The Little Black Book

On another grey, not-so-sunny morning, Helena, as per the usual weekday routine, made her elevator escape from the bleak whites, drab greys, and skreak lights of her condo’s colorless corridor.

Dreading a day that was going to be boring, Helena, inside the elevator now, watched the doors slowly close as she made her feeling-out-of-shape escape from the clarion clickity-clack of her door's locking lock echoing back, reverberating eerily against each barren corridor wall toward the desolate end of the hall.

And, with the usual ding of forewarning, Helena, stepped out from the elevator into the artificial bright whites of pot lights as her long, dark black hair gently flowed back from behind her.

After the quick, customary “good morning”, Helena, passed the concierge, who was wearing his usual black suit, white shirt, and black tie, as she sauntered through the echoey condominium lobby to commence her typical trek to work on another mundane Monday.

Then, suddenly, without an ounce of warning, Helena, the almost never-lucky, black-haired girl from Kentucky, would have her life change forever if not changed for the better.

...

Exiting from the large glass doors, Helena paused underneath the condominium’s fancy, hotel-like overhang to check her pockets for her mask.

And, as she put on her mask, there, in front of her, stood a sharp, shiny-shoed chauffer, holding a coffee in one hand, the morning newspaper in the other, and a beautiful, black book under his arm by his side. Behind him, Helena noted that there was a magically mesmerizing, luxurious-looking black Buick with a spectacular showroom shine.

“Oh, madam! Good morning, I didn’t expect you to arrive so soon. Will Mr. Chandra be accompanying you today?”

“I think you got the wrong person.” said Helena.

“Oh? Oh, Yes! Sorry, madam. It’s hard to tell who’s who nowadays with these masks we’re all wearing—Forgive me.”

“It’s no problem! Have a good day.” Helena said politely.

“Thank you. Wishing you a wonderful day, madam.”

So, smiling with her eyes as her mask covered her big, bright smile, Helena parted ways with the mysterious masked man, who smiled back at her through his mask, and commenced her commute down the sidewalk to head to work. And, as she continued on her routine route of her typical trek on a mundane Monday toward the work-life woes that were put on pause last week for the weekend, she noticed that the streets were still littered with dirtied picket signs of contrastingly colorful magentas and neon greens as she passed the white-stoned, US Capitol building, which was gloriously perched at the top of Capitol Hill, standing as a testament of the American history on which the American dream was founded upon. In seeing the picket signs littering the streets, she was reminded that, about a month ago, American history was made as fellow American citizens and opposing American news networks waged wars with words as stories of protests, riots, and insurrection at the Capitol littered the minds of the masses during the impeachment trial of former-President Trump. Still, having to walk by the Capitol each weekday morning to get to work, Helena was reminded of her unwavering American identity as she, though grateful for her comfy office job, begrudgingly dragged herself to work through the streets of Washington, D.C., in order to continue life as an American who was blessed with the opportunity to continue her pursuit of the American dream. But, though she had a routine route to work, her route to pursue the American dream was not so routine. As Helena was a curious, quirky, and clever creature, en route to pursue her American dream, she was one to think for herself at work, which helped her procure promotion, and was one to think for herself when it came to the mentions of the media and the masses surrounding the uproariousness of American politics.

Now, as all these thoughts about what had happened a month ago whirled around in her mind, her train of thought came to a halt as an image of the chauffeur's coffee jumped at her in her mind’s eye.

She stopped in her tracks.

Her gentle, dark eyes widened as, for a moment, she stood still for like a statue on the sidewalk. Then, it began: Helena commenced a crazy, coffee-craving-charged coat pat-down.

"NO!!!"

She began to frantically dig into her pockets.

“Urrgh! My credit card!” she exclaimed as she stomped in protest of her forgetfulness, swiftly turning around to retrace her steps toward home to get her wallet, which she had left on the kitchen counter.

