The Wave

If she considered the idea of magic, her nervous system undulated pins and needles. “Magic,” she thought to herself, “was exactly what I would need in order to make this moment last longer.” Behind her a blue tiled fountain poured tranquility into itself, splashing in the background. The court formed in terra cotta and there were bushes flowering magenta at every angle but her shoes, too small and giving her blisters, were ruining the moment. Looking up she saw spires and turrets, which bristled the church tower. Milling around the plaza were mostly families and the elderly. She could tell of their wealth by the way their shoes shone. The center’s history ran deep with strife and war. It was peaceful now, but people like her didn’t survive here. Her gaze landed on four old men, sitting some twelve meters across the plaza. Did they even have notebooks, or were they too old? “I bet they meet every week, right there in the same spot,” and she considered this for a moment. Jealous of their perceived ritual, her pages never repeated themselves in this way. Her thoughts turned to schadenfreude. With glee she imagined awkwardness at the automatic teller machine while the old men faltered, struggling to operate the technology. They wouldn’t be able to insert their notebooks in the designated slot. “I bet they can’t even see the paper on which they have to write,” she snorted to herself. But through the glare of midday, she could tell they’d done it. Watching the men in their matching baseball hats, she could see they were happy. Eyebrows shooting up she realized suddenly then, that their stories must nearly be over. “The only thing that would let me enjoy this day more would be the security of being one of them.” The scary thing about this thought was not its truth. She was indeed poor, and the higher levels were always spoken of as blissful in comparison to the lower-downs. Rather, it was the possibility that she could move up that had been scaring her. But how, she had no clue. She’d read somewhere that when asleep, a human’s power of free will is diminished. “Was this,” she’d begun to wonder, “suggesting that we are free to do as we please?” Maybe it was just her level of human but the idea of being in control made her doubtful. It could be dangerous. Despite her low level, which was painfully obvious in this town, she still felt fairly accomplished in her story. She didn’t steal or lie. At 24, so far she’d been able to conquer fear, sorrow, guilt, and sometimes- even apathy, but hadn’t succeeded in scripting the happiness that she observed in the old men. Now that free will had been seeded within her, it was keeping her up at night. If she truly could have control but somehow it had been diminished, that would mean something about her current level. Could it mean she had placed herself here? She couldn’t afford to buy tennis shoes, but had still gone for a one-day vacation she couldn’t afford. “All people ever want is an escape,” she thought to herself. Peering down her nose, frowning, she paused. Yes, she would script that. Sighing, melancholy despite the thesmophorian atmosphere, Chas reached for her canvas bag so she could record in her journal. Its shape found her palm. Needing her pen in order to get going, her eyes were on the cavity of her bag during her realization process. It came in slow motion; a flash of red directing her attention sharply downwards proved the intruder to be true. There in her lap was a white notebook, hard covered and bound shut by a thin strip of matching white elastic. Running through it: a red ribbon as a place marker. “What’s happening?” she actually heard herself utter aloud. This wasn’t hers. Her notebook was black and little. It had always been black, because that was the one that had been assigned to her. Swiftly lifting the bag upside down, emptying tissues, coin purse, and her sweater on the brick besides her; none revealed her little black notebook. The four old men she’d originally been preoccupied with all seemed very far away now. Suspicious, she jumped up and circled the bench she’d been sitting on but the floor only demonstrated clay. Looking around, she saw nobody. Who would steal her notebook? Anyone with eyes could read her status. Examining passing silhouettes, desperation pounded her senses and for split seconds at a time, images of asking every one of them for help were met with passive headshakes and blank responses. She alone was responsible. Notebooks were private matters, and the shame of having lost hers outweighed the chances of her being brave enough to make a sound. It had already been a risk to come at a time like this, and she didn’t want to attract attention by making contact with anyone here. As if someone tuned a dial, the background noise faded and anxiety began to singe the base of her neck. How could this have happened? What would she do if she couldn’t check in? She’d heard of people refusing to check in before. Those same people had never failed to disappear, remaining only in memory and certainly never spoken of again. An event like this one was unheard of. Without a notebook you were unidentifiable, essentially lost as far as time and space were concerned. She could go to an automatic teller machine and see if there were directions on how to report them lost, but this too would raise flags if she went to one and didn’t submit any pages. The embassy presented an option, but reporting to the authorities in her own country was terrifying, much less in one where she didn’t speak the language. She was barely able to breath. When was the last time she’d been to a teller machine? In her panic