In my teens, when it wasn’t safe to go home after school, I’d hide out in the library.

To fool the librarians into thinking I belonged there, I flipped through books and magazines.

In this way I slipped into an intimacy with words from which I have yet to recover.

Bob Thurber is the author of “Paperboy: A Dysfunctional Novel” and two collections of stories. A celebrated master of Flash and Micro Fiction, his work has appeared in 60 anthologies, received dozens of awards, and been used in schools and colleges throughout the world. He resides in Massachusetts where, though legally blind, he continues to write every day. Visit his website at BobThurber.net.