The Cleaning

By Alycia Christine

A SHORT STORY

“We’re making a safer, cleaner world...”

In the Digital Age, printed books have become as obsolete as the public libraries that house them. The government has spent millions of dollars to ensure that all print books are properly scanned and preserved as e-books before they are recycled...all except for the dangerous ones, that is.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Alycia Christine
• Release date: Sep 17, 2014
• ISBN: 9781941588178

Alycia Christine

Alycia Christine grew up near the dusty cotton fields of Lubbock, Texas, with a fearless mutt for a dog and a backyard trampoline that almost bounced her to the moon. She fell in love with fantasy and science fiction books when her father first read them to her at age ten. Her love of fiction writing blossomed during her time at Texas A&M University. Alycia’s fiction has received wide praise for its unique characters and vivid storytelling. Her award-winning art photography has been featured in Times Square. When she isn’t writing or shooting photos, Alycia enjoys long talks with her husband, drinking copious amounts of tea, and coaxing her skittish cat out from under the living room furniture. Find her at AlyciaChristine.com.

Book preview

The Cleaning

Alycia Christine

PurpleThornPress.com

Contents

The Cleaning

Meet the Author

Also by Alycia Christine

Bonus Material

Copyright

In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the reproduction, storage in a retrieval system, or transmitting of this book, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than brief passages excerpted for review and critical purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [e-mail]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

The Cleaning

The leather-faced librarian sat behind a massive mahogany desk squinting suspiciously at us through the thick glass of her bifocals. I selected the paperwork for our most recent cleaning job on my electronic tablet and slid the device across the scarred wood toward her shaking hands. I barely noticed her watering eyes as I wrinkled my nose in disgust. Like all the others we’d visited, this place smelled of dust, mold, and decay and its lone occupant