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There were plenty of shelves in the library;

This meant there were plenty of places to hide, something that, right now, Giselle was particularly glad of. She was holding a history textbook as if she was reading it, but inside the history textbook was a somewhat dogeared copy of Pride and Prejudice.

Pride and Prejudice was not normally the kind of book that one would hide in a history textbook so no one would see the cover. It was a perfectly acceptable book to read out in the open, aloud even, and no one would think the worse of you for it. But to Giselle it was mortifying insofar as she had a terrible, horrible secret attached to it.

She was attracted to Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. When she read about Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, her heart sped up approximately two beats. Her face flushed approximately one shade. It was not much, but it was a lot for Giselle, who had never had a boyfriend or a crush that was not at least a hundred years dead and historical.

Mr. Darcy was not historical. He was fictional. It was one step away from liking Edward Cullen, and as far as Giselle was concerned, it was one of her darkest secrets. She was hiding in the most out of the way corner she could find and stopping every so often to look around like a paranoid badger. She couldn't even read the book in her room because Elke barged in too often, so she had to find more out of the way places. She still didn't think she was hiddden well enough, but one thing was for certain.

No one must know.

Giselle had just gotten to one of the good parts, and thus hadn't looked up in a while. It made Remi's outburst a complete surprise. Slamming the history textbook shut with Pride and Prejudice still in it, she let out a yelp. "Read what? I'm not reading anything!" Her head whipped around to find the accuser and make them forget with her mind, and when he saw Remi, she treated him to the Giselle Glare Beam.

It was less effective becuase she was completely humiliated, and she felt it. She simply could not stare someone down when her cheeks were bright red and her hands were shaking. She thought that his reasons for reprimanding her were the same reasons the book was a guilty pleasure. Was it so obvious? She had been sure she was being discreet, but she was most certainly caught in the act. "You won't tell anyone!" she demanded, looking somewhat upset.

After a moment, after the shock was gone, she reluctantly added "Please."

She was thinking furiously. Did he really not know? Did he not see her blushing while she was read? Hope swelled in her chest. She could bluff her way out of this.

His statement was odd though. This century had barely even started, maybe he meant the 20th century? She flushed and looked away. "Well, I do read The Great Gatsby and such, I recognize their historical significance," she hissed quietly, "And they probably have more cultural merit than Pride and Prejudice, yes, but the dialogue in the book is really brilliant, you know, and it's an engaging comedy of manners." She made her point as forcefully as she dared, trying not do overdo it. If she acted right, he'd never find out about her crush on Mr. Darcy. It was to embarrassing to be spoken of.

"Anyway, reading some fiction now and then, no matter what century it's from, exercises the mind. The wider a variety of genres we read, the more knowledgeable we become, both about ourselves, and our culture." It almost convinced her, and she knew the truth. Surely he'd take the bait.

Giselle, whose dream since childhood was to be a fat cat college whoop-si-do, stiffened like a ramrod had been shoved down her back.

Forget defense mode. She transitioned smoothly into attack.

"Excuse me, but I do support today's writers. Today's writers write to reflect our society, which will one day become history as well. I sit down and read all the popular tripe our generation has... Has spewed, and if I must read one more plothole driven travesty like Twilight or Harry Potter, I think I may have to do someone an injury. I will admit, I have enjoyed some literature from the modern era, but I also enjoy literature that has survived the test of time. Their writers have done commendable work, don't you think they should be praised and recognized for it?"

She tried to snatch the book back from Remi. "The dialogue in this book is brilliant," she informed him hotly. "As for what I consider to be a work of art, I look for literature that accurately portray societies and people, books that explore the meanings of questions pertinent to their culture, and preserve the images of their societies for future historians to get glimpses of. When our society begins producing a large variety of works that meet my standards, then I will put down the classics."

And when they create a protagonist as flustering as Mr. Darcy, a tiny, oft-ignored, and very feminine part of her mind chimed in. No Cullen could compare to a man who didn't have to stare at you through your bedroom window to let you know he was thinking of you every waking moment.

Giselle was not mollified by his relief. What was this boy trying to say?

