Lupo

Chapter Nineteen: The Bodleian

Happy Saturday!

(As always) this is unedited and imperfect. Not at all happy with the first couple of paragraphs, but CBA with this one anymore. Things get interesting in the next chapter, which will be a Loooooong one (just to prewarn ya!) 

(C)copyright SJCLewis2020

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Friday dawned wet and gloomy. 

Minerva was already sitting at the kitchen table by the time Darcie was up and dressed. It was plainly obvious- from all the books and empty Redbull cans strewn across almost every surface - that she'd been sat there all night. Red-eyed and dog-tired, she had only raised her arms in weary triumph in response to Darcie's question of " Have you finished, then?", and Darcie had emitted a small sigh of relief as she'd made them both toast and coffee. The dissertation deadline was now mere hours away. 

They'd sat on the bus into town in companionable silence, and Darcie was mildly surprised -though thankful- that neither Tito, nor Audrey, nor Bash had appeared. They parted ways at the print shop, Minerva anxiously joining the queue of students at the door, and Darcie heading straight for the Radcliffe Camera. 

Thank fuck for that. 

She made it to the Gladstone link just as it opened, and managed to bag one of the coveted spots opposite the stairs before the desks became too crowded. By 10am the library was full, Oxford and Brookes Students alike all cramming for exams and frantically trying to complete essays. Darcie was sure that the expression of grim exhaustion on so many faces was also plastered across her own as she fired up her laptop. She had plenty of time to complete her final assignment - a 3000-word analysis of humourism in Shakespeare- but after her dissertation, she was struggling to find the motivation to study. 

Her laptop - old and slow- whirred loudly, as if in protest at all the software Darcie had demanded it run, and it was a few minutes before the blank word processor opened on screen. Savouring this moment wherein she was forced to sit and do nothing, Darcie considered her hands, her mind wandering away from the library and the task at hand and back to 153 Heavitree road. Despite already succeeding in dragging herself up and all the way into town, the urge to put off work in favour of returning to bed to watch Netflix all day was so strong it almost won out. Almost...

Her phone, which lay on the desk atop one of her many notebooks, lit up as a message from Minerva flashed across the screen. Darcie glanced gloomily towards it, and just caught the words 'Printed and off to submit...' before the screen faded to black again.  She sighed bitterly. The thought of Minerva, unkempt, unwashed, and nearly sick with stress and exhaustion, presenting her dissertation to the exam office so perilously close to the deadline, was just enough to spur her into action. Reluctantly, she opened her notebook and pulled out the list of references she'd complied during her last lecture.

Ugh, where to even begin?

The first book on the list, Shakespeare and the Four Humours, had been particularly recommended by her tutor, and Darcie figured that was as good a place to start as any. Grudgingly, and with another sigh, she pushed back her chair and made for the shelves with the corresponding reference numbers first, unhurried and unwilling to return to her desk too quickly. The code she was looking for was listed on an already open stack at the very back of the room; Here, the library was half bathed in shadow, and the sounds of rustling and typing were muffled by the shelves upon shelves of reference books lining the walls.  A little put out that she'd managed to find it so soon, she made her way along the aisle until she spotted the range of numbers she was looking for. Crouching down, it took her a few moments of scanning along the bottom shelf, before she spotted the scruffy, laminated cover of Shakespeare and the four humours.