Read Me.

The chattering of my teeth drowned out my thoughts of self-hatred as I realized how wildly under-dressed I was to be outside. . .in Boston. . .in the middle of January. As I waited for the perpetually delayed B-line on Harvard Ave., I tugged my scarf up over my mouth and nose and attempted to nuzzle deeper into my coat as another gust of wind all but blew the skin clear off my bones. There was nothing I could do for my exposed thighs other than pray I fight off the frostbite. Misery.

Thirteen minutes later, the train finally announced its arrival with the familiar yet unnerving begging-for-WD40, ear-splitting screech. It was 11pm on a Tuesday so the T was pretty empty, and I had my pick of the seats. I was on my way to meet my friend Sophia in the North End, where some guy from her Broadcast Journalism class that she is currently obsessed with and planned out some hippie lunar love chart thing for, was having a house party. Generally, I would avoid such social gatherings, especially on a school night, but Wednesdays I didn’t have classes and I owed Sophia for the midnight book signing I dragged her to last month.

I made my way to the coziest and loneliest spot at the back of the train where I could defrost in peace. As I scooted my feet back up to the under-seat heaters without getting close enough to actually melt the leather off my boots, something caught my eye. A dark object was hidden in the shadows under the row of seats across from me. After some aggressive squinting and wiggling around my seat, I could just make out the shape of a small, abandoned book.

Boston’s MBTA is not the most hygienic of places, and it probably is not best practice to touch anything you find on the ground, but my curiosity got the best of me and I still had 25 minutes left to Haymarket. I bent and stretched across the aisle without lifting my butt off the seat, then caught the book’s corner with the tip of my middle finger and slid it back over to me. It wasn’t a novel, but rather a black Moleskin notebook. I opened the cover to see if I could find a name or some information to whom I could return it to, and instead was met by the big bold words “Read Me”.

Flipping to the first page, I felt my heart rate start to pick up. It’s not every day that a stranger’s notebook invites you to read it. In a very boxy all-capitalized handwriting, I began to read:

Hello dearest reader. It appears destiny has brought you to me on this very day, at this very moment, at this metaphysical crossroads with this only intention: to give you the opportunity to change the course of your life.

Do you wake up in the morning and eat a big bowl of mundane for breakfast? Do you then take the packed rush-hour train to your mediocre job or uninspired college courses, to then go back home and do it all over again the next day? If this all sounds pitifully familiar, then I am exactly what you’ve been looking for.

In the pages that follow, you will be presented with tasks. Each task comes with a reward. The rules are simple: complete the task, collect the reward. Are you up to the challenge?

I looked around the train to see if there was somebody watching me, any sign that could tip me off as to whose book this was and if I were the victim of just another one of those lame TikTok pranks. I can’t deny, I was certainly intrigued, but this book couldn’t have been meant to be read by me. Not to say I wasn’t the epitome of your average Jane, studying an average major at an exceptionally average university in Boston, along with like thousands of other students. I was another ‘one in a million’, yes, but I wasn’t necessarily unhappy. Naturally, I kept reading.

Task 1

In the alleyway behind The Black Rose, you will find a package. Don’t let anybody see you.

Deliver this package to 137 Salem St Apt #4.

From there, you will receive your next set of instructions. Good luck.

The rest of the notebook was empty. Such a waste of a perfectly good Moleskin.

In my daze of pondering whether or not to bother taking this book seriously, the train arrived at Haymarket. Sophia was waiting for me at the stairs.

“Jesus, could you be any more late! I’m freezing my ass off!”

“Hey, blame the Green Line! I almost underwent hypothermia waiting for the stupid thing.” I pulled out the notebook, “by the way, look what I found on the train.”

“Ew Liss, on the train? What the hell, that’s probably covered in herpes!”

“Shut up,” I laughed, “seriously, it’s really bizarre. Read it.” We stopped at the top of the stairs so she could catch up.

“Holy crap, is this real?”

“I don’t know, I thought it could be a prank…but what if it’s not?”

“Let’s do it!”

“Really? But what about the party?”

“It’s only 11:45, Black Rose is like a 10-minute detour, but it’s still nearby. And plus, look at the address, Salem St. That’s in the North End! We’ll try doing this, and if it’s lame or freaky, we’ll just go to the party.”

“Cool, let’s go.”

Unfortunately, the 10-minute detour on a 32-degree winter evening was doing no favors for my scantily clad thighs. But I had the thrill of an adventure to keep me warm, or at least distracted. We were huddled together arm-in-arm as we crossed the streets and walked around Faneuil Hall. The streets were bustling as people were running to catch their last trains. I couldn’t help but wonder if anybody around us knew exactly what we were up to. I couldn’t help but feel we were being watched.

