The Infinite Bookshelves and the Forgotten Name

The Infinite Bookshelves and the Forgotten Name

I was back in the local library I used to study in during college, looking for my lost notebook before closing time. But when I turned down the aisle for local history, the bookshelves just kept stretching into the dark, taller than the building actually was. My old high school biology teacher was sitting at a wooden desk under a dim green lamp, meticulously sorting through an oversized deck of tarot cards that had city bus routes printed on them instead of symbols. She looked up at me like she knew why I was there, but she also felt like my grandmother at the same time. She pointed toward an arched doorway between two shelves that definitely doesn't exist in real life, whispering that whatever I was looking for was filed under a name I had forgotten. I felt this intense, quiet dread that if I stepped through, I’d figure out something I wasn't supposed to know about my own family, but my alarm went off right as my hand touched the brass handle.