A Borrower's Anthology

Hug

Michelle wonders to herself about the relationship between borrowers and humans while watching Philip have an off day.

...

Night had drawn the curtains of the afternoon hour to an evening's close. Soon, it would be time for the humans to sleep. Multiple little feet raced up and down the darkness, rearranging and preparing. Among them were families of raccoons, sole bug adventurers and tiny humans with buttons pinned to their knapsacks that shook with the vibrations of their running legs. There was no rest in the night for them. Other than a nap or two, being a borrower was a twenty-four hour dedication. If they rested too long, they missed great opportunity. Opportunity was their life's blood.

From in the vicinity, another long gust of air expelled, sounding more and more like an old weeping willow using its last bit of leaves untouched by the autumn season to sunbathe. The only problem was the withering sigh came from a human, not a tree. The human had sighed a lot for the past hour in his bedroom, stacks of books piled on the desk and notebooks left half open around him. It was the messiest Michelle had ever seen the surface of his table. Now, he was lying against his bed, too early to sleep but too late to get up and go out again.

Michelle thought he looked like he needed some cheering up.

She had been observing him ever since he had come home, this human she'd known as Philip. Name alone wasn't all she knew about him though; she knew his and his family's work schedules, what friends they liked and disliked, their birthdays. Hell, she even knew their clothes sizes. Three years was plenty long to learn about someone. Around his parents, he was 'son'--when in trouble, it was 'Philip Jay'. With his siblings, he was 'Phil', or 'Philly' to Elizabeth.

To Michelle, he was just Philip--"the oldest son" when speaking with her dad. She didn't have the courtesy of putting his given nickname to practice. Her dad used names when specifying who was in what room or gone from the house. Otherwise, he didn't care for familiarity. It invited wishful thinking, he would say.

Philip suddenly sprang up to sit and Michelle stiffened, ducking deeper between the two cracks to the wall panels. Her hiding place sat on the opposite side of his bedroom, the wall which supported the back of his dresser and mounted his TV. Her heart hammered in her chest when his face angled to her wall, but his eyes were not on her. She knew the chances of him noticing her were slim unless he was too close without her knowing. Still, it never not startled her, wall between them or not.

In these more modern ages, her dad had told her most borrowers were lucky to find a house whose structure wasn't composed of too much metal, glass or fortified plaster. The materials were meant to keep most things out. It was hard not to think that humans knew of borrowers and were driving them to further extinction by providing them no place to live, sending them out to the wilds. And while it wasn't impossible for a borrower to find a life outside, it was definitely much easier to live in the comfortable space of a human's dwelling. The only thing in the house they had to worry about were bugs and rats, aside from the humans themselves.

Borrowers needed humans so badly yet feared them enough to stay hidden, keeping forever separated. Her father hated that debate each and every time she brought it up. Nicholas was on her side more often than not when it came to things, but even her carefree friend had his limits. Humans were that limit.

Once Philip stood, Michelle's eyes followed him where he plopped himself down in his chair again, holding his head in his hands. She frowned; he'd been doing that a lot too, on top of sighing--going back and forth between his desk and his bed. What was he thinking about? In the past, he'd mutter to himself while working, writing tirelessly through the night until he retired, giving her some sense of the work he was doing, but this time he was wordless while he paced. When she glimpsed his face, she'd catch the knitted brows and narrowed teal eyes at nothing except the floor.