"I never said all of them were bad, but the ones that seem to be enormously popular are hardly stunning. You appear to be misinterpreting my words. The modern books I find well crafted are popular, but rarely make it to the level of fanaticism that some of the more popular drivel has. And writers tend to follow the popular writing of their generation, I've lost count of all the vampire romance novels I've seen recently. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be known as part of the Vampire Chick Lit generation."

Of course he didn't understand. He was a boy, and from what he had showed her so far, a mildly irksome one at that. "I enjoy the dialogue and the novel's societal humour." she said flatly. "The way it portrays people is amusing to me, and I find it interesting to watch them interact. The writer has a strong narrative voice, and I appreciate how the novel takes place in a setting that is realistic for its time period. What do you dislike about it?"

"Then I suggest that you not write tea parties." Giselle said frankly. "I will inform you that there is not a single tea party scene in Pride and Prejudice."

She didn't quite understand what he was trying to say, besides the fact that he was blowing enough hot air to qualify becoming the world's first human hair dryer. "So," she said slowly, as if talking to a child, "Your point is this, if I understand it. We should not compare literature to anything, since that is awfully mean to the writers, and we don't want to scare them, heavens forbid. In order to make writers become more prolific, we must assiduously avoid expressing a preference for any book but books written in the here and now, and if we make connections to book we have read from the past, we absolutely must keep those connections to ourselves, because if we didn't, we might scare the writers into silence. As for what we choose to read, we can read whatever we want, so long as no one tells us to read it. Heavens forbid we listen when someone suggests a book to us, or do you mean that we shouldn't read books that authority figures suggest to us? Are their opinions on what makes a good book null and void because they've been studying literature for so long?"

It was the 'I guess you can read it' that set her off. No one told Giselle what she could or could not do but people she looked to for guidance and herself. Certainly not a rather irritating boy who thought that classic literature wasn't worth his time.

"Everyone has different taste, and books should not be forced out of mainstream culture simply because an author is dead. I openly encourage people to read literature from the past. I don't know about you, but I think it's important that we know what our ancestors were reading, that we seek our roots so we can better understand the culture that's sprouting around us. Ignoring literary history or saying that it's gross only harms your understanding of literature in general."

Giselle was not literary circles. Giselle was historical circles, and though she enjoyed literature, and classical literature especially, she considered writers on the whole to be a group of rather fussy things that couldn't take criticism and leaned towards the sentimental too often.** Remi met her expectations.

Exceeded them, even. She raised an eyebrow as he pushed the notebook over with a somewhat fatalistic comment and scanned what he had written. "I see." she said gravely, using much the same tone a concerned individual might use if a stranger walked up to them and informed them that they could not contain their lust for pine trees. She could get where he was coming from, but she certainly did not approve. It didn't help that she had already categorized him, either. Once Giselle categorized someone, it was hard to earn a re-evaluation.

"There have been millions of writers since earlier than Ancient Greece." Giselle pointed out simply. "If you did not sound like at least one of them, you would have to be some sort of prodigy or babbling complete nonsense. And even nonsense isn't a sure way to sound totally unique." Giselle saw nothing wrong with repeating styles. History repeated things all the time. Giselle repeated things all the time, especially in situations like this one, where it took a while for people to get it. In this day and age it was absolutely impossible to be totally original. "People make connections. That is how people have thought, that is how people do think, and that is how they will think until the end of time. We like things to fit, and saying you sound like someone else isn't necessarily an insult." It was like saying there were parallels between Feudal England and Feudal Japan. Merely a comparison.

A pause.

"Unless the person in question is Stephenie Meyer. As for the claim that one must read classical books to be more well informed, if you don't want to be compared to them, I suggest you make yourself aware of what they sound like. If you dislike comparisons that much, then surely it would make sense to take some steps to avoid being compared to."

She frowned at his other comment. "And this is absurd. No one can tell you that you are or are not capable of speaking in literary circles. You must show them that you are capable yourself. If you work your way up from the bottom, your world is merit based, and only you can change it." She gave him a stern look as she pushed the notebook back. Since childhood, that lesson had been pounded into her brain. She could achieve anything she deemed herself capable of if she could prove she was capable of it. That was why she attended Barren Pines.

**If it was true, but for the sentimental, Giselle would have made an excellent writer.