dieewigenacht | The Library (Reply)

Let me tell you what I like about the college Library.

The library.

I’ve said a couple of times now, that the thing I love the most about my College is the library.

Three stories of books, books and more books (And more stuff, obviously, but the books are the interesting part)

There’s something else about the library that makes it the best place ever. It’s a limbo, I’m absolutely sure this place is out of the normal plane of existence.

The eerie atmosphere, the light and delicious silence (Yes, the silence in this plane of existence is delicious and light) the random colors of the walls, the people.

If you are here a couple of minutes you wouldn’t notice it, but when you are around here a couple of hours then you notice how this place is, oh, so different than others.

You can’t be sure if you’re still alive or if you’re death, everything seems unreal, the smell, the silence, the textures, the atmosphere, your own perception of life is changed.

You can hear the occasional laughter, the always rare ring of a phone, some awkward steps, a couple of whispered conversations, sometimes you know where they came from, but most of the time you just hear than, and you can’t find what caused the sound.

The endless pictures of people stares at you, the weird art plastered in the walls transports you to different worlds. The, oh so very faint smell of cheap machine coffee mixes with the old and spicy smell of old books and mild dirty carpets.

Some lights flicker, causing the mirrors to reflect mysterious figures, and sometimes a shadow will cross your line of vision, when there’s nobody there, probably a consequence of the design of the place, probably not.

Students reading, students, chatting, playing, walking and sleeping. You’ll find them all, scattered around the library as living sculptures, they’ll stare at you and you’ll stare at them, both unable to decipher the reality of the situation.

Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you’ll hear all kind of accents and languages, if you’re unlucky then you won’t listen a thing, but the occasional sounds you just can’t locate.

A breathing, right behind you, and there’s no one. Steps, following you or going into an opposite direction while you’re the only one on the place, the fain echo of typing, of someone opening a book.

Trapped sounds or trapped souls? You’re never sure.

You are not even sure if you are there or you’re somewhere else, like a dream. Except when you’re sleeping.

It’s a good place, an interesting and calm building trapped between two dimensions, a place where you don’t know who or what you are, but you just don’t care. A place that invites you to be inside forever.

It’s rare to see someone alone in here, almost everyone is with someone, in small groups, in big groups. Those, brave enough to be alone are sleeping, or locked inside small cubicles, everyone alone with their thoughts.

And everyone seems as lost as you.

You walk around, you’re on the third floor and someone asks you where are the stairs, you answer and after a couple of minutes you wonder how the hell that person managed to get to the third floor if he ignored where the stairs are.

You shrug and keep walking.

After what seems like an hour you’ll noticed you crossed the same place at least three times and still you can’t find the place you’re looking for, you turn around and it happened to be right at your side, where you checked before to find nothing.

You know you’re at a place you don’t know, some place that shouldn’t exist in this world, and yet you don’t care, the chairs will change randomly of place, as well as the people, or the paintings, or everything at once.

The shadows will follow you, just like the sounds, the laughter and the steps.

You will walk and walk, never repeating a place until you notice that you’ve walked around the library at least ten times, and yet nothing seemed to be the same more than once.

This place, this…dimension, is alive, it breaths, it thinks and it wants you to feel happy.

It’s full of ghosts and other trapped beings.

They observe you. They follow you. They want you to feel at home.

You’ll never notice this if you’re just here a couple of minutes, that’s why a lot of people don’t like this place.

It’s different when you spend a couple of hours in the library every day, it calls you, it greets you and treats you right, you’ll feel someone at you’re side every second, even if you know you’re alone.

It is your friend, your slave and your owner.

You’re hers.

You’re at home.

Mainly because it's true. I'm not lying about this shit.