Virginia quickly closed the diary and placed it in her backpack. "But I've only been here for thirty minutes."
"Honey, you've been here for almost three hours. It's five-thirty. The library is closing. It's time to go."
Virginia stared at her computer screen with lost eyes. Three hours? No, no! I need more time. I need better answers. "Hey! Maybe you could help me."
"And what might that be," asked the librarian, somewhat excited to assist.
"I'm looking for a piece of property somewhere around this area. Its name might have been changed in the records if someone had purchased the land, obviously, but maybe the history of its name is enough to point me in the right direction. It's a section of land once called Alaythia. Have you heard of it? Does it mean anything?"
The librarian chuckled and shook her head. "Oh, Honey, that's just an old fable—a legend, better to call it. It was supposedly the land to which young lovers ran off to escape their old lives. Some say that a couple once ran off and 'supposedly found' this land, but it did them no good to escape the inevitable. They were eventually found and then separated."
Virginia's shoulders sank, and a look of hopelessness crossed her face. "But—but surely! Surely, there must be a place that was once possibly named Alaythia. I read—" she stopped to correct herself. "I mean, I heard that it was located somewhere in these parts and that it was an actual place rather than just some 'lovers' secret hideout.'"
The librarian smiled as if she knew this was coming. "Yes, that is what the legend says, also. It all started with a single love story about, oh, a rich young girl and a poor Indian boy, I believe. That story was first told over a hundred years ago. It then spread throughout this area. It has become this town's folk legend—something that has gone around for years, and the story has changed throughout those years, too. Soon, it was a rich man and a young Indian woman. Then, it changed to an Indian man and woman who fled off their reservation, hoping to find a new life outside the control of the White Man. The story always attracts tourists who come here for the first time—it really helps to make our town more recognized, too! Oh, I could go on and on with all the different stories from that single fable, but I haven't the time. As much as I love to hear and tell such love stories, I must close the library."
Virginia felt her brain go numb. She did not know whether to throw the diary across the room or to cry out of lost hope. All this time spent digging deep, all this time wasted over nothing more than just a mere 'fable'—a tourist attraction?!
She threw her hood over her head, grabbed her backpack, and stormed out of the library.
The librarian picked up Virginia's books and walked toward the stairs. She had only made it up the first few steps before she stopped and noticed a man dressed in a dark trench coat with a black hood over his head sitting in the far-right corner of the library.
"Excuse me," she called out. "The library is closing. Do you need to check out a book?"
The dark figure stood up from his seat. "Actually, you might be able to help me."
He walked across the room and stood at the base of the staircase, looking up at the librarian. "I was waiting on a book from that girl who just walked out."
"Oh! Well, let's see if we can find it."
The librarian fumbled through the books in her hands. "We have The Town of Mason and an old atlas containing maps of this region. Which would you like?"
He shook his head in dismay. "You know what? I'm afraid neither of these is what I was looking for. I must have had the wrong book title in my head."
"Well, would you like me to look it up for you quickly on the library computer?"
"Oh, no, ma'am. That's alright."
He looked towards the entrance of the library. "I'm sorry to change subjects with you, but that girl that left here seemed really upset about something, didn't she?"
"Oh yes, poor girl. She was studying the location of some property that she thought existed, but she has run into a dead-end, I'm afraid."
"A dead end? How so?"
"Poor girl. She was trying to find a place called Alaythia. I told her it was not a real place, just a story, and then she ran out the door."
The man dressed in black stroked his fingertips along the edge of the books in the librarian's hands. "She asked you about that, did she?"
"Yes. Poor child. She looked so hopeful, too. Oh, if there ever were such a place, I would hope that she would be the one to find it."
"…I see."
"Is there anything else I can help you find, Dear?"
The young man raised his gaze and looked at the woman with a wicked smile and a gloomy, green glow in his eyes. "Oh, no, thank you. I believe you've helped me find exactly what I've been looking for."
He walked out of the library, leaving the woman alone to complete her last-minute tasks before closing.