A gauze bandage was more likely to fix the ozone layer than a Martin student was to enter the Ryan Memorial Library on Saturday of the Fourth of July weekend. Regardless of this basic logic, I held my post behind the reference desk bright and early the next morning. I disliked the location of the reference desk. “Island” would be a more apt description of the area, which was a glorified high counter floating in the middle of the main floor. In it, I felt exposed and cut off from the safety of walls and back exits. After reading library management journals, the previous library director relocated the reference area directly in front of the library’s main entrance, hoping that after a patron ran into it, he’d ask a question. Although the undergrads had more bruises than before, the arrangement was not exactly working as planned—and wouldn’t, as long as Internet search engines dominated the average student’s research methods.

By ten o’clock, our only patron was an elderly journalism professor who sat in the back of the main floor cursing at the microfiche machine. Occasionally, a loud bang drifted from the professor’s general direction, but the library staff turned a deaf ear. The professor had a reputation for biting off heads. I was flipping through a new botany text to distract myself. Mark’s emotional drop-in visit to the Blockens’ yesterday reminded me of Olivia’s ill-fated high school graduation party. His two appearances were so similar that the thought of one always reminded me of the other, and I wished that I could forget them both.