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Linden has no idea where the money came from, is the problem.

Her day had started out normally enough. She'd woken at five when the dog started whining, let him out into the backyard, and considered staying up and getting the day started right up until the dog came back inside and the bed had seemed to beckon her back. Her alarm had gone off at seven, and then the day had actually begun: shower, clothes, coffee, a glance at the news on the television and the news on Twitter before opening the front door to glance at the news in the paper she still gets delivered.

The paper had been there like it always was. It had been sitting on top of a cardboard box, neatly taped and addressed to her, decidedly not like it always was.

Linden had brought both paper and box inside, and she'd truly meant to start with the paper, but she hadn't ordered anything recently, and nobody had mentioned sending anything. Curiosity had gotten the better of her, so she'd set the paper aside to peek into the box.

Linden's staring at the contents of the box now, heart hammering in her chest. No matter how many times she blinks at it, the contents don't change. There's a small black notebook sitting on a canvas shopping bag. The notebook has all but the last few pages ripped out, and in elegant, looping cursive on the back page is written For Linden Pratchett, for services rendered Apr. 19. With regards, Christen. Below that is an intricate doodle, lines and swirls dancing across the page, never forming an identifiable image but interesting to look at all the same.

In the bag, in neatly-wrapped stacks of fifty-dollar bills, is twenty thousand dollars.

Linden's mind is whirling in a thousand different directions as she stares at the cover of the notebook. She doesn't know anyone named Christen. It's April 17th. She makes a decent amount as a freelance graphic designer, but the most anyone owes her for any sort of services she's rendered is a guy named Paul who's trying to argue with her over a $1,500 invoice. All of the invoices she'll send for work that hasn't been rendered don't add up to $20,000.

She pulls in a deep breath and tries to think. Should she call the police? They'll have questions, she's sure, and she won't be able to answer them. She can't answer them in her own head, and the added pressure of the police asking them won't make it any easier.

Should she see if maybe there's someone else with her name who should be getting the money instead? She can look, but neither her first nor last names are common, and she's pretty sure she'd know if another Linden Pratchett lived anywhere near her.

Her phone beeps, and Linden flinches as she's pulled away from her thoughts. It's her warning alarm, reminding her that she has to be out the door in fifteen minutes if she wants to make it to the coffee shop in time for her client meeting. She glances back at the box as she turns the alarm off.

It's going to have to be a problem for later, she decides. She grabs the bag with the money and breathes past the alarm bells in her head, going into the bedroom and shoving the whole thing under her mattress before returning to the living room. She makes sure she's got everything she needs for the meeting, then hesitates before grabbing the notebook from the box and shoving that into her messenger bag as well. It can't hurt, she reasons, and maybe if she has a few free minutes, she can see if a new setting makes anything jump out of the pages at her.

It's a nice spring day; the breeze makes it a little chilly, but after the winter they've been through, it's still nice to be outside. She's been to the coffee shop a few times before; the owner, a nice older guy named Jeff, had heard about her from a friend, and he's been thrilled with the work Linden's provided so far. They're meeting today to talk about her ideas for his website redesign, and she's honestly excited to start on the project once Jeff picks a layout.

The meeting goes well; the coffee shop is warm and homey, and Jeff gives her a steaming mug of coffee and a few things from the bakery cabinet on the house "to power that creative process." It takes half an hour to go through the three design proposals Linden created for him, and once Jeff picks the one he wants to go with, he smiles and stands from the table.

"Take your time," Jeff tells her. "I'm gonna get some back-of-house stuff done, but stay as long as you want. If you need anything, just ask Kristin. She probably knows more about this place than I do, and she's definitely better at making coffee than I am."

"That's because you can't brew worth a damn," the cheery woman behind the counter says, laughing as Jeff shakes his head and moves towards the back of the store.

Linden laughs and looks down at the notes she'd scribbled as she and Jeff talked about design. She'll type them all up here, she thinks, and maybe get some other work done, too. If she's here, she doesn't have to deal with what's under her mattress; she's not avoiding it, per se, except for how she's maybe, possibly, avoiding it.

"Screen glare or bad project?" Kristin asks when Linden rubs at her eyes about an hour later, and Linden laughs as she looks over.

"Both," she says. "It's nothing for the coffee shop, though, don't worry."

"Good," Kristin says. "Need a refill?"

Linden stretches as she stands, grabbing her mug. "God, please. You wouldn't believe the day I've had."

