Trust Me

It doesn’t get any crazier than this, but I’m telling you, this is what happened, I found myself saying to the officer.

It was just sitting there, a lone black notebook perched on a park bench, too nice to be forgotten about. It was an elegant simple black leather design, something I’ve purchased many times. I thought nothing of it and continued my walk. The owner will come back for it I reasoned. There weren’t that many people in the park that day anyway, all the regulars and one stranger. He seemed a bit out of place, but not in a “call the police kind of way.” Maybe it was his notebook?

I did another loop, and another. The second time around I didn’t see the notebook. I figured the owner remembered and came back for it. I don’t know if I was imagining things, but the stranger seemed to look directly at me, then as if he were nodding in the direction of the notebook, like he was telling me to go back and get it. I smiled, waved, and kept moving.

The third time around, there it was right in my path, the notebook! What? There was no wind, and there was no one around. It wasn’t a lightweight notebook anyway. It would take more than a breeze to blow it on to the path. I thought I heard the words, “open me.” I looked around and didn’t see anyone. I heard it again, “open me,” as if the words were on the breeze. It was a solid notebook, but the pages started to flutter. I picked it up and sat down on the bench to check it out, maybe it had contact information for the owner written inside. The pages were blank, no lines, no words. Nothing. Was someone messing with me? Was the stranger a prankster? Then the pages started to change. The truth is, I didn’t know what to do with the notebook. It was just sitting there and then a treasure chest and all of these short sentences started to materialize.

There’s no place like home.

Your word is your bond.

You are what you think.

I don’t know. It seemed kind of cheesy and cliche…until I got to this one line. I even started to chuckle after I read it. I looked around to see if anyone was looking for their notebook, or looking at me. Feeling unbothered I continued reading.

“If you say these words, you will get twenty-thousand dollars.” OK. I’m definitely being punked, but I’ll play along, so I turned the page. IT WAS BLANK. I’m telling you officer, the page was blank. It kinda pissed me off. I kept turning the pages. The rest of them were blank too! I figured that was the joke and someone was secretly recording my reactions. I looked around one more time and didn’t see anyone. I put the notebook down and then I left. That’s how my fingerprints got on the Duchess of Sussex’s notebook.

Kids, that was forty years ago, your grandfather and I had just started dating. It was also when DNA testing and finger-printing had become standard procedure for lost and found items. It could be done in a matter of minutes, and it made it really easy to find the owner and to find the culprit, and in many cases to find whoever touched the item.

Well, like I said, I walked away. As I walked away I could have sworn the stranger looked directly at me and smiled. This time I was just chagrined. I don’t know how or why he did it, but I assumed he was the prankster. It was harmless fun. I was already in the park exercising.

What I didn’t tell the officer was that when I got home, I received a cashier’s check in the mail with my name on it, and yes that check was for $20,000. I never found out who sent it or how they got my name. I didn’t even know the wallet belonged to the Duchess of Sussex until the officer called me. Apparently the notebook was quite valuable, so they contacted everyone whose finger prints were on the notebook. And that kids is how I started my business, and why the Duchess of Sussex is a personal friend. We've never discussed the secrets of the notebook.