The Thousand Faces Notebook

I could feel the salty taste from the sweat that made its way into my mouth from my upper lip. The focal white light over my head was so intense, pointed at me as a sharp inquisitor, forcefully obliging me to act. I was never good at acting. Never good at starting something. Life was the one who always pushed me with its slow and monotonous flow.

Everyone was looking at me. Were they? Their eyes seemed to be, but not their souls. Lost in their own dramas and egos, they pretended to be there, but they never really were. Those were the ones who made themselves available to become an audience of a TV show. Randomly selected non-interested nor interesting people sitting on plastic chairs for more than 6 hours just for a chance to be featured in those 10-second spots on someone else's TV. As if they would be remembered for that. No one cared.

I had always been on the other side, sitting on my couch, looking at (not watching) the lighted square that sat alone in my empty living room, laughing at things that weren't funny—mechanically reacting to what was put in front of me. Looking at those faces and their meaningless reactions. I didn't even know what I thought was funny anymore. I didn't remember how to feel; I was numb.

Now it was me on the other side. In the spotlight, not by choice, but as a sailor adrift in the river flow called life. I had been brought to this TV show and had accepted what was given to me as usual. Against my will, in endless internet scrolls during empty weekends, an ad had popped between a porn website and another. I was almost coming when I saw a flicking and shining text that wouldn't allow me to carry on.

"Are you ready to be someone else?

Do you want to change your life forever?

For the first time ever, the one and only "Thousand Faces Notebook" from the dead and unforgettable Mr.Shleble is available for you - if you dare to try your luck!

Click here to participate in this challenge for the chance to become whoever you want to be!"

I remember thinking of who Mr.Shleble was. Wasn't he that magician that had no face? Or, that guy that had several faces? I never knew he had died. I wouldn't know who he was anyway; I was never paying too much attention to anything, especially to someone that could change his appearance at any time.

With a little research, I found out that before the "Thousand Faces Notebook," his latest and apparently last creation, he had been a famous inventor well-known for his marvelous ideas. The "unbomb" and the "disclock" were only a few of the things he had come up with during his apparently glorious life.

I had nothing to lose. By clicking on that ad, I never imagined that one month later, I would be standing here, with a long-toothed tall skinny guy in a purple tuxedo and purple bow tie looking at me with his shiny black hair full of gel and piercing black eyes.

"You have to choose one option, sir. This is the final challenge. Everyone is waiting."

The whole world was indeed waiting. This had become one of the most famous TV challenges of the year. Before dying, Mr.Shleble had left a lot of money and instructions in his will to his lawyer, so he could be sure this would be the most televised and advertised TV challenge ever. I didn't understand why they had chosen me. Probably by some mistake. But the fact was that I was here and I had won all the previous challenges.

I was careless with my life because it didn't matter if I lost it. Different from other participants, I wasn't afraid to die. I longed for it. So, for the past week, I had gone through awful challenges and came back victorious from all of them.

My recklessness had brought me to the last stage. I had won. How my long-hours in front of a hypnotizing squared-white light in my filthy bedroom had made me know so much, I wouldn't say. But I did, and now it was either press the button on the left and leave with a 20 thousand dollar prize or pressing the button on the right and being the new owner of that secretive black notebook.

You might be thinking now what a fool I would be to choose a notebook instead of money because, for someone that has nothing, money could buy me a new life, a larger apartment, a better reason to live. But the notebook was my way out—the way out of myself. I had hated being me for so long.

Sitting alone night after night on the same couch, never knowing if it was hugging me or engulfing me in its slow suffocative embrace. The tiny apartment inside the crowded building I lived in made me feel more alone than if I was indeed alone. The foul smell coming out of the bad lighten narrow hallway whenever I came in or out from work made me want to puke every time. The only human contact I had was the elevator's awkward moments when myself and someone I didn't know wouldn't bear being in silence for the 1-minute trip through all the 30 floors of that old building.

Life was a burden in itself. My body was my trap, and time was my poison. Being me was not good, and this was my way out. I was breathless, and not a sound was heard the second I pressed the button on the right. Screams of happiness and unstoppable clappings were followed by a golden paper rain that fell on my head right after that. It was over, I had chosen the notebook, and now it was mine to be used for whatever purpose I needed.

"Good luck and let god help you find your way" were the last words in my ear from the guy in the purple tuxedo when handing me the prize. It was a thick black notebook with yellowish pages. I couldn't dare to open it until I arrived at the hotel. One of the rules was that the winner should be escorted right after the show and couldn't go home until a month after the last episode was aired. Apparently, it was too risky, my face had been seen worldwide, and the notebook was too valuable. I could be killed, kidnapped, or robbed on the way.

The leather was soft and firm beneath my dirty clothes. The car smelled of something different; it must be the smell of cleanliness that hadn't come across my nostrils in a long time. The ride was smooth as the driver and I floated across the dirty dark city while I held tight to my curiosity and didn't open the notebook that sat on my lap.

We arrived at a modern shiny tall tower, all of its glass windows illuminated. It was completely different from my apartment. Life was good on this side of the town.

Two tall security guards, one on each side, escorted me through bright hallways until we reached the elevators that stood fiercely in the middle of the hotel. It was a short ride until the 100th floor, but it felt like forever as I anxiously held the notebook in my hands, longing to open it for the first time.

They walked me to my room in silence and opened the door for me with the electronic key. Apparently, they would stay outside keeping guard, but I didn't care. I quickly closed the hotel door behind me, and with my back to it, sat on the carpeted floor of the penthouse room.

I looked around mesmerized, but it wasn't time for that. What was in my hands felt much more important. I quickly opened the notebook and saw a handwritten note from Mr.Shlebel:

"Dear winner,

Do you still remember how to write?

Here's where your handwriting becomes the master of your journey.

Everything written on these pages will come to fruition as soon as you close this notebook and are immediately teleported to your story.

You will only come back when the story you wrote is finished, and then everything is erased so you can start again.

But beware, whoever you become and whatever you feel in your story experiences comes back with you. That can't be erased.

If you die in your story, you die here. If you fall in love with your story, you fall in love here. You might possibly never be able to see that person you love again, since no story is the same.

Even if you can copy the same story, how would you know if the characters on your pages will come back the same way they were?

Are you the same writer in the morning as you are in the evening? The same writer when you are angry or when you are happy or sad? I don't believe we ever are.

Oh, and don't forget to stay in a safe place when you travel. Your body will remain at the exact same location you are when you leave. If anything happens to your body when you are traveling, it will affect you permanently.

Except if you find the answer. I found a way to stay in a story and never come back to this world.

If you ever figure out how to stay in a story, you will be able to find me, and I will tell you the biggest secret about this notebook. All I can leave you with now is this:

"When you look for the keys outside, remember the main door lies inside. When you find what you can't hide, there the answer resides."

Hope I can see you in person soon.

Safe travels,

Mr.S."