Page 1 of Raw & Vulnerable

Chapter 1

Every single day is endlessly the same; a repertoire of familiarity and monotony.

Minnie quite likes it that way. If someone were to ask her, she’d tell them that shelovesit.

Ah.Yes, the everlasting joke. Have a good laugh. Minnie, sort of likeMinnie Mouse. Her mother loves Disney characters with a deep passion and it clearly shows. Her sister’s name is Ariel. Yes, like the mermaid. Larger than life, full of adventure. Must be why she didn’t get named after amouse.

It’s like some sick twist of fate, the mouse thing. Minnie, quiet and unassuming. Reserved. Averse to taking any sort of risks or breaking any of the rules. There are reasons for that, but none of those reasons make for polite conversation.

She doesn’t like seeing pity when someone looks at her, so she keeps her problems to herself.

“You’re getting boring, Mouse,” Ariel had said recently, during one of her impromptu visits. “I’ve lost hope that you’re ever going to get out and live. You’re the old maid card in every deck.”

Minnie recalls being vaguely offended by that statement. Oh, who is she kidding? She’s actually been upset about it for weeks.I’m not even thirty yet and she has the nerve to call me an old maid.

After all, what’s wrong with liking law and order? Is it a crime to live a happy, safe life? She has her cute little house plants. She’s named them all. Donald. Goofy. Mickey. She absolutely doesnottalk to them when she cleans her townhome.

Her place of work is the library, surrounded by oodles of books. Her home away from home, hidden amongst all the shelves. Nothing bad ever happens at the library. Not that she’s heard of, anyway. If something baddoeshappen at libraries, well, she doesn’t want to know.

Ignorance is bliss, as far as she’s concerned.

Her townhome has two bedrooms. She has the same precious queen-sized bed from childhood and Minnie quite likes being able to stretch across the whole darn thing.Alone. Always alone. There are inspirational, decorative signs around her home, shining down positivity and some occasional sass.

The second bedroom in her place is a bit…different. Gothic elegance, perhaps? She loves Edgar Allan Poe and Mary Shelley. Her sister hates sleeping in the room when she visits, always complaining,“I feel like you’ve prepared my funeral in here. Extravagant, yet morbid. Where’s the damn casket, Mouse?”

It’s a room for dreary days and midnight horror stories. Minnie doesn’t care if it’s off-putting because it’s not like she has tons of people coming to visit her. She’s pleasant, sweet, but not exactly sociable.

In fact, not sociable at all, bychoice. Any changes in her routine are jarring, phantoms fingers of anxiety touching her nerves. An omen of danger, whispering in her ear, tormenting her with thoughts of every terrible thing that could possibly happen in any given situation.

As a girl, they had diagnosed her with mild symptoms of PTSD. She’s functional, yes. Very much so, in fact. She’s aware that she’s unreasonably afraid of things she shouldn’t be. Routine is the key. The charm. Her safety blanket.

So, yes. Every single day is exactly the same.

Except today.

She’s taken up residence at the info desk for the time being. Her library is mostly calm, quiet during the mornings and early afternoons. The same people come and go, sometimes new faces from the local high school, looking for reference books for some sort of paper they are struggling through.

So, needless to say, Minnienoticeshimwhen he walks in.

All the hairs on her arms stand up, prickling with awareness. Her chest tightens, like a hand just reached inside her ribcage and grabbed her heart. Staring is rude, but she can’t look away. A moment of confusion rushes through her, looking at him from behind the latest in new literature she’s reading.

Is he lost? This doesn’t look like the sort of place…well, it just doesn’t look likehissort of place.

Distantly, Minnie realizes that’s rather stuck-up of her, but whatever, no one can judge her thoughts. Men like this don’t just walk in the door to her quiet, civilized library. Housewives, sure. Dads with their kids, yes. Emo teenage girls bemoaning love, all day long.

Men that look like they’re about to jump on the front desk and yell,‘empty your cash registers, sluts’is a large no.

Because this is a library and money really isn’t a thing here.

He looks strangely lost among the shelves, dark work boots on, dirty, tattoos peeking out around the collar of his shirt, crawling down his tightly chiseled arms. Black gloves that give her the shivers are stuffed in one of his pockets. His dark hair is buzzed, slightly tighter to his scalp on the sides, more generous on the top. Aggressive, low maintenance. His eyes are sharp, lips cruel, and he’s frowning at the books as if they’ve done him wrong. There’s a honeyed sort of tan to his skin and Minnie assumes he must work outside for a living. Some sort of townie from the wrong side of town.

He probably works with his hands. He probably doesn’t wash them after he pisses.

Flipping to the next page in the book in her hands, Minnie feels one of her eyebrows quirk behind her large glasses.Has he even seen a book before?

Minnie!She mentally scolds herself in the same breath.You’re a terrible person.

Her eyes catch on his hands as he reaches out to pluck something from the shelf. Broad, rough. Veined. They look strong enough to crush someone’s throat. She bets they could engulf her neck easily. Maybe he could encircle her entire waist with just his two hands alone.

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