she couldn’t picture where she’d been the last time she she’d checked in. The uncertainty seemed to lift her out of her body. Collecting the unfamiliar notebook off the ground, hastily she shoved the rest of her belongings back in her bag. The only thing to do was retrace her path. Running, the cobblestone streets lead her back up the hill… … The ring of church bells bellowed colonial nostalgia. As the sun set strawberries and cream over rooftops and more church domes, Chas looked out over a ledge and saw a distorted scrapbooking of adobe and modern architecture. A different box represented each house: vibrant yellow, green, orange and teal. Returning to the café, she’d discovered a stairwell at the back of the room she hadn’t noticed before. It led to a terrace, whose views might’ve been enjoyable was she not paralyzed by the fact that she’d exhausted every possible place where her notebook could’ve fallen out. Feeling that the authorities would surely come for her without her identity check in, Chas looked down at the little white notebook. In a normal situation she would never dare turn the pages of somebody else’s. In fact this act was illegal, as such she’d never even held another little book before. The danger of navigating without her hers still rippled through her. “I’m doing it,” she acquiesced, shaking her head at her decision. Sliding off the rubber band around the cover, reading the Credentials was her final chance at finding it’s owner. Maybe if she just read the last entry, she could find it’s owner and where their paths had crossed. Just as she pulled open the elastic, a voice interrupted. “Are you Chas?” She looked up at a man standing before her. He had dark hair, but his appearance was ambiguous. His outfit, a red exercise shirt over khaki pants and tennis shoes, suggested a similar level as hers. He couldn’t have been over forty. “Yes, and who are you? How did you know my name?” “You can call me V. May I?” She nodded, suddenly calmed by V’s presence despite his mysterious arrival. Strangers didn’t just assert their presence at other’s tables. Not on deserted rooftops at sunset. This moment had to mean something. Their gaze locked now, he maintained eye contact, pulling a chair to sit. “What are you doing here? Who are you,” She pressed, anxiety overriding the fact that he hadn’t yet answered her first question. There was a vague smirk curving his mouth and he answered, “I do a little bit of everything. I’ve done a lot, but I teach. Right now, I’m enjoying this moment being here with you. What do you do?” Eyes floating to the sky in embarrassment, in comparison to ‘a lot’ she was unsure of what she’d done. Nothing seemed worth mentioning. She had many fantasies of what she wanted to do, like perform with the circus and attend art school, but these things always embarrassed her to even imagine talking about. They were silly. All of them required a certain level that Chas knew she didn’t have, so she mumbled something about the construction and volunteering she’d done. The conversation flowed with generalities for a few minutes before V asked, “What do you think brought us together today?” Brow furrowed, she crossed her legs. “Well, since you knew my name I assume that you’re either a bookkeeper or a Teller. I lost my notebook today and I’ve been trying to switch it back with whoever left me theirs.” The smirk appeared again. Then, gesturing an olive skinned hand V asked, “Would you believe me if I told you that other worlds exist? Worlds which, existing outside the confines of these walls, we cannot see with our eyes?” “Yes.” She felt alert now and her answer came easily. Now his hands were clasped over his lap. “Good. Now I ask you, what do you want out of this lifetime? Apart from good health, of course.” She squirmed in her chair. V’s stare was direct but he waited patiently. It felt like ten minutes passed before she could stammer, “I…I don’t know. I guess I’ve never allowed myself to think about it before...” He nodded. Pausing to exhale, V’s addressed Chas. “There is no such thing as coincidence. Magic is real. We live in a world though, where people think this is inherent rather than cultivated. These powers are attainable; it’s only that you need to capture them. The process is invisible, but it almost always involves suffering. Very few people are born with these capacities, and even fewer are up to the struggle to get there. “We are all required to engage our stories, of course, and we present them to the authorities every day for review. Our self-monitoring is an exchange for our safety. However most people, Chas, they are born to read. They would rather flip the pages of their notebooks than engage their individual publication, because observing ones own behavior; much less creativity is no easy task. “Our experience is nothing but a series of expansions and contractions. We regard the infinity of the universe, but be careful not to see yourself as separate from any of it.” Chas was entranced, but she didn’t understand how this related to getting her notebook back. “You are very wise V, but this doesn’t help solve my problem. I still have a notebook that is not my own, and I don’t know how I’m going to get home.” Fingering the white hard cover in her hand, she’d cracked open the book while he was speaking, but V was standing up to leave. “The notebook is yours now. There is no way to go back.” And then he was gone. She flipped to the front of the book where the credentials had been on her old one. The Name entry was blank. Underneath it was the Assets entry. Her eyes prickled. There it read, in the finest of black print, $100,000,000.