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Library Planning Meeting, Part Two

 He walked in while they were sanitizing the library. No one was quite sure how he had gotten in, but he looked so well-dressed and official that they figured he had a key of some kind.

One of the librarians was wiping off a cart when she looked up and saw him. "Hey, I remember you! It's Stan, right?"

"Close enough," he said, smiling brilliantly. "I just wanted to see how you all are doing. It's been a long time since I was at your library planning meeting."

"Well, things have been pretty crazy here, same as everywhere else," she responded. "We shut down for months. We've had a table and canopy set up since the spring where people can pick up their holds after they call in. We're so happy that the library is open again, and we just hope it can last. What about you? Have you been able to stay busy what with all the libraries being closed?"

"Oh, I've stayed plenty busy," the well-dressed man responded. "I did a few little things here and there. One little thing was 1000 times smaller than a grain of sand . . . that was fun. And I've been doing some chemistry experiments lately. Seeing if things blow up. Giving into my pyro side a little bit. Hanging out with grand juries, too. And hey! I've even been messing with hand sanitizer a bit! It looks like you got some of mine!" he said, squirting some on his hand and sniffing it.

"Yes, but this stuff is NAS-TY," she said, looking at him with new eyes. It couldn't be? Could it? A shiver of fear went down her spine.

The man traipsed down the corridor, nodding approvingly at the blocked-off drinking fountains. "It looks like it's been pretty empty in this library. That's what I like to see." Then he paused and stared at a blank wall. "Hey! Where are all the computers?"

The librarian laughed. "There's no way we were going to have those around these days! They would get touched so much! Come to think of it, a mom with three little kids was just in here right before you got here. She stared at that wall for several seconds before saying, 'thank goodness!' Who knows if we'll ever bring them back!"

The man couldn't disguise his annoyance, though it was short-lived. "Well," he said, shrugging his shoulders, "You win some, you lose some."


And then he left.

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