The Twenty Thousand Dollar Soul

In my defence, anyone in my position would have taken the money.

I had more outgoing than incoming. I was constantly worrying about whether I’d make my rent at the end of the month.

I had to work part-time at a coffee house just to scrape by - you know how it goes. I would have been crazy not to take the reward. I should have asked to see the fine print.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. First, I need to tell you about the book. The little black book that ruined everything.

It was late on one of those autumn days that everyone except the aesthetes find miserable – dark, rain-soaked, haunted. Only three regulars were mulling over their coffees. I was trudging around with a plastic bowl, gathering cups and plates and used napkins.

I didn’t notice it at first, clearing away four mugs that looked like the same drink four times – someone must have done serious work here this afternoon. I took the bowl out to the kitchen, grabbed a cloth and a bottle of cleaning spray.

I was wiping the table when it caught my eye. Cleaning tables doesn’t exactly require a lot of attention, so my mind wonders, and so do my eyes. They drifted their usual path across the table to the padded seats, idly passing crumbs I made a mental note of, up to the arm, paused, rewound, trained in on the black smudge that had entered my peripheral vision.

I frowned, stopped my unenthusiastic window-wiper motions on the table, and focused. It was a little black notebook, wedged between the padding and the arm of the corner seat. I wiped my hands on my apron and pulled the book free.

I’d seen the odd forgotten notebook, but none of them had been like this one. The cover was black faux suede, the edges beginning to fray, with a slightly beat-up, well-used kind of look to it. I was immediately struck by the basic charm of the thing. It had a comfortable feel to it, as if it were a companion rather than a tool.

The manager, Mike, called to the last customers about closing up, so I dropped the notebook into the pocket of my apron and hurriedly resumed cleaning. I had a paper to finish that evening, and the sooner I got it done, the sooner I could catch up on the latest season of American Horror Story.

***

I awoke in the raggedy armchair that had been left by a previous tenant – it was probably third or fourth-hand by now – and groggily stretched the kinks out of my back and neck.

Glancing at my phone, I found it earlier than I had expected, and wondered over to the open-plan kitchen. I opened the fridge, grimaced, closed the fridge, made a mental note for the third time that week that I had to go grocery shopping. Flicking the switch on the kettle, I looked around for something to keep me occupied while the water was boiling. I had chucked my work apron on the floor as soon as I walked in, so I stooped to retrieve it. It felt heavier than it should have, and I remembered the notebook. For a split-second, I felt guilty for not dropping it into the lost and found box at work, but then my curiosity overpowered all else and I flicked through the pages.

It was, in a word, beautiful. Neat handwriting, carefully drawn diagrams, exquisitely detailed illustrations – from a purely aesthetic viewpoint, it plucked all the right strings inside me and I knew I wouldn’t try to find its owner. Don’t get the wrong idea here – I never break rules, I am always polite, and I’m honest to a fault. What you have to understand is that this was how much of an impact this little notebook had on me. Just a peek inside and all of my principles went out the window. I had to keep it.

I squinted at the blocks of text, trying to find some indication of what the notebook was for. Most of it was unhelpful – there was very little written in English. I identified five different languages from a basic recognition I had learned over the years by skimming user manuals and warning stickers. One script, however, held my attention. It was unlike any written language I had seen, and even after three hours on the internet, I couldn’t identify it.

I was still examining the book’s contents when I realised it was morning, and my itchy eyes could no longer focus on the pages. I groaned and crumpled over my desk – I had a full day, and making it through on no sleep was not going to be pleasant.

***

“Are you alright?” Mike asked, “Do you need to go home?”

I couldn’t decide if his concern was for me or for the cost of replacing the four plates and two mugs that I had dropped during my shift.

I knew I looked like crap, and I was exhausted, but that wasn’t what was causing my clumsiness. I had been screwing things up all day, and it was because of that little black book. I couldn’t get it out of my head. The desire to figure out what it was about burned through my brain like a fever.

“Sorry, Mike,” I mumbled, trying to sound sincere. “I didn’t sleep last night. Can you handle the rest without me?”

“Sure; go home and get some sleep.”

I should have been mortified at the mess I’d made and the trouble I’d caused, but honestly, I couldn’t have cared less. I wanted to go back to my room, back to the notebook.