Now, approaching the condo’s overhang, she noticed the chauffeur seated inside that sparkling, classy black car. After a quick courteous wave toward him, she quickly paced through the doors to head toward the elevator.

She sauntered back through the lobby hall.

“Helena, the elevator is out of service!” said the concierge as his voice echoed through the echoey lobby.

“Thank you, Connor!” replied Helena, quickly changing her navigation toward the stairwell door. Approaching the door, she murmured to herself under her breath:

“Urggh, I’m gonna be late! Urrgh! COFFEE! I NEED coffee!”

Then, as she reached for the handle, the door abruptly swung open, almost slamming into her.

A young man appeared from the doorway. He was dressed in a well-tailored, San-Marino-blue suit, holding a very, very large bouquet of deeply crimson-red roses, speckled with delicate baby’s breath. Wide-eyed and mouth agape in surprise, the bouquet slipped out of his hand and, as if in slow motion, it fell to the floor. You could hear that little 'boosh' sound from the crinkling bouquet foliage as it hit the ground in the sudden quiet of that mausoleum-like lobby.

“I’m so sorry!” they both exclaimed simultaneously to each other, cutting through the silence, as she was caught in the gaze of his brown eyes and deep black pupils.

He quickly picked up the bouquet.

There were smiling eyes exchanged in the echoing exclamations as their eyes met.

Suddenly, amidst the sound of loud click-clacking heels, another voice emerged from the entrance of the lobby.

“You know its rude to leave a lady waiting—Oh! Are those for me?!” exclaimed a beautiful lady with long, beautiful, super-straightened, black hair by the condominium entryway, dressed in high-fashion Italian designers. She strut toward the collision scene in her shiny, glossy black Louboutin heels through the lobby as if a catwalk model walking on a tight rope.

Directing her eyes toward Helena, the lady said, “Hello, who are you?”

“Hi, I’m Helena. Nice to meet you. I live here as well. Just going to my condo.”

“Oh... Sorry. Jenna. Nice to meet you. Actually, I don’t live here--yet!”

The stairwell door shut with a thundering thump that echoed through the echoey lobby.

And, reaching for the young man’s face, stroking his cheek, she said, “But, I’ll be moving in soon, right, sweetie?”

The young man let out an awkward grin, shifting his gaze upward as he looked toward the pot lights on the ceiling.

“Your Bible-belt parents will love me, don’t worry.”

“Jen? Let’s talk about this another time?”

Grabbing his hand, Jenna said, “Nice meeting you, Helena. Baby, let’s go, we’ll be late for work.”

“Sorry, Jen. The elevator broke down. I waited 10 minutes before taking the stairs.”

“So, why didn’t you tell me? I was calling you.” said Jenna as she adjusted her mask.

“My phone was on silent.”

Jenna turned to Helena.

“Excuse us, bye! Again, nice meeting you.” said Jenna, smiling with her eyes.

Standing by Jenna’s side, the young man said “Sorry about bumping into you earlier. Bye.”

“Bye. Nice to meet you both.” said Helena.

Then, Jenna turned and started her strut down the lobby, toward the lobby entrance, bouquet in one hand, boyfriend in the other.

Helena couldn't help herself to eavesdrop.

“You bumped into her?” Jenna said, in a muffled, semi-whispering, semi-loud sort of way.

“Yeah.”

“Babe, you’re not wearing your mask. Where is it?”

They paused in the middle of the lobby. He reached into his pocket and showed her his mask. Jenna took the mask and put it on him.

“There.”

They started to walk toward the door.

“You know… You should pay more attention so you don’t just bump into people. Just like how you should pay more attention to your phone when I call you.”

“Sorry, Jen. It was an accident.”

“Bumping into her? Or, having your phone on silent?”

“Both.”

“Well, I want you to pay attention more. Babe! Pay attention more. Pay attention to ME more."

She looked intently at him.

“Sweetheart, I texted you good morning, didn’t I?”

