A Twenty Thousand Dollars Notebook

A TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS NOTEBOOK.

If life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

But what if life gives you a black notebook?

This is the story of Andrew Jordan.

Three years ago, Andrew lost his grandfather. He was the most important father figure in his life, so losing him was hard. The only things that his grandfather left him were some cigarettes, and a small black notebook. He smoked the cigarettes and read through the notebook every time he got sad.

One night, seconds after falling asleep on the couch, Andrew heard a loud bang in the room. He jumped,

"Who’s there?"

He looked around; nothing. All the doors and windows were locked. Maybe he had a quick dream.

When Andrew went to the bedroom, he found the notebook on the floor.

"What are you doing here? You scared the Jesus out of me."

He took it, dust it, put it back on the desk next to his grandfather's picture, and went to sleep.

That night, his grandfather came in a dream.

"Andrew!"

Andrew turned around.

"Grandpa?"

"We need to talk Andy. I hope you still have my notebook?"

"Yes, of course."

"Good, good. What about my cigarettes?"

"Sorry, grandpa. I smoked them all." Replied Andrew, embarrassed.

"Well, that's not good. First thing you'll do tomorrow, you'll quit smoking. Ok?"

"Yes, grandpa."

"Good, good. You need to look at the notebook and figure out why I always took care of it."

"I already looked, but there was nothing in there other than some lottery numbers, your drawings, and a few bad jokes." He said, cracking a smile.

"Well, I can't believe that you forgot what I've taught you? Look again, I left you a sign."

"Wait, what? So, you threw the notebook?"

In that moment, Andrew woke up. He took the notebook, opened it and started looking again. Nothing. What was his grandfather trying to tell him? He closed it and threw it on the desk. He took another look at the black notebook and seen a crack in the spine. Andrew grabbed it, slowly cracked open the book cover, and found a piece of paper, folded in four.

"What is this?"

He took it out and unfolded it.

"Is this a map?"

Where did he knew that layout from?

"Wait a minute. This is the layout of my house."

He started looking around.

"So, left here, straight ahead, and a right here? Here where? There is a wall here. I'm not a ghost, I can't go through walls."

He knew that towards the end his grandfather started losing it, but he was hoping that maybe he would have found a small sentimental treasure from grandpa.

He starts touching the wall. The wall felt hollow. Ok, maybe his grandfather wasn't that crazy after all. He grabbed a hammer, and started swinging. Twenty minutes later, he made a door to a room he never knew about.

"Grandpa, you crazy old man, what have you done."

Andrew came out of the room with a suitcase. He put it on the table and opened it.

He was speechless. The suitcase was full of money. He counted a total of $20000 which made him do a little celebratory dance. As he's doing pivots in the room, a pocket in the side of the suitcase caught his attention. He opened it to find an old newspaper from 1954. On the first page, there was a picture of a bank with the title in capital letters "HEIST OF THE DECADE".

"Wait a minute. Does this mean that grandpa robbed a bank?"

Since he was a little kid, his grandfather told him stories how he took from the rich and gave to the poor like Robin Hood, but he thought that it was a story and not real.

He starts thinking about what he can do with $20000. He can pay his student loans, or he can buy a car, or he can buy an older car and pay his student loans. He made all these plans until it hit him; if he appeared at the bank with so much cash, it will raise suspicion. What can he possibly do? The only good solution that came to mind was to go to the bank, put the money in a safety deposit box, and take small portions every month to pay his bills. That way he won’t raise any suspicion.

So, he put the money in a backpack and went to the bus to get to the bank.

As the doors of the bus were closing, he heard a woman screaming for the bus to stop and wait for her.

"Wait. There is a woman that wants to get in," said Andrew to the bus driver.

He stopped and opened the door. The poor woman got on the bus, barely breathing, she thanked the driver.

"Don't thank me, thank this guy, he heard you and told me to stop."

"Thank you, young man." Said the old lady catching her breath.

"No problem ma'am. Have a seat." Andrew stood up, giving her the seat.

After a few minutes, she started crying. Andrew looked at her.

"Excuse me, ma'am. Are you alright?"

"Yes, I am. Thank you for asking."

"Well, ma'am you are the first person that I've seen that is all right and crying."

He managed to put a smile on her face.

"I am alright. I just have some problems and I don't know how to fix them."

"What problems?" asked Andrew, "Maybe I can help you."

"Sorry young man, I'm afraid you can't. My husband died, and duo to funeral bills, I fell behind on my electricity and water bills."

"How much money do you owe?"

"I still have to pay $8000 for the funeral, $1500 for the water bill, and $1000 for the electricity"

He looked at the backpack, "Well grandpa, looks like it's my turn to be Robin Hood."

