I still have the blue spiral notebook sitting on my kitchen counter. It has exactly 217 dates written inside, all in my messy handwriting.

I worked at the public library on Oak Street for nearly thirty years before I retired last month.

It is a quiet place, just a small brick building with creaky floors and that old-paper smell I always loved.

It gave me a reason to get out of the house after my Harold passed away, to be honest with you. The house gets awfully quiet when it is just you and the television.

Then last year, around the middle of September, this little boy started coming in. His name was Leo.

He was only nine years old, a skinny little thing with a mop of brown hair and the brightest blue eyes you ever saw. He would walk through the heavy glass doors at exactly 3:15 every afternoon, right after the school bus dropped him off.

Leo would go straight to the back corner, near the big window that looks out onto the parking lot. He always sat in the same high-backed green armchair.

At first, I was just glad to see a young kid using the library instead of playing on those cell phones. But after a week or two, I noticed something a bit off.

Leo never actually read any books.

He would pick up a random chapter book from the display shelf on his way in, but he would just hold it closed in his lap. He spent the whole time staring at the front doors.

If someone walked in, his whole body would tense up. He stayed in that chair until the clock on the wall hit 7:00 PM, which was when we closed up for the night.

“Are you waiting for your mom, sweetie?” I asked him one rainy Tuesday.

Leo didn’t look up from his lap. “No, ma’am.”

“Is she working late?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.

I didn’t want to pry too much, bless his heart. I figured his mother was working a double shift and didn’t want him home alone in an empty house.

But it kept happening, day after day, week after week. He never had a backpack with him, just his school clothes and those worn-out sneakers.

By November, it was getting dark early. The parking lot would be pitch black by 5:00 PM, and there Leo would be, sitting in that big green chair, staring at the door.