“Yes, boo, but, that’s not the point—”

“You’re special to me. You’re my golden girl, remember?”

She stopped at the door and he went ahead of her to open it for her.

“Yes. Yes, I am,” she said, holding her chin up high.

He smiled as she looked intently toward him again.

“You’re lucky you’re so handsome...” she said, grabbing his hand tightly and walking him toward the sparkling, black car idling outside in the February weather by the sidewalk.

The chauffeur opened the door for them.

“Shawn, we’re late. Get us outta here.” Jenna said as she put on her designer shades.

Helena was so caught up with the moment, she realized that she ended up eavesdropping on the whole conversation as the couple trotted off. Amidst the echoes of the clickity-clack of designer heels, Helena couldn’t help but spectate, being engrossed by the brilliant bomb-defusal of a lover’s spat by a very smooth, suave, sweet, San-Marino-blue-suited suitor.

“Lucky...” said the girl from Kentucky under her breath in a sigh.

Then, as if snapping out of a trance, she looked around, and, under her breath, nodding after each word, she gently pounded her fist in her hand in synchrony as she listed out the game plan: “Credit card. Coffee. Work.”

But, a split second after, before she could turn to reach for the door again, the ding of the elevator rung through the lobby.

“Lucky!”

So, she contorted herself from by the stairwell door toward the elevator as she semi-leaped inside, smashing the button for her floor with her thumb.

After having retraced her steps back to the condo to collect the coveted credit card, she waited at the elevator again, speaking to herself with a sigh:

“Lather, rinse, repeat...”

So, with the usual ding of forewarning, Helena, made her elevator escape.

Lather, rinse, repeat:

Entering the elevator.

Watching the elevator doors close.

Pressing the ground button.

Waiting in the cab.

Watching the elevator doors open.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

And, with the usual ding of forewarning, Helena, in the middle of her crazy caffeine-craving crisis, again, exited the elevator into the bright whites of pot lights of her condominium lobby.

Having done the customary “good morning”, Helena, about to saunter passed the concierge through the echoey condominium lobby once more, noticed that, by the stairwell door, there was a little black book that was sitting against the smooth white-and-grey marble-tiled floor.

She picked up the book and took a look inside. The leather felt good in her hands.

"Moleskin." she read.

The cover was a deep, dark black and made of high-quality leather. She opened it up. There were scribbles of math and finance jargon all over the pages in both pencil and pen. As she continued to study the writing, she noted that the scribbling was often smudged.

"Must have been a lefty." She thought to herself.

She knew this because her younger brother would always smudge his writing. And, he was a lefty. It happened because, while writing from left-to-right, his left hand would follow the pen rightward and drag over the freshly lain ink to the left of the pen, which, then, would smear from his left hand onto the page. It happened with pencils too. Her brother had an artsy knack growing up, probably inspired by all the cartoons he watched on TV. Back then, TV was life--especially growing up as latchkey kids. And, with the white noise of the commercials, the background music, the chattering characters, and the honk, beeps, pings, and all the other sound effects you could imagine, all emanating from the TV that was blaring in the background, he would be sketching away with a pencil. And, after going at it for a commercial break or two, the side of his palm would end up covered with a big, black splotch of pencil graphite from being smeared between the side of his palm and the front of the paper.

Helena, then, recalled how, when he would often smudge his writing and sketches, she found it so peculiar in their younger days since it would never happened to her when she wrote or doodled, being a righty.

Helena continued to another page. There were doodles there too. Some were also smeared.

She flipped again. On this page, there were sets of letters, like mysterious code, jotted down: GME, AMC, BB, BBBY.

“That's stock market stuff! These are symbols for companies... GME is GameStop!” she thought to herself as she looked at the almost-hieroglyphic, code-like, letter abbreviations.