The sound of drunkards singing karaoke over fishbowl cocktails at Hong Kong café pierced the night sky, signaling our destination approaching. We reached the alley and stopped to look. It was pitch black, and even with the loud music coming from Black Rose, Sissy K’s and Hong Kong, the pounding of my heart in my ears was even louder.

“Do you see it?” whispered Sophia. “Do you see a package?”

“Not from here, it’s too dark!” We peered to our left, then to our right, and when we saw that nobody was around, we scurried in. We turned on our phone’s flashlights and started inspecting the area.

The overwhelming stench of garbage, alcohol, and old throw-up was nauseating, and I couldn’t shake my paranoia that we were somehow being watched. Just when I felt like grabbing Sophia and escaping to the party, Sophia yelled out “oh my god, there it is!”

And there it was. A small plain cardboard box, waiting for us in all its mysterious glory. The only problem was it was staring down at us from the fire escape 20 feet up, and with two girls reaching an impressive stature of 5 foot 3, the odds seemed a bit against our favor. Reaching the metal ladder on our own was out of the question.

“I’ve got an idea,” I flipped the lid to one of the recycle bins and started rolling it towards the fire escape. The glass bottles in the bin clanked around and the wheels roared loudly against the pavement, we’d have to work fast. Sophia jumped on the lid and was able to reach the ladder and yank it down.

“Holy shit, that’s freezing,” she hissed.

“Hurry up before someone catches us!”

The ladder creaked under her while she whimpered her way up and finally reached the top. She picked up the package, “here, it’s not too heavy but I can’t carry it down. Catch!” She tossed it down to me and I caught it with zero grace as the corner pierced my chest and I let out a yelp.

“We have the stealth skills of farm pigs,” Sophia teased. We linked arms to huddle again and made our way out of the alley.

“Hey! What are you girls doing back there!” A man’s voice came from the direction of the Black Rose. We had no time to think, we just ran. And from what it sounded like, he was following. “Hey! Stop! Wait!”

We booked it all the way to Hanover Street and had remarkably lost our chaser at some point. He must have been pretty out of shape not to catch up with us considering I was asthmatic, and Sophia had flat feet. Nothing short of a miracle.

“What if we stole something? What if we get arrested?” I started panicking.

“If it were that serious, he definitely would have caught us. He was probably a bouncer for the bar and thought we were drunk customers peeing in the alley or something. It’ll be fine.”

In silence, we made our way through the North End and found ourselves standing in front of the assigned address. I swallowed back what felt like my stomach trying to climb out of my mouth. My finger hovered over the bell of unit #4 for so long that Sophia did the honor of pushing it down for me. We were immediately buzzed in.

Anxiously, we crept up the stairs and made our way to the penthouse unit. On the door, there read a note:

For package delivery – place package in locker, knock four times.

I placed the package in what appeared to be a double-sided locker built into the wall beside the door. Sophia knocked four times. We heard movement on the other side of the wall, someone grabbing the package, and dropping something back in the locker. Then there were four knocks from the other side of the door. We exchanged glances, and I opened the locker to now find a key on top of another Moleskin book. I opened it.

Take this key to the 237 Lewis Wharf. There will be a lock box with your reward.

Another adventure. Another Moleskin wasted. I looked at Sophia for confirmation. “It could be a trap. Should we go?”

“After all that? As if you don’t want to find out what our reward is.” She was right, I wanted to know. But I also hoped to survive the night.

Ten minutes later, and ten degrees colder, we stood shivering on the wharf searching for a lockbox. Besides a couple of parked cars and garbage bins, there was no sign of anything.

“What if it’s hidden? Like in the garbage or behind a bin,” I suggested. We opened all the lids and peeked in, but nothing. We rolled them around, one-by-one to check under and around them. Lo and behold, under the last one, was a medium-sized metal lock box.

With a shaky hand, I took the key from my purse and slid it into the lock. It clicked open. As I lifted the lid, we were greeted by neatly packed stacks of Benjamin Franklins grinning up at us. We were speechless. Sophia grabbed a stack and started counting.

As she calculated, I noticed a pocket on the inside of the box’s lid. I reached inside and pulled out another Moleskin notebook. Inside read:

You’ve had a taste. You’ve come this far. How proud I am, my shining star.

More rewards, and larger rewards, are in your future. If you choose to continue this path, your chariot with the next task awaits you.

“Liss, there’s $20,000 here. This is unreal!”

Blinding headlights turned in to the wharf as a black car pulled around and parked. It sat, idling, waiting for us. We exchanged glances.