I discovered I was a Parallaxer while reshelving Kafka. One moment I was organizing "The Metamorphosis," the next I was inside it – literally inside the text, watching Gregor Samsa struggle with his newfound insect form. Turns out I could read books by becoming part of their stories. Talk about immersive learning.

My name is Theodor Wells, and I'm what the government calls a "narrative interface specialist." The staff at the New York Public Library, where I work, just call me the guy who knows where every book really is. Not just where it's shelved, but where it exists in the vast landscape of literature itself.

The first few weeks were rough. I kept slipping into books accidentally. A brush against "Moby Dick" and suddenly I'm on the Pequod, smelling salt air and whale oil. A misplaced hand on "The Great Gatsby" and I'm at one of those parties, watching the green light blink across the bay. The worst was "House of Leaves" – took me three days to find my way out of that one.

But here's the thing about being a literary Parallaxer: the books remember me. And more importantly, they remember each other. I started noticing connections, storylines bleeding together at the edges. Characters leaving footnotes for each other. Plot points crossing over when nobody's watching.

That's when the Library Board called an emergency meeting.

"Mr. Wells," said the head librarian, peering at me over her glasses, "we've been getting some... unusual reports. A patron claims she found Sherlock Holmes solving a murder in 'Pride and Prejudice.' Another says 'The Old Man and the Sea' now includes a submarine battle with Captain Nemo."

"The books talk to each other," I tried to explain. "They're alive in ways we never realized. And now they're... networking."

That's when the men in black showed up. Apparently, the ability to enter and potentially alter the content of books has "significant intelligence implications." They wanted to know if I could infiltrate classified documents, extract information from redacted files, maybe plant new narratives in existing texts.

I told them I only work with fiction. I don't think they believed me.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

The thing is, I was lying. I can enter any written text. But some things shouldn't be messed with, and government documents are definitely on that list. Besides, I had bigger problems.

The cross-contamination was spreading. Genre boundaries were breaking down. I found Hamlet wandering through "The Hunger Games." Lady Macbeth was giving questionable advice in "Little Women." And something from Lovecraft's stories had taken up residence in the card catalog.

I tried to maintain order, I really did. But have you ever tried to tell Jay Gatsby that he can't throw a party in "Wuthering Heights"? Or explain to Captain Ahab that the white whale isn't supposed to be in "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea"?

That's when I discovered my second ability – I could not only enter stories, but I could guide them back to their original forms. Like a literary shepherd, herding wayward narratives home. It's not about forcing them; it's about reminding them of their true nature, their core themes and purpose.

Most of them, anyway. Some books are just natural rebels. "Don Quixote" keeps sneaking into other stories to fight windmills. "The Call of the Wild" occasionally lets its dogs run through different narratives. And anything by Borges basically does whatever it wants.

I've learned to maintain a balance. A little cross-pollination keeps things interesting. Like finding Romeo and Juliet's balcony scene playing out in the background of "1984" – a reminder that love persists even in the darkest settings. Or discovering that Mrs. Dalloway bought her flowers from the Secret Garden.

The government still shows up occasionally, asking about classified documents and redacted texts. I keep telling them I just help maintain narrative integrity at the library. They keep not believing me.

Truth is, I did try accessing a classified file once. Just once. But government documents are different – sterile, cold, aggressively linear. Fiction is alive. Classified documents are just... paper.

Besides, I'm too busy these days. Someone has to keep "Fahrenheit 451" from starting actual fires, convince "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" to stop eating through other books' pages, and make sure "The Time Machine" doesn't accidentally send the entire classics section into next Tuesday.

Last week, a girl came in looking for a book about her parents' home country, a place she'd never been. I found her the perfect story, then slipped inside to make sure all the sounds and smells and textures were exactly right. When she read it, she cried and said it felt like coming home.

That's the real power, I think. Not changing stories, but helping them become more truly themselves. Helping them reach the readers who need them most.

The library closes in an hour. The night shift is quiet – just me and thousands of books, their stories softly overlapping like waves on a shore. I should probably do something about the white whale swimming through the Russian literature section. And I think I just saw Alice chasing the rabbit through "The Sound and the Fury."

But first, Kafka's calling. Not "The Metamorphosis" this time, but "The Trial." Something's different in there, a new passage forming like a crystal in a saturated solution. The books are still evolving, still growing. Still telling new stories.

Time to dive back in.