Page 69Dirty read

The people working in the store weren't really dressed 'properly' as such. Jeans and a shirt with a jacket over it for the one at the counter. They even had a whole comic book section in the back, separated from the other books. Esmeralda went in there immediately, gleefully exclaiming 'They've got comics!'. I followed her in, my eyes drawn to a somewhat surprising section inside.

Adult comics.

The thing that surprised me the most is my own reaction. Rather than blushing, which I tended to do at more direct contact with sexuality or personal hints to it, this just sparked my curiosity. There were varying degrees of comics, from simple jokes to fully fledged filth. The drawings were of decent quality, as most of the comics appeared to be drawn at the very least by professionals. Not many of them had anything resembling a story though, just the empty ploys to get a man and a woman together. Or just two women alone.

"Enjoying them?" Esmeralda's voice scared me.

"They're interesting." I almost didn't blush.

She shrugged. "Some of them are. The humorous ones are okay, it's just humor with less taboos."

I nodded. "Well the plot in erotic stories are usually paper thin. A bit of a shame really, you could do so much with freedom of taboos rather than guy meets girl and guy jumps girl."

"Or girl jumps other girl." She giggled. "I've seen what you were looking at."

I smiled, again almost no blush. "Just keeping an open mind."

"I'm sure."

"But I..." Suddenly I noticed that I knew one of the customers. Grace. She was leaving the store but someone her saying 'thank you' had registered in my head. I couldn't see the book she had bought, as it was taken in a plastic bag. But it was fairly big and heavy looking. She was already through the door. It felt like she glanced back for just a second before she walked outside.

"Wait here for a moment." I said as I pressed the comic I was holding in Esmeralda's hands.

I moved through the store after her, obviously running normal rather than dashing quickly, hoping I could talk to her. But, for some reason, she was gone when I was outside. I didn't see her anywhere. I didn't take that long but the crossing wasn't far away so perhaps she'd made it that far. But I couldn't find her there. Seconds passed as I looked around, unable to see her anywhere. There was a nagging feeling in my head that something like this had been done to me before but I couldn't place it.

At least there was no rain.

What an odd thought.

I returned to the store, apologizing to the store-owner on my way in and returned to Esmeralda. She just looked at the comic I pushed into her hands, reading it seriously. It was a modern fantasy story about a man who was cursed with a smell that attracted women. While that didn't really sound that much of a curse, it looked like they would use him, rape him almost, and discard him when they were done. There was a strange underlying story about love, self-discovery and respect as far as I could tell but I didn't get to read much of it yet.

Esmeralda only looked up when I was already standing next to her. "Were you reading this?"

I nodded. "Yes, why?"

She blinked. "It's just... A little different from what I thought you'd like."

I smiled. "Because it's erotic?"

"No, because it's a guy."

That surprised me quite a bit. "So?"

"Aren't you a lesbian?"

I didn't really know how to respond. "I don't think I'm anything. I enjoy looking at both and, you know, kissing both. But I usually don't go much further."

She blinked and lowered her voice. "Are you a virgin?"

I just nodded silently.

She smiled. "I'm sorry I asked. You're a very strange girl sometimes, Amy, but a lot of fun!"

"Thanks. Will you help me look for some books?"

"Sure."

We put the comics away and explored the rest of the store. Downstairs was all the new books, or rather those that hadn't been used before. Upstairs, however, was a whole section with second-hand books. It was still in the same boring style, but properly categorised by author and genre. Very helpful. They even had some foreign books but not many. I wasn't really that interested in those anyway.

The next two hours were mostly spend on finding good books and reading the first few lines to see if I liked them. Time was easily lost with Esmeralda surprising me with some of her favorite authors as well, mostly fantasy but one surprising romantic one. I didn't end up buying the adult comic, but the store-owner probably didn't mind as I bought twelve books, three of which were fairly thick and all but one second-hand. Perhaps even third.

But they were much nicer than the new books. They often had gold-foil titles (or something similar) and thicker backs. Shades of gentle red and brown mostly, with some green and yellow by exception. Two science-fiction, seven fantasy, three humor ones, and a couple of others that were somewhat harder to explain in a simple word. The only other strange book I got was one for creating jewelry. A somewhat old do-it-yourself guide for various materials. I had no idea if it was something I was going to read, but it was only two floryns, so I didn't care. Besides, it had nice pictures.

The start of my library.

Now that would be an interesting picture. Amy running an old bookstore. The young, pretty vampire girl, surrounded by books and having read most, if not all, of them. Reading by candle-light perhaps?