Metamorphosis

One morning, as Georgia Samantha was waking up from her girlish dreams, she found that in her bed she had been changed into a stiff-spined book. Change is part of a girl’s life, and she did not immediately comprehend that this change was different than when her front teeth fell out and new ones appeared. Than when bumps slowly remapped her chest. When wiry hairs sprouted. Those changes had come so gradually they did not alarm, but this change was sudden and a little frightening. Georgia Samantha realized she had undergone a momentous transformation.

Since she learned to read, her mother had warned her it could happen.

‘Reading books is not good for girls. If you don’t watch out, you are liable to turn into a book yourself.’ And, ‘Got your nose in a book again? One fine day you’ll wake up and find yourself in trouble.’

Georgia Samantha laughed gaily, or disbelievingly, or rudely, or with the I-know-more-than-you-ever-will attitude that young girls so often have.

Once she said petulantly to her mother, ‘Well, if you had ever read a book yourself, you would understand.’

Her mother didn’t answer immediately. She kept on rolling pie dough, thinner and thinner, then said acidly, ‘I’ve read books. In Latin. And not just one.’

Georgia Samantha was surprised. She said lamely, ‘Well, then.’

The mother lifted the dough which was now so thin it was nearly translucent. She said, ‘Some things are best forgotten. Go make your bed; later you will have to lie in it.’ Georgia Samantha flounced out of the room. Her mother yelled, ‘I’m warning you.’

Now it had happened. She had turned into a book.

At first all the knowledge inside her stiff covers made her feel superior to other girls. But boys took one look at her and said, ‘I don’t understand you.’ As the enormity of the change swept over her, she felt only a fatalistic, So this is what they meant when they said too much reading would ruin me.

Her parents, who were kind and well-meaning folks, wanted what was best for her. When they realized their daughter was a book, they decided she would be happiest with those of her own kind. They took her to a used-book shop. Just as they feared, she wasn’t worth much on the market.

‘But she has never been read,’ her parents protested.

The antiquarian bookseller said, ‘What people want nowadays is something light to divert their thoughts. Nobody wants to get in too deep. This one,’ and he tapped an impatient forefinger on Georgia Samantha’s forehead, ‘these are a dime a dozen. I am doing you a favour by taking it off your hands.’

Her parents were respectable folk who didn’t like gossip. They nodded. The bookseller put Georgia Samantha on a shelf with similar books. It was crowded and dusty there and she had a constant crick in her spine. Sometimes she heard muffled crying in the night, but didn’t ask questions.

One day a tall man came into the shop, walked around looking at the books, noticed her title, said, ‘Hmm.’ He took her off the shelf, turned her this way and that, opened her up, sniffed her pages. She felt a thrill she had never felt before. ‘Hmm,’ said the tall man again.

She held her breath. Was it, could it be? Yes, he was carrying her out of the room of dusty shelves and across the threshold to the cash register where the old bookseller was sorting new arrivals into stacks.

‘Found one you liked?’ the bookseller asked in the sonorous, jocular man-to-man voice men use when doing business.

‘I think so,’ said the man.

‘Prime condition, prime condition,’ said the old bookseller. ‘One in a million. I hate to part with it. But business is my business.’ And he laughed, though Georgia Samantha didn’t see anything funny or understand why he winked.

When the tall man had paid and put her in his pocket, he said casually, ‘I’ve been looking for one like this one for years.’

He took her to his home and put her on the bedside table. He never opened her again though. There was no follow-up of that first thrilling interlude in the dim light of the bookshop. Later he moved her to a shelf in another room and apparently forgot all about her. Sometimes he would look in her direction and say, ‘Well, you’re so smart, you tell me, Miss Know-it-all.’

Later, even that bit of interest waned. He didn’t seem to notice when she was in the same room. She stopped being disappointed and became resigned. She knew he was reading something else. She noticed the glint as he turned the glossy pages, she saw the centerfolds open, heard the zipper. She didn’t dare ask what he was doing, but some evenings she wanted to scream. Just scream. Sometimes she hated him. She had only herself to blame though. Her mother had warned her. That’s what happens when a girl reads too many books.