By the time she gets home, Rei’s fingers ache from carrying the heavy bookbag.

Koestler. Friday. Hirschfeld. Freud. Irigaray. Rei rubs her fingers along the spines one at a time, as if that will tell her which to read first, which can tell her what she needs to know.
In the end she bounces back and forth between them rapidly until all the volumes are lying open in a semi-circle around her on the bed. She tries to take it all in at once, in little bursts, until all the words jumble together inside her in a tangled confusion, telling her everything she wants to know and nothing at all.