Pentagons

'People don't have only one face.' I suppose I had read that phrase from one of my sister's books before. Even if you knew them for a long time, there's no assurance that the face they showed to you was true. A normal person consisted of three faces; A face they wore for their family, A face for their friends, and lastly for acquaintances and strangers. 

Thinking about that, maybe it was too serious for me to understand hence I didn't finish reading the book and left it on my bookshelf which where it surely collecting dust.

As we opened the door, a scent of woods and papers immediately greeted us.

"Welco—Oh, it's you again!" A girl hugging a book exclaimed as my sister and I entered the store. Certainly, she's one of the staff of the store since she had a nameplate on her chest.

After we finished our ice creams, I accompanied my sister to the bookstore. There was a book in the store that she wanted to buy no matter what, she said after we left the ice cream store. Which led us here; the bookstore near the convenience store.

"Yeah, it's me again. Do you have a problem with that?"

"Well, you're one of our loyal customers, do I need to say something about that?" The girl placed down the book on the counter next to the door.

"Thought so," my sister as she started walking to the columns of huge bookshelves.

Evidently, I was left gazing at the lines of books on the counter. For a moment, I wondered what was the reason to keep books lined on the counter when you could just pick them up on the bookshelf itself.

I guess people could be unreasonable sometimes.

Gawking around, my eyes fell on the signboard at the left section, which was the opposite of where my sister headed. The word 'Reference Books' caught my attention hence, I found myself unconsciously moved my feet.

A series of different books were lined up in a parallel line but obviously, it was in its proper order. Every row had its own particular subject. For example, the first row had chemistry books, the second was biology, and the last one had statistics. All of them weren't taught in elementary so it made me felt excited to read them, I felt something tickled inside me.

I stretched my arm and stood on my finger toes as I tried to reach the chemistry book since it caught my interest ever since I'd read the Fe2O3 thingy. I still wondered what was its meaning but it made me more wondered why I always forgot to search about it.

Just when my fingertips grazed the spine of the book, someone grabbed it and pulled it from the bookshelf. Excuse me, that book…, I almost said but I stopped as it turned out that the one who took my book was the girl, who was hugging one, earlier.

Her gaze shifted from the book to me, and back to the book. Ultimately, her eyes stopped shifting gazes as she looked at me dubiously, as though wondering why I was about to take the book that wasn't particularly made for my age.

"Oum…" I suppose she thought I was just grabbing random books for no reason.

She brought the book back to its own place, then she turned to face me and slightly bent her knees. "It seems you made a mistake, Young lady," she said with a smile on her face. "The kid's section is on the side of the store. If you'd like, I will bring you ther—"

"Oum, excuse me but I intentionally went in this section," I admitted. "And also for the book…"

"Oh…" 

She cocked her head, looking at me puzzled as though she didn't realize her mistake. It certainly made an awkward situation for both of us.

"Oum, excuse me," I said.

I slightly bowed to her and turned to face the bookshelf. Once I stood on my finger toes, I tried to reach the book once more. But she then again snatched it before I even had my fingers on it. Seriously, what's wrong with this…

"Oum, like I said I—"

"Here," she said, giving me the book with a smile. It looked as though she was trying to redo what she did earlier but there was a hint on her smile that she was embarrassed by what she did.

Timidly, I accepted the book from her and gave my "Thank you." She eventually said, "Your welcome" and went back to where she came from.

Thus, I peacefully went back to finding a good book to read, specifically, to learn.

Picking up the book that took my interest, I walked to meet my sister. Pink, white and blue hand size book came into my view. Unlike the section where I went to, this area had a lot more books. Not to mention that they were all on the same subject. There were also books lying in the box on the floor but unlike those in the bookshelves, there were few gaps between them, separating books from one another.

I grabbed one and opened a few pages. It's not like the books she had in her room, I thought as I analyzed its content.

Nothing was interesting about this book. Unlike the reference books, this one didn't sound like teaching at all. It was just a bunch of people talking about one certain topic.

"Whoops!"

I left staring at my hands as my sister snatched the book that I was reading. Her hand stretched the book to the air.

Looking up to her, since we had a huge distance on our height ( I want to grow faster…), I saw a strange expression on her face. Her face grew redder than tomatoes but her ears were more flushed than her face. Her lower lip was slightly trembling as her eyes grew wider than saucers.

"Big sister?" I mumbled, surprised by her reaction.

Eventually, the mysterious expression faded away as her hand slowly got lower and returned to her side. She placed her vacant hands on my head and run her fingers through my hair.

"This is not for kids, you know," she said, waving the book in the air. "You wouldn't grow proper adult if you start reading these at your age." she grinned.

For some reason, it made me upset when she said, at my age. And for some certain reason, it just made me intrigued about what's inside the book.

It seemed she would also purchase the book that she just took from me. And of course, I'll make sure to read it later, I thought.

Just then, I felt my sister flicked her fingers to my forehead that made me come to my senses. I scratched my forehead with my little fingers and frowned at her. 

"That hurts, you know," I complained. After a few rubbing, the burning sensation on my forehead had eventually gone.

"I know what you're thinking so, I'll make sure to hide it somewhere you can't find. Try to find it if you can, Miss grow up," she prompted.

"Wua, that's unfair!" I half lamented.

Since I knew where she hid her private books. I occasionally took one but I made sure to return it after an hour so she wouldn't know.

"Anyway, is that all you want to buy?" she asked, as she pointed to the book, I took from the reference section, with the book that she snatched from me.

I nodded. Then she asked me, who would pay for it and I just gave her a wide smile.