He opened his backpack, counted $11000, opened the bag that the woman had, and put them in it.

The old lady looked in disbelief, and couldn't close her mouth.

"Merry Christmas Ma'am." He smiled at the woman and got off the bus.

The old lady was so shocked “it’s June... I mean Thank you so much."

"Man, that felt good.” He still had $9000. He could still pay his tuition and afford to buy a car or bicycle with it.

On the way to the bank, he passed a bakery where his grandfather used to take him all the time when he was a little kid, and used to buy him pretzels.

"Hello, one pretzel please."

"That will be $5." Replied the baker.

The baker looked again at Andrew,

"Excuse me, are you Constantin's grandson?"

"Yes sir."

"I can't believe it! Do you remember me?" asked the baker. "I remember when you were just a little boy and he used to bring you here for the pretzels, how is Constantin? I haven’t seen him in a while."

"He died." Replied Andrew.

"Oh no. What happened?"

"Pulmonary cancer."

"I am so sorry. He was a good man."

"Yes, he was." And he exited the bakery.

As he was getting out, a young boy stormed in with tears in his eyes. Andrew stopped and turned to see what happened.

"Grandpa, the van broke again," said the boy.

"What happened?"

"The timing chain broke. It damaged the oil pump and the alternator."

"And where is it now?" Asked the baker.

"I left it at Sam's Auto, but he told me that he won’t fix it until we pay him."

"And how much is it?"

"He said $2000 with used parts, plus we still owe him $1000 from last time."

The old man looked in the cash register and took out $1500.

"That's all we've got. Looks like we will not be able to deliver anything today." Said the old man disappointed.

Andrew knew he had to do another stop. He searched for the mechanic address online.

Right around the corner, he saw the mechanic shop. He went in.

"Hello, I'm looking for Sam." He asked a guy that was cleaning the floor.

"You’re looking at him. How can I help you?"

"Are you the owner of this place?" Asked Andrew amazed.

"Yes, I am. A good owner takes care of his property." Replied Sam with a smile on his face.

" I apologize if I offended you. It wasn't my intention. I am here to make a payment."

"Do you have a car here?"

"Yes, my friend brought his Bakery Van to fix it.”

"OK. It will be a total of $3000, $2000 for the used parts, and $1000 for fixing the transmission."

"And how much would it be with new parts?"

"So, $5000, and he can have it in two days."

"If I give you $1000 extra, can you finish it today?"

"If you give me $1000 extra, I’ll make it happen in two hours."

"Good, here is $6000, you have a deal"

"OK, let's go into the office and make the papers."

"I need a name for the invoice." Said Sam.

"Constantin." Replied Andrew.

"OK Mister Constantin, the van will be done in approximately two hours. I’ll call once it’s ready."

"OK, I have $3000 left. It’s not worth getting a deposit box anymore. Now I can pay some of my bills in cash and get a bicycle."

So, he went to a sports store to get himself a bicycle.

He found the bicycle of his dreams; and it was 50% off, only $1000. Score! He took it out and brings it to the cash register.

In front of him was a woman with her 10- or 11-year-old son.

"Hello, sir," she said to the cashier, "My son’s skate broke and I was wondering if you can fix it."

The cashier took the skates, and put them on the counter.

"Sorry ma'am, it's cheaper to buy a new pair than to fix them."

"And how much is a new pair?" Asked the woman with a trembling voice.

"A decent pair is between $1000 and $1500, and to fix yours it will be $1200."

She started crying. She couldn't afford it. So, she took the broken skates while holding her son's hand, and left.

Andrew looked again at his backpack and said in his head, "Might as well be Robin Hood until the end."

So, he took out $2500 plaid for the skates and his bike, and ran to the mother and the child.

"Excuse me, ma'am, you forgot this." And gave her a bag.

She took it, looked inside, and burst into tears.

"Why are you helping us?"

He looked at both of them smiling, "Merry Christmas." And got out of the store.

She was shocked, no one has ever done anything like this for her. The only words that came out of her mouth were "Thank you so much, but it's June."

Andrew started laughing, he heard that before. He jumped on the bicycle and went home.

All that pedaling made him hungry. He stopped at a corner store to get a quick snack. At the register, he saw the lottery tickets and remembered the 6 numbers in the black notebook. So, he got himself a lottery ticket, some food and went home.

The next morning, he turned on the TV, and saw a reporter standing in front of the corner store saying that someone who bought a lottery ticket from that place, had won.

He ran to the wallet and checked the numbers: 04, 08, 10, 11, 13, 22. He got all six numbers. He had just won twenty million dollars. He remembered how his grandfather always told him, that if he is doing good things, good things will come back to him.