As she quickly skimmed through the pages, appreciating the craftsmanship of each beautiful page as she scanned the interesting comments, she recalled that, less than a week ago, the news was full of stories about the GameStop stock price skyrocketing to the moon. So, when she heard about it on TV, being the curious and clever creature she was, Helena took it upon herself to do some research to figure out how and why it all happened....

...

...So, about four days ago, she did some digging on the Internet. She stumbled onto Reddit.

She scrolled, and scrolled, and scrolled.

And, she read, and read, and read.

And, she learned a lot. She learned that young people--just like her--from all across America--if not the world--would connect with each other over the Internet through their phones, tablets, laptops, and computers as they met together in cyberspace on Reddit, an online discussion forum. There, they would talk stock. And, as she read, and read, and read, she found out that these people noticed something huge.

These Reddit raiders noticed that there was something huge about a stock of a company called GameStop. It was a company that sold and traded video games.

It sounded familiar. Helena remembered how her brother would often go to GameStop when he was smaller to trade in his old video games for a new one. In her judgment, it was kind of a rip off. But, her kid brother was happy with the new game he got in exchange for a handful of his old ones. Helena thought that people like her kid brother probably wised up eventually, realizing that they were getting jipped and stopped trading-in their games to GameStop when Kijiji became a thing. And, as long as he was trading in his old video games and not trying to sell her collectibles from her Barbie collection on eBay (which he did try), World War 3 was averted. And, with the whole pandemic thing, people, from the comfort of their sofa, could order everything from Amazon and have it shipped to their doorstep the next day with just the simple click of a mouse--almost like magic. It was the magic of markets at work. But, Helena understood that, in this magic of markets, if there was rising, there was razing. She understood that the rising of Amazon did not come without the razing of the Amazonified. After all, the rise of companies, like Amazon, meant the fall of other companies, like GameStop. So, Helena figured that companies like Amazon were bad news for GameStop. Meaning: GameStop may not do so well. Meaning: GameStop's stock price goes down. Meaning: People with GameStop stock lose money. But, it did not only mean just that. It also meant that the cute, petite, (tastefully) goth chick, who her brother crushed on, would lose her job at GameStop.

That would be bad for GameStop. And, it would also be bad for Helena's brother. He crushed on her so hard for so long that he actually never dated anyone. He was crazy for her. Actually, his crushing on her probably helped the sales for that GameStop shop as well since, Paul, her brother, would shop there a little more often just so he could chat with her at the cash. And, since it is doubtful that he was the only one smitten by her jet-black hair and her stunning, dark eyes, Paul probably had a lot of competition. And, though that competition may not have been good for Paul, it was great for sales at that GameStop, assuming that the competition would shop there a little more often (too) because there would be a cute sales associate with dreamy, dark hair standing at the counter there. Now, Helena couldn't speak for the quality of the suitors that this lady was receiving attention from at GameStop (despite the quantity of the suitors, Paul including, that she was receiving attention from), but she could vouch for Paul as a decent guy--minus that time he tried to sell her Barbies on eBay when they were little.

Crushing brother aside, Helena did some googling about GameStop. She found out that you could buy stock of GameStop on the stock market. And, you could do it all from within the comforts of your bedroom as you lay in your bed. All you needed was your phone and an internet connection! This was much different than it once was. Once upon a time, if you wanted to trade stocks yourself, you'd have to get out of bed (early), get yourself showered, get your teeth brushed (preferably), and get yourself dressed (cute outfit required) before you commute through New York City's treacherous traffic to Wall Street in Lower Manhattan so that you could step onto the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. But, with the magic of markets, times have changed. All of this can be skipped. Now, to trade a stock, all you need to do is tap "buy" on the screen of your smartphone that you held 3 inches from your nose as you lay, comfortably, in your bed--no time wasted picking, trying, and putting on a cute outfit required! It really is that simple now--it really is quite the time to be alive!

