The Dreadful Surge

by Albert Tucher

About the Author: Albert Tucher is the creator of prostitute Diana Andrews, who has appeared in more than seventy short stories in such venues as THUGLIT, SHOTGUN HONEY, and THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2010, edited by Lee Child and Otto Penzler. Albert Tucher works as a cataloger at the Newark Public Library, where Beatrice Winser, the protagonist of THE DREADFUL SURGE, was the Librarian for most of the early 20th century.

Excerpt

This is middle age.

Beatrice Winser turned from her left side onto her back. Experience told her that she would lie in the dark for five minutes before executing another quarter turn onto her right side. Then she would return to her back in preparation for another interval of futility in her original position.

She could only guess at the time, but it must be well after midnight. For hours sleep had teased her like a murmured conversation in some exotic language. In the morning she would rise and force herself to act the part of the Librarian of the city of Newark.

She would instruct, commend, exhort, and discipline her staff, all the while longing for her bed, where she would spend another night like this one.

What was it about age forty-seven? Since her birthday in March she had spent uncounted hours staring into the darkness. Was it fear of mortality? She had no such conscious fear, but who knew what her depths harbored? Dr. Freud made much of the duality. Her life was certainly more than half over, but she had many productive years ahead of her.

She knew that this fretting in the dark was futile, but her mind refused to stop.

And now it was time for that richest of rewards for stubborn wakefulness, a trip through the darkness to the bathroom. If she turned the light on, she knew she would be giving up on even a catnap in the brief period before she left her bed for good.

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