressed in her purple polka dot pajamas. The glass is gone, the building vanished, the old lady vaporized into nothingness, yet the emotions of the dream still lay heavy on her. So heavy she sits on the floor for a moment, breathless, her arms wrapped around herself in a tight hug.
“It was a dream this time, only a dream. I’m not in trouble.” Lilly says aloud, hoping to solidify reality.
She picks herself off the floor and climbs back into bed.
“Rise and shine, sunshine. Time to pack your back. We leave in an hour. Remember, no books.”
“Sure thing, mom, no books I promise.”