"I've heard some doozies in my time," Kristin says, grinning like it's some sort of private joke. "Try me."

Linden's not going to tell her about the package or the money. She's not going to tell anyone, she thinks, not until she's got a clue about what's going on. She laughs instead, setting her mug on the counter. "I'm still figuring it all out," she says. "Maybe when I've got it straight in my head."

Kristin smiles and fills up the mug, pushing it back towards Linden. "I keep track of the weirdest ones," she says, shaking her head. "I change all the names, and if there are big identifying details I'll change those too, but I like writing things down. I'm going to write a book, or maybe a short story collection."

"Changing the details?" Linden asks with a smile. "What, do you encounter a lot of mob bosses who might be after you if you write down what they tell you?"

Kristin's eyes dart away from Linden and then back again, almost too fast to notice. "Better safe than sorry, right?"

"Sure, yeah," Linden says, a little thrown. She's about to make her excuses and then go pack her things up, but Kristin pulls a little black notebook out of her apron pocket and starts thumbing through it, and Linden's words freeze in her mouth. There are a billion little black notebooks in the world, she tells herself sternly. Five billion.

"You wouldn't believe some of the stuff I've got in here," Kristin says, putting it on the counter and patting the cover. "Half the time I'm convinced someone's going to realize I've been taking notes and, like, track me down, or something."

"Sounds like a spy movie," Linden forces herself to say. She can't look away from the notebook. "Do you just write, or do you draw, too?"

"I doodle," Kristin says, flipping open to the last page of the notebook, and Linden grips the counter so hard that her fingers hurt when she sees it.

"Kristin," she says, forcing the words out. "Is that—is that the common spelling? Your name?"

"No," Kristin replies, a small frown line appearing between her eyes. "It's spelled like 'christen the baby,' actually. Why?"

Linden swallows down the panic that's blossoming up her throat and takes a step back, then another and another until she can reach into her messenger bag to pull out the notebook. She keeps her eyes on Christen's face as she walks back to the counter and gently lays the book on it, inches from Christen's own.

"This showed up on my doorstep this morning," she says, opening the cover to reveal the ripped-out pages before turning to the last one, an exact duplicate of the complicated doodle in Christen's notebook below the writing that's only in Linden's copy. "It was in a box on my doorstep. With, uh. Some other stuff."

Christen doesn't say anything for a long, long moment. She's looking at the notebook beneath Linden's fingers, then to her own, back and forth over and over again.

"Wow," Christen finally says, looking up at Linden. "So you're the one."

"The one," Linden repeats. "What one? What's going on?"

Christen smiles and flips through the pages of her notebook, pages that are no longer in Linden's version. She's not even looking at it, but she seems sure of herself as her fingers stop at a certain spot.

"In two days," Christen says, "you're going to save my life. I'm guessing I left what I left on your doorstep so I could make sure our paths would cross today, probably so I could tell you about it."

"You're… guessing," Linden says slowly. "You don't remember leaving a cryptic message and twenty grand in a box on my doorstep?"

Christen flashes a smile at her. "I haven't done it yet. I probably won't do it until after it actually happens."

Linden splutters and gestures at the notebook. "You clearly have!"

"I haven't," Christen says, laughing. "My book doesn't have all the pages ripped out. I must have done that before I left it on your doorstep. And that money is very much in my apartment right now. I've been trying to decide between putting it in a shopping bag or stuffing it into a manila envelope for the effect."

There's a moment where Linden considers leaving. Something way beyond Linden's pay grade is clearly going on here, and she considers just bolting out the door, leaving the money under her mattress, maybe referring Jeff and his graphics needs to a friend, just so she can firmly never deal with whatever's happening here.

Once it passes, though, she's incredibly curious.

"I think I'm going to need you to start at the beginning," Linden finally says.

Christen's smile gets wider as she holds out her hand. "That's a long story. Want me to show you instead?"

Linden looks at Christen's outstretched hand, at the notebooks on the counter between them, at her things spread across the table a few feet away. She thinks about the empty box on her kitchen table, the money stashed beneath her mattress, the ripped-out pages that both are and are not in front of her at this very moment.

She takes a deep breath and looks back at Christen. "Okay," she says, reaching out and taking Christen's hand. "Show me."

Christen laughs, loud and wild, and as she wraps her fingers around Linden's, the world around them fades away.