But, what are the specific steps to buy or sell a stock on your own from your smartphone (preferably from the comforts of a soft, comfy bed)? Well, from Helena's googling, she found out you could download an app, like Robinhood, transfer funds from your bank (also on your phone), and start buying and selling stocks on that app (as soon as the funds transfer). Its that simple! And, she also found the special symbol to use when you want to buy or sell GameStop stock. It was "GME". Three-letters. All-caps.

So, after getting that far, she ended up scrolling through Reddit again. She saw that, as redditors do, the redditors were redditing. They reddited that GameStop stock didn’t have much more stock being bought and sold on the stock market for people to buy anymore at the current prices. So, probably, with the hopes of getting rich, they formulated a plan: They would get together and buy as much of the remaining GameStop stock that they could buy. As they would try to buy all of the remaining GameStop stock on the stock market, they would hold it without selling it to anyone who wanted to buy it at the lower prices that they got it at. Through the magic of markets, this would make the GameStop price go up. Some of them were saying how this would save GameStop. This would be great for GameStop. But, also, this would be great for her brother too, since this would save the job of her brother's crush too.

With this whole plan, which you could, perhaps, imagine being orchestrated in a red-orange-and-white, reddit-logo-colored war room in cyberspace somewhere, some redditors were crying out on the boards that they were going to take out Wall Street this way. They were saying that the hedge funds were going down. To these redditors, Wall Street and its hedge funds represented the rich and the the greed within capitalism. They were demonized, Gogs and Magogs. And, in a shear coincidence of poetic proportions, many redditors would execute this whole plan through the stock trading app that was befittingly called "Robinhood" (Robin Hood took from the rich to give to the poor). They were talking as if they were readying themselves for the oncoming enemies in a war (or, in Helena's case, as if they were taking up arms against any perp, her brother included, that wanted to sell her childhood Barbie collection). And, as they readied themselves, the chatty chatters on the chat chanted, "hold the line!" (Translation for "holding the line": Don't not sell any GameStop stock.) "Holding the line" would shrink the amount of stock available for others to buy even further. It's like a situation where the Redditors would go to MAC and buy all the inventory of the hottest and best selling makeup, including the stuff that you use. So, when you went to shop there and found yourself at the shelf to get that product you wanted, you found the shelf bare. Then, in frustration (or disappointment, depending on how you cope with such a makeup merchandise mishap), you turn around to catch glimpse of three ladies, wearing Reddit graphic tees, at the cash walking out with bagfuls and bagfuls of makeup, including the stuff you use, which you just ran out of and need more of ASAP. Now, imagine that there was another lady beside you, dressed from head to toe in Chanel. She notices these ladies too. What do you think she would do? Well, she'd look at the empty shelf and stomp one of her expensive heals first--that's a give in. Then, realizing what had happened, her only option would be to talk to the ladies in the Reddit tees before they left the mall, and make a bid to buy some of their makeup for more than these ladies paid for at the cash. Though, she would do so begrudgingly because, though she is rich, she knows that, if she blows all her money getting caught up in these infuriating situations, she's eventually not going to be rich anymore. She'd probably have to resort to wearing ZARA or Michael Kors--and that was a no-go for her. And, so, that's exactly what the redditors planned to do to Wall Street and the hedge funds. Because of the redditors, those hedge fund people would, in theory, be infuriated too (just like the lady in Chanel at the makeup store was) as they begrudgingly had to buy GameStop stock at unreasonably higher prices.

