The Search for Macadamia, a Quest Most Noble

CHAPTER 3 - A QUICK RUN TO THE LIBRARY

Spencer wasted no time. He loaded his backpack to the halfway point with snacks, the slingshot, his thirty-eight dollars, phone, library card, and bus/train pass. He and Evie walked six blocks that scorching afternoon on the last day of July and waited for the bus.

"There it is," Spencer said.

Evie knew the drill. She scrambled into his backpack, filling the free space. "I like your dad, but it's like he's trying to be fun, you know?"

"Do you see my pass in there?"

Evie pushed the pass out through the gap in the zipper. "I mean, that watch joke was not very funny."

"Dad jokes aren't meant to be howlers."

"Okay, but hatched you? That was straight-up embarrassing. I remember when his friends used to come over for poker night. They'd laugh and hoot at each other until long after you were asleep."

"Alright. Quiet now."

They rode the bus to a train stop where they got on the R-11 line. Evie didn't speak, bark, or move for the entire ride. A few minutes of riding, a few more of walking, and they were at the library-a brilliant structure of glass and steel in the heart of Kimball.

Waiting at the intersection, Spencer noticed two older, rough kids being lectured by a police officer, then saw an elderly man on a bench yammering to everyone passing by but also to no one in particular. Another train pulled out of the station just across from the library, ready to climb the hill to Ouray State University.

Spencer crossed the wide road to the library grounds. To the west, the city's original gothic courthouse stood alone, surrounded by grand old shade trees. He went south to the library's courtyard where an elaborate patchwork of well-tended shrubs and trees was crisscrossed by gravel footpaths.

It was Evie's first trip to the library. Of course, Spencer had been hundreds of times. His preferred entry point was the massive, curving, seven-hundred-foot outdoor stairway leading from the courtyard to the roof, four stories overhead. As a first-grader, he'd imagined he was walking up the spine of a giant lizard and entering through its brain.

At the base of the stairway, sheltered by cement walls, he set his backpack down and Evie wriggled out. "Hello again, blue sky. Whew. I was being smothered in there."

They went up the stairway, a series of landings separated by two steps. Step, step, landing. Step, step, landing. His first time on this curving masterpiece, his mom had challenged him to count the landings: exactly twenty-six. She was always assigning him dumb things to do to keep him centered. Now, years later, he counted them purely out of habit.

At the top, a bridge connected visitors to a lush garden hidden above the hot streets. Evie waited in the shadows for Spencer to scan for other rooftop visitors. "No one up here but us."

As a favor to Evie, Spencer searched the library's catalog on his phone so she could sniff around the garden. He was looking for books on macadamia nuts while Evie followed a scent trail. "There've been varmints up here."

Finding no gophers, squirrels, rabbits, or other four-legged pests, Evie spun three circles and licked herself in the shade. "I love those rough steps. They polished up my claws really nice."

"Yeah. It'll save on vet bills. Now back in the pack. I found a couple books."

"That was fast," Evie grumbled.

The first book was all about nut farming. The second was specifically about cultivating macadamia nuts-great pictures, dull reading. While paging through, he made sure his backpack was laid open in front of a vent with plenty of cool air breezing in.