The most curious flight of wooden stairs began where no one noticed. It was unpolished and un-dusted, with a creaky floorboard at the end of the first flight that you could jump across (or, you could peek between the planks as you paused in flight to discover the hidden storage room of the haughty cafe beneath, the one that played nothing but a jazzy Christmas number).
It was a peculiar one, this bookstore, with its selection of fine literature, French films, tall windows and sheaves of paper exquisitely bound. The owner of the bookstore, a young wee one with the spirit of someone elderly, was perpetually working.
With the counter-top serving as a workbench, the young man was often found sawing, or hammering or stitching, all at once bearing a relentless pain in his head. It was inevitable that the elderly spirit had chosen a muse again; a breathing museum. The pain was composed of brilliant octaves that came with age-old wisdom and ancient art.
Every fortnight, the youth produced more than a hundred works of art. He worked without sleep, often without breath, and suffered unforgiving pain. He acquired great skill: intaglio, collage, trompe l'oeil... He grew articulate, revered perfection and was effortlessly charming; it was only a matter of time that everything he touched grew wiser and more beautiful. The elderly spirit was proud.
At the corner of the bookstore, there was a shy left window that a street lamp was in love with. The young man frequently worked in front of it. Every night, the bold uncovered bulb of the street lamp overwhelmed the window (how lustrous, and mustard!). The glass window, bashfully warmed, multiplied each radiant wavelength into a million more, quite like a generous chandelier - its luminance transposing onto the young artist while creating a halo behind his heavy head.
This love (so fresh and inspired!) pierced the young man's consciousness, like a million billion pieces of a goblin's mirror. In the background, J. S. Bach's Cello Suite No. 1, as performed by the illustrious du Pre, plays on a loop. The deep resonance of the cello seemed to soothe the throbbing and placate the elderly spirit. Yet, a small part of him, the part pierced by light, wondered - what if a violinist could inspire what he believed only the cellist could?
Nonetheless, and all of a sudden, it happened. The young man stood up painfully, his flesh crumbling under the burden from above. He knelt before the small black screen that lay diagonally across the bookstore. It was playing a nouvelle vague film. He desperately needed to be released. He (the one I name 'petit ami') forced his young eyelids open against profound gravity.
Now then, the spirit knew, it had to let him go; the elderly spirit stepped majestically away from the youth, too vain to lament, transposing itself onto the footage displayed across the screen. In that precise order, I saw: a museum; a shattered chandelier; a violin prodigy; and a bookstore independent of it all.
Karen Wai, 23, is the co-owner of independent bookstore BooksActually. She is also an English literature undergraduate at the National University of Singapore.