The Other Side of the Door

Chapter 10

Imagine the most beautiful thing you've ever seen. 

That was the library for me. It was everything I could have ever hoped for. It had probably millions of books, each of which I could dive into if I had the time. 

The smells emitted from the room were wonderful. Old books were one of my favorite smells. 

The furniture and architecture was gorgeous, of course, but I was so distracted by the colorful spines of each book, and how neatly each book was perfectly placed in the shelves. 

"Do you like it?" 

I didn't have words. This was one of my biggest dreams: surrounded by millions of books. "It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen!" I exclaimed. 

The beast chuckled, which actually pulled at my heartstrings. When had been the last time he really laughed, or even felt some feelings similar to joy and happiness? "I am glad you like it."

I started wandering around. It was absolutely magnificent. I ran up the stairs to get a closer look, still completely mesmerized. 

"What would you like to read?" I asked him, dancing around the bookshelves in glee, picking up as many books as I could fit in my hands. 

The beast looked very confused. "I... I don't even know which books are good. I was hoping you would know."

I gave a small smile. "Of course I can pick one. I was just seeing if you had an opinion."

"Of course I have an opinion. I don't want anything... too feminine. I don't want a romance novel," he frowned. He was trying to maintain his tough exterior, but I could see through him. He really didn't even know what type of books were out there. 

I looked around for a bit until I found one of my favorite books. "Romeo and Juliet," I explained as I set it down in front of him at the table. 

"Isn't that a romance novel?" he looked at me with one of his eyebrows up, quizzically. 

"Definitely not. Shakespeare wrote it as a comedy, then it switches to a tragedy in the middle. You'll understand when you read it." 

I opened the book to the first page. The beast just looked at me, as if I had grown another head. 

"When you say you don't know how to read, do you mean you have no idea, or you just don't read well?" 

"I have no idea." 

I kind of wanted to cry. Royalty like him should have been more educated by his age. "Well, let's start from the very beginning, then. Do you have parchment and ink?" 

The beast brought over some parchment for me to write on. I taught him the alphabet, and how to pronounce each letter properly. 

After probably a good hour and a half of  that, I decided that I would just read him a little bit of the play, that way it wasn't all boring for him. 

"Wait, do you mean to say that Romeo now loves Juliet, even though he was crying over Rosaline just a few minutes ago?" the beast furrowed his brows. 

"Yes, that's part of the humor, actually," I chuckled, closing the book. 

The beast stared at me. "Are we done reading for today?" 

I stood up to put the book away. "Well, I thought we could be done for the day. It was a very good stopping point." 

The beast looked thoroughly disappointed. It broke my heart that he wanted to learn so much in so little time. I didn't know how much time was left in the curse, but there couldn't be that much left.