So, also like the lady in Chanel at MAC who had to be willing to pay more for the makeup from the three Reddit-tee ladies (as, at any moment, they begin to trot away through the mall exit with bagfuls of direly needed makeup in hand), the suits on Wall Street would have to be willing to pay more to get their hands on the GameStop stock. And, through the magic of markets and more complex finance, that means they lose money. But, the problem was worse for hedge funds because the redditors were, in theory, not going to sell it to them until the price flew to the moon. So, they wouldn't just lose money. They would lose a lot of money--millions. This is how it would pan out: First, the hedge funds would desperately have to buy from anyone else other than the redditors that were willing to sell their GameStop stock because the redditors wouldn't sell as they "held the line". Since there was already little stock available, that option dried out quickly. It would be like the lady in Chanel running to the associate manager at MAC, asking if they had any more of the makeup that she needed in stock, only to recieve the answer that they were all sold out. In the meanwhile, the three ladies were trotting off into the distance. And, so, desperate times call for desperate measures. She would have to switch from the regular seller to the reddit-tee ladies. That means she would have to take off her heals and bolt for the door if she ever wanted to get the makeup that she so desperately needed because they were already out the door. So, off came the heels and off she went, charging for the door as her dainty, pedicured feet hit the floor and her expensive heels dangled in her right arm as she held them above and over her shoulder. Then, after a quick, gazelle like sprint through the hall of the mall in her bare foot, the lady in Chanel finally catches up with them. Now, in seeing her dressed in her designer outfit, with her designer heels in hand and slightly out of breath, they wouldn't sell her what they just bought at the same price they bought at. They would expect more to make it more worth their while. So, in the same way, the hedge funds would have to offer higher and higher prices until someone in the reddit army that was 'holding the line' caved in and sold, pocketing the difference. That difference was the profit: the difference between the price that they bought the stock at and the price that they sold the stock to the hedge fund at. But, until too many redditors caved into selling, they could sell at a much higher price once the leftover stock went dry since, from the comforts of their sofa, the Redditors had secured practically all of the GameStop stock. Then, the suits of Wall Street and the hedge funds who were looking to buy some stock would have to accept that higher price. In other words, the redditors would first hoard the stock. Then, the redditors would be the price makers and the suits would have to be the price takers, selling the stock only at much, much, much higher prices to the guys in suits. So, if a redditor bought low, hoarded the stock, then sold high to those suits on Wall Street, if they did that with enough stock, they could be rich (if not richer). And, that was the plan that Helena figured out from her hours of reddit research.

But, this wasn’t the full story as to why the GameStop stock would skyrocket. Hoarding was only part of the reason why. So, during her research, Helena figured out the rest of the plan.

The rest of the plan involved targeting the hedge funds. It was a little more complicated. But, she figured it out with a little more googling and a whole lot more persistence. She figured out that hedge funds were just a bunch of companies that were run by hedge fund managers. You'd (probably) have to believe that the redditors (probably) saw these hedge fund managers as the Devil--with horns and a tail--driving their Lamborghinis around while wearing Rolex watches underneath their expensive, hand-tailored suits. True or not, what these horned-and-tailed managers would do was invest people's money onto the stock market, make a profit with that money, give part of that profit to the investors, and then, take a cut of that profit for themselves and the hedge fund company that they worked for. But, Helena noted that some redditors claimed that some of these hedge fund managers got too complacent and too cocky. Others said that these hedge funds were too greedy. So, what Helena read was that a few hedge funds used their investors' money, which they were in charge of, to invest as usual. But, there was a problem: They invested way, way, way too much of the money into a certain something, called a "short". Here, a "short" is a legal bet that these managers made against GameStop stock from going up in price because they expected GameStop to do badly so that its stock would go down in price--despite all of the goth girl's hard work at her store and all of the extra sales she made on Helena's brother among the sea of suitors of gamer guys. So, that means that, if GameStop ever went bankrupt, which some of these hedge funds thought was inevitable, these hedge funds would win the bet and make a lot of money for their investors who gave the hedge fund their personal money. Then, these hedge funds could get their cut out of the profit they made from winning the bet too.

