You would think access to a massive (just walking across the main atrium could take hours depending on how favorably its spatial warping cooperated with you), multidimensional (he’s encountered people from alternate timelines and entirely alien worlds), library would be the start of a proper adventure.  And it has been really interesting!

But he isn’t ready to bail on the normal steps of mundane life and he still has his senior year to finish, so he doesn’t yet have the time to spend properly investigating the library.  Especially considering traveling to it involves driving about an hour to another city, going down a tucked away alley on foot, taping on several bricks in a sequence that changes with the current weather and date (Freddy was given a cheat sheet when he was shown the Way, but he still has to try it multiple times to get it right), and walking several hours through a massive atrium.  And that’s just to get to a (front?) desk, where the inhuman librarians can direct you further.

Once he graduates, he is taking a gap year just to properly spend time in the library without other obligations hanging over him.  There is a lot to learn about a reality much bigger than most people can imagine, but Freddy knows the first thing he wants to learn is magic.

His mom freaked out when he said he wanted to take a gap year, but his dad was supportive, and the full ride scholarship he had gotten (somehow, he’s a bit suspicious) to a liberal arts college in Portland that specifically allowed the option of taking a gap year does a lot to settle his mom down.  Hearing his vague plan of “travel around the US, doing odds jobs” got she excited all over again.

Still, he has gotten himself a solid year to explore the library without other obligations getting in the way (well he needs to keep track of Christmas and a few other events to drop by home again, but basically…).