Roberts smiled into the MAD camera and looked at her ten-foot image on the big screen across the room. The GMA camera swiveled to her image on the big screen as she said, “This is Robin Roberts, signing off from the future.”
The fifth floor was mostly a mess of men who were assembling furniture.
“This will be a drop-in day care by day and a homeless shelter by night.”
Forbes said, “Single moms can work one floor below their kids, and people trying to get back on their feet won’t lose jobs because they don’t have beds and showers.”
The sixth floor was empty.
“Libraries have always been the only place where anyone can consult with a professional for free, and we’ve done the best we could,” said Serenity. “This will be our medical, legal, and mental health knowledge center. Not a clinic, except in a very basic sense, but a link to professionals who can get people connected.”
Roberts said, “If I were lucky enough to live in Maddington and didn’t have a doctor, but had a strange pain, or if I had a scary legal situation, but didn’t know a lawyer—”
“Come to the MAD. We’ll get you started.”
The seventh floor was a mess with the breeze still blowing through open holes and men climbing around and yelling at each other.
“Our administrative offices will be housed here,” Serenity said, “and, appropriately, it’s just a mess.”
“Perfect.” Roberts turned to the camera and did her closing.
When the camera was off, she came to Serenity with a serious look. “As we were moving up, it occurred to me that there are two reasons why this hasn’t been done before. The first, and most important, is that each of those floors, in their own way, represents a powerful lobby that fights for its own turf. You’re going to have a hard time keeping this from being pulled apart. You’ve got a tough fight ahead of you to keep this, maybe just to survive. Let me know if I can help.”
“Thanks. I hope those are not just polite words. I may call on you,” Serenity said.
“I meant it. Anytime.”
“And the other reason?”
Roberts laughed. “We’ve all put up with these problems too long. No one’s been mad enough before. Pun intended.”
The Forbes guy came up carrying a tablet.
“I thought you might want to see a rough draft of what our cover might look like.”
He turned the tablet around and showed them the screen. The shot was the outside of the MAD with men working on the top floor and a line of people waiting to get in. The Forbes logo was across the top and plastered across the building was, a city of books.
sixty-nine
the power of the book
DEDICATION MORNING: MAD DAY 1. Tuesday, August 19th if you paid attention to the old calendar, which no one in Maddington had for—oh, seven days.
Serenity sat on the podium and looked out over the crowd. Most who lived in the city were there, and it looked like half the people in the state were there, too. Camera crews, bloggers, tweeters, and high-school journalists, along with the Library Journal and other trade publications that were covering the seven-stories-in-seven-days building story were all there. Someone said Matt Drudge of The Drudge Report was there, reporting that Elvis was at the MAD, and threatening to turn Democrat.
In the front row sat Paul Molcut. Serenity had invited him to be on the stage with her, but he demurred and insisted that she should be on stage alone to claim the glory. Other local politicians decided not to be on the stage, either. In the back, she saw an Auburn jacket under a straw hat on a large and nondescript man and recognized him as Molcut’s enforcer. She saw him make head nods to men scattered here and there throughout the crowd.
Americana singer/songwriter Amy McCarley was singing on stage, donating her time to support MAD. She came to the end of “Everything Changed,” which was Serenity’s cue. She stood up with a book in her hand and took the stage as Amy stepped down.
“Ladies and gentlemen, fellow citizens of the MAD, welcome to a new day,” said Serenity, who paused for a scream from the crowd. “I’m not going to talk long because I’m as excited as you are to get inside.” More cheers. She saw Molcut’s enforcer make a “get ready” signal to his men and knew something big was coming.
She took a deep breath and savored the smell of paint and sawdust. She realized that there was book dust in it, too, and smiled.
Scanning the crowd, she realized that Joe was nowhere to be seen. Just as well. She didn’t want him caught up in this. She smiled again, thinking of what their last memory of each other might be.
She knew what she wanted her last moment to be, if this was it. She took a deep breath.
“For years, here at the MAD we’ve done our best living on scraps and crumbs, afraid to ask for more. Despite that, we’ve always had a library that was a shining beacon for ‘what’ and sometimes ‘why.’ Throughout cutbacks and policy shifts, patrons always knew they could go to the library and our overworked librarians would do their best.
“But our best often wasn’t good enough because we didn’t have the time, the money, or the tools. Worse, if someone needed an answer to a ‘how’ question—how do I find a job, how do I start a business, how do I heal my broken family, they had nowhere to turn. Our librarians had one heartbroken day after another filled with people asking for help that we didn’t have the tools to provide.
“And all of us paid the price.” She paused, looked up from her notes, and then directly at Molcut. “We paid the price as a community, because none of us could face the price we might have to pay to do better.” She looked back at the crowd. “Because we were afraid to face our own suffering, our children suffered, people who wanted to work suffered, businesses suffered, and teachers suffered.
“No more. The city of Maddington has stood up, led by civic leaders such as Ron Powell, and businessmen like Seth Burroughs and a thousand other citizens who went from saying this couldn’t be done, to finding the courage to make the impossible real. That shining building in front of us, waiting for us, is an enormous toolshed for us alclass="underline" Tools to build, tools to learn, tools to heal, and tools to grow a future beyond our wildest dreams.”
She locked eyes with Molcut. The crowd cheered and she wound up for her finish. Molcut’s enforcer saw the end coming and signaled his men. Serenity saw them shift so each had a clear line of fire toward the stage.
She raised her book over her head with two hands and shook it at them.
“Other cities are built on councils, and chambers, and committees of the absurd. But Maddington is built on books.” She caught the eye of the enforcer and jerked her head up to the sky. He and his men followed her eyes up and saw OHR and his men appearing in the trees, watching and ready. Molcut’s men sat down. For now.
Except for one. The enforcer himself got up quietly and edged through the crowd to a small notch in the building that held the side courtyard. Early in the morning, the courtyard was dark, and out of sight of OHR’s men. A couple of them were scrambling, but it would take them time to follow him.
Serenity saw the enforcer lean against a wall, just a shadow to anyone not watching him. She saw a gleam of metal as he raised a long-barreled pistol.
Fine. But they’ll never kill my books.
At the top of her lungs, she screamed, “Books. Books and courage and strength. Citizens of Maddington, welcome to your MAD.”
The crowd leaped to their feet, cheering. Serenity was listening for another sound over the crowd, and she heard it. A gun boomed but she felt nothing. He must have missed. Then the long-barreled gun dropped, and the shadowy man collapsed into a heap. Joe stepped out into the sunlight, putting his gun away, and was swept away with the crowd.