Who knows what they would do with their money. As far as some of the redditors were concerned, perhaps, the managers would all buy, in unison, another rolex watch so that they could wear one on each arm. Perhaps, they could buy some more make-up for his heel-stomping, Chanel-wearing wife. Humor aside, if the redditors had their way, the hedge fund managers would neither have a chance to splurge on another Rolex nor buy makeup for the wife this time round (if that's what they really would do with their money). Rather, they'd probably lose their shirts. This is because the managers running some of these hedge funds thought this was an easy bet and didn't see the risks--which was why the redditors said they were too cocky and too complacent. The problem for these hedge fund managers was that the redditors saw a flaw in this whole bet--and the redditors could profit off this plan, if not get rich, in the process if they all worked together.

As Helena continued to read, she found out that the redditors pointed out the risk that these hedge funds overlooked. It was that, in their over-confidence, they thought that GameStop going the way of the dodo was inevitable. The redditors knew that these hedge funds would be forced to exit the bet and lose a lot of their investors's money if the stock price of GameStop goes up too high. That probably means someone was going to get fired (meaning no more Chanel, let alone make up, for his wife). And, so, if the redditors, who were hoarding the GameStop stock, sold their stock high enough, those hedge funds would be forced to exit the bet, and buy at the redditors' high prices. So, the hoarding, and the forcing--or squeezing--of the hedge funds out of their "short" bet would create a buying and selling cycle (through the magic of markets) that moves the price upward as the redditors (and whoever else was taken along for the ride) would be able to sell their GameStop stock at those higher prices. The redditors called this process a "short squeeze". Now, leeping in mind that this bet was called a "short" and keeping in mind that these hedge funds would be "squeezed" out, it made sense to Helena as to why it was called a "short squeeze". What Helena learned about this "short squeeze" was that anyone who had bought the stock before the "short squeeze" would be able to sell those stock at those high prices after the price moved upward, pocketing the difference--perhaps getting rich in the process. So, depending on how much stock you bought, this could be the difference between buying the larger size of your favourite drink at your local coffee shop (if not your nearest Starbucks or other local posh coffee shop) for a week to buying it for life. Now, if Helena's brother joined the Reddit raiders in their crusade against Wall Street, he probably wouldn't have enough to retire with, but he could buy the goth lady her favourite drink when she starts her shift in the morning. All in all, whether or not the goth lady would accept said tokens of love, this is how the redditors planned to make the price of the GameStop stock explode and make some money in the process as they attempted to crucify the suits of Wall Street and the hedge funds.

So, some of these hedge funds were banking on GameStop going bankrupt. And, there was huge irony there. The irony was that, though the hedge funds expected GameStop to go bankrupt, through the redditors' elaborate plan, it was actually the hedge funds themselves who would go bankrupt (in theory). So, then, in the style of Robin Hood, through their Robinhood app, the reddit army would take from the rich and greedy hedge funds and give to the not-so-rich band of merry men (and ladies) of the reddit army (in theory).

This whole process would make the hedge funds lose millions. And, that's why it got on the news: It worked. They lost millions.

After learning about all this, Helena opened an investing account on her phone. ..

...

...Helena then flipped one more page.

Her eyes widened.

She looked at her phone for the time; She had 5 minutes to place an order on her investing app. She quickly pulled out her calculator and did the math:

“If I put in $1000 on this stock, I could make a lot. Even if I wasn’t lucky, I could make about $2000,” she thought to herself.

So, she got on her app, and, after placing the order, she let out a big sigh of relief and headed out to work. Passing the Capitol Building again, she took a look at the beautiful, little, black book. She noticed how it was luxuriously designed, bound carefully in very high-quality leather, died a rich jet black.

She turned the book in her hands, looking down at the back cover intently.

"Moleskin." she read aloud.

Then, suddenly, Helena, the almost never-lucky, black-haired girl from Kentucky, had her life change forever. She looked at her phone. It read:

Gain: +$20,000.

So, after the mandatory stop at the coffee shop for some coffee, a Caffè Americano—usually a venti but, today, a trenta—she excitedly finished her trek to work as she had her hands clasped around the little, beautiful, black book.