Needless to say, I didn’t go to sleep when I got home. I made myself some coffee, and I nested myself in the armchair with notebook and laptop. Though I hadn’t figured out the strange language that made up the majority of the text, the languages I could look up online and the images were beginning to make some kind of sense.

It seemed that the notebook was some kind of research on souls, what they were made up of and how they reacted to the world around them. It was fascinating, and I found myself engrossed in searching for the answers. In fact, I became so engulfed in that task that I didn’t even realise I was missing classes and work until I received a phone call from Mike – I had already spent the entire weekend with the notebook, trying to unlock its secrets.

I had no choice but to go to work Tuesday morning.

When I arrived at the coffee house, a notice in the window caught my eye. It was a reward notice – the return of the notebook for $20,000. My heart leapt into my throat and pounded as if it were trying to escape through my mouth.

$20,000. What I could do with that much money!

And then my heart dropped, passed where it should have lodged and into my stomach to melt. They wanted the notebook. The notebook that had become the centre of my miserable and futile existence. The one thing that gave my life any kind of excitement or mystery, and they wanted it. Why did they care so much? They were the ones who had forgotten the notebook in the first place, just left it abandoned in a coffee house where anyone could have picked it up. If they cared about it so much, how could they have left it behind?

I squinted at the poster. $20,000 for the notebook? Who the hell had $20,000 to just throw away? Just for a notebook? Why was it so important to them?

I glared at the window, at the poster, at the little photograph of the notebook.

I was pulled from my musings when Mike opened the door and leaned out. “What’s up? You not coming in?”

I gestured irritably to the reward poster.

“Oh that? Some guy came in on Saturday and asked if he could put it there. So much trouble, makes you wonder what’s in the book, doesn’t it?”

I made a vague sound of agreement in the back of my throat, seething.

“Well, if it’s that important to them, that’s their business. Come on, the queue’s getting long.”

I followed Mike inside, miserably aware of the little black notebook sat on my desk in my apartment.

The shift was difficult – I kept forgetting people’s orders, I dropped another plate, and Mike gave me a warning. On my break, I sat in the corner seat with a coffee and stared at a spot of light on the table.

This was getting out of hand. What the hell was I doing? I was heading down a path that would throw away everything I’d spent the last three years working towards. All for that damn notebook? Without the notebook there to tempt me, my principles came back full force – I felt the rush of guilt and shame. My stomach twisted at the thought of failing college. I’d come so far, how could I be so stupid?

By the time I’d finished my coffee, I had made up my mind. I worked accident-free for the rest of my shift and as I was leaving, I took the phone number from the poster. When I entered my apartment, I went straight to my desk, pulled out a thick envelope, and slipped the notebook inside. Then I called the number.

“Hello?” A man answered.

I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry to call so late but I saw your poster at the coffee house. I work there, and I actually found your notebook. There wasn’t any contact information inside the cover so I didn’t know what to do with it.”

“Oh!” The man’s voice was suddenly injected with passion. “Oh, thank God! That’s such a relief. Can I get it tomorrow morning? At the coffee house?”

“Sure, it opens at seven.”

“I’ll be there. Thank you so much!”

“No problem, see you tomorrow then.”

I smiled as I hung up, satisfied that my decision was the right one.

The next morning, I met the man, who was about as unmemorable as the take-out coffee cup he clutched. I took the cheque he presented with an attempt at modesty, assuring him it wasn’t necessary, but he insisted.

As I said at the beginning, I was in no position to refuse the money, and I went straight to the bank after the man had left. I had a swarm of butterflies in my stomach the entire time the clerk was processing it, but there were no problems and I walked out of the bank $20,000 richer, trying not to grin like a lunatic. I was light and free and overwhelmed with possibilities. I was on top of the world.

And then I wasn’t.

My mind was spinning through all the plans I had for the money, and I was so elated I wasn’t as careful as I should have been. All it took was crossing the road at the wrong time and a driver paying as little attention as I was.

There was the squeal of breaks and the skid of tires and the world tumbled away from me.

When I opened my eyes, I saw the unmemorable man’s face and it suddenly wasn’t so unmemorable. It was stretched like some horror movie clown, grinning down at me with perfectly straight teeth.

“That didn’t take as long as I was expecting,” He said cheerfully. “Usually, people at least get to spend the money first.”

“W…What’s going on?” I asked feebly, my mouth feeling full of clay.

“You died,” The man told me, as pleasantly as when he had presented me with the cheque. “Your soul belongs to me now.”