It’s a warm night - warm enough that I don’t need a jumper - and the evening sky is darkening beyond the train station. It’s still light in the east, filled with white-edged storm clouds which have managed to catch the last, peachy smudges of sunset. It sets in thirteen minutes, but the red-brick hills mean it might as well have left hours ago. They have hidden the orb from sight.
There used to be a bookshop here. It opened when I was young enough to still be reading a book a night. I'd take short, action-packed books from the library and read them on my bed in one sitting, a plate of buttery crackers on the duvet cover. We didn't have a bookshop nearby and that tiny, ten-foot-wide shop became a welcome oasis we would visit in the hour between school and closing time. We spent our book tokens there when World Book Day arrived -- my sister, Alicia and I still in our costumes as we browsed for 70-page specials we could get for free. The stories were never particularly memorable, but I liked that they fitted in my school blazer pocket. When you're young, there's something fascinating about the miniature.
The bookshop closed just a few years later, and they sell hardware there now. Drawers of screws and nails, and long ropes of hose replacements. I can't bring myself to go back, even now, because it's still a bookshop for me. Do our favourite places ever stop being what they were?
The sky is already darker than it was. Five minutes until sunset. I'm sure the moon is already here, risen somewhere to the west beyond the red-brick buildings. I can't see it, but I'll find it when I'm home.
5 comments
What a lovely description! And coincidentally 11th June happens to be my birthday. Please never stop posting these little updates. It’s always so lovely to read them. 💖
Beautifully written!🤍
Yes, I have many places that are no longer what they were, and I always feel nostalgic. Why do we love the past so much? I think I am looking back thinking times might have been easier, especially without some of our recent tech, but actually in reality probably a lot harder. I love much of the fashions, language, furniture, architecture of the past much more than the present!
Absolutely beautiful entry, Ruby. I have so loved going through these posts and eagerly await whatever musings grace your mind!
Ruby,I love your blog particularly,but I can’t browse through your letters clearly,I guess it’s because I’m from China.However,I still like you.By the way，I want to ask if you would register Sina Microblog/Weibo.