Junk by Josephine Myles Read Free Book Online

he could pull it up over him like an extra blanket, but in summer, it was a liability, prone to getting tangled around his feet. Some nights he’d give up on the stuffy room and go and sleep outside in the hammock. Waking up in the garden to the sound of birdsong was always a great way to start the day, even if he did invariably end up with a crick in his neck.
    But this morning he was glad he’d spent the night up here, because now he was in the perfect position to choose something to throw away. A book. Surely he could get rid of one book. Not throw it away, of course, but pass it on to another reader. Perhaps he could find something Lewis might like to borrow.
    No, not borrow. Have. Keep . A gift. Jasper could give something away. Of course he could.
    The stacks next to the left-hand side where he slept were all twentieth-century classics, and he’d read every single last one of them. If he wasn’t so sure of a book’s literary merit, it ended up on the other side of the room until he’d had a chance to read it and make his decision. There were many more books on that side, it had to be admitted. Books that he ended up classifying as light genre reads made their way out onto the landing, seeing as how he’d completely filled the spare bedroom with them a few years back.
    Jasper picked up Heller’s Catch 22 and read the blurb. The memory of Yossarian’s wartime exploits filtered back in flashes of colour, but he could no longer remember the whole storyline. No, not that one, then. Not until he’d had another chance to read it and fix it in his memory.
    Ulysses presented the same problem, as did The Sound and the Fury . Even EM Forster’s Maurice —a book he must have read at least five times during his teens and which had helped him in so many ways—was little more than a frustrating set of isolated images and feelings. What the hell was wrong with his mind?
    It would have to be one from the other side of the room. But when he crawled across the bed and examined the first stack, Jasper knew it was futile. How could he possibly decide to get rid of a book he hadn’t yet read? There could be useful information in there. Even the most unpromising-looking books contained hidden nuggets of truth and beauty.
    Even Jeffery Archer must have his good points, although he couldn’t think of one off the top of his head.
    For a moment, Jasper seriously considered offering Lewis a copy of Stephen King’s The Stand , as he was sure he’d seen it somewhere else in the house at some point. But who was to say Lewis would appreciate being offered a brick-sized tome of post-apocalyptic weirdness? No, safer to wait until Jasper had read it first, and then he could decide whether or not it would suit Lewis. He wouldn’t want to give the man nightmares.
    Perhaps not a book, then. A magazine? Or a newspaper? But no one in their right mind would give one of those as a gift. Lewis would sneer at him, Jasper was sure of it. He’d never realise just what it had cost Jasper to lose even one paltry magazine.
    As the familiar headache started up behind his eyes, Jasper gave up on the task. Better just get washed and dressed, then head into work. At least he could promise himself not to bring any more magazines home today, couldn’t he?
    Yes, that would be something. An achievement, of sorts.
    The bitter irony that his biggest achievement of the day would lie in not doing something didn’t escape him, however, and Jasper’s steps were heavy as he negotiated the crowded trail between his bedroom and the bathroom.

Chapter Five
    By the afternoon, Jasper’s mood had lifted—the result of a happy couple of hours in the back room entering new books into the system. He loved that job, with its comforting ritual of entering the data on the computer. And best of all, he got to open the boxes to unleash the scent of fresh books. Being the first one to lift them out of the packaging was always a buzz. This particular supplier used the