Time Travelers Notebook

The rain begins to pour down and small water pools form outside as Evan flips the sign in the window of Reader’s Café from ‘OPEN’ to ‘CLOSED.’ Grabbing his jacket and bag from the upstairs office, he looks at the picture of his parents on the wall. They are standing in front of the café all smiles on the first day it opened.

“Another Thursday in the books guys,” he whispers as he places his hat on his head and exits the office.

Arriving at the bus stop, he digs his vibrating cell phone from his pocket.

“Hello?”

“Daddy, where are you?” Asks a small, sweet voice on the other end of the line.

“On my way to you baby girl. I’ll be there in 20 minutes, 30 tops.”

“Okay.” She responds in a mellow tone.

“I’ll be there soon. I promise but if I’m taking /too long you can call me again.”

“Okay,” Her voice livelier than before. Evan smiles as the he notices the bus slowing to a halt in front of him. “I love you baby girl.”

“I love you daddy.” The tiny voice says just as they both end the call and Evan boards the bus.

35 MINUTES LATER:

Evan kicks the door open to his small 1st floor level two-bedroom apartment. Both little 3-year-old Evan Jr. and sassy 6-year-old Evangeline slowly stride into the apartment in front of him, their raincoats making a water drop trail onto the hardwood floor with each step. Evan kicks the door closed behind him, and heads towards the kitchen. Placing the groceries on the semi-cluttered counter, he walks back over to the front door and secures the top and bottom locks.

“Who's ready to eat,” he asked as he lifts little Evan over his shoulder and tickles Evangeline. She giggles and wriggles out of her jacket while following him to the bedroom.

“I'm hungry daddy,” says little Evan as he wiggles out of his raincoat and rubs his engrossing brown eyes.

“Okay sleepy man. Want some juice and a snack while you wait for it?

“Yes!” Evan Jr. exclaims excitedly.

“Okay go watch your tablet and I’ll bring it to you.” Little Evan hurries off and Evangeline rushes up to her father, jumping to try and shove her backpack into his chest.

“Look at how good I was today daddy,” She says smiling up at him and batting her long eyelashes as he takes the bag from her hands and unzips it.

“I bet there are 10 gold stars in here,” Evan says smiling back at her knowing his angelic daughter is fully aware that she has him wrapped around her little finger. “Take a snack for you and your brother to your room while I check it out, okay?”

“Okay daddy,” she replies. He helps her reach an open bag of chips on the counter and she scurries away.

As he does every day of the week when the trio arrive home, Evan drags out a chair at the kitchen table and sets the pink and black glitter-daisy flowered bag down on top of the unopened mail that is covering the table. Removing all items in the bag at once, he notices something that he has not seen before. A small, cloth covered, hard back, black notebook with an elastic closure and two-ribbon bookmarks. He notices each ribbon is marking two different pages. Evan examines the outside of the notebook closely, searching for a name or any markings to show who it belongs to. With no traces of wear and tear to be found on the notebook, Evan is perplexed by how this brand-new, unfamiliar notebook appeared in Evangeline’s backpack. It had not been there earlier in the week.

“Ev, can you come here a sec?” He calls out to his young daughter. Evangeline strolls into the kitchen and stands next to him.

“Did you see my stars,” She asks as she does a thrilled twirl.

“No, but I found this,” he holds up the notebook. “Where did you get this baby girl?”

“I’ve never seen that before daddy, but I got 16 stars today. That’s a record!” Her expression switches from puzzled to excitement within a second.

“Good job baby girl. Daddy is proud of you.” He stands up with the notebook tucked under his left arm. He reaches and opens the refrigerator and pulls out two juice boxes. “You and your brother take those in your room. Daddy will be right back.”

“Where are you going,” Evangeline pouts and asks, grasping the juice boxes.

“This might be Ms. Angie’s or Danny’s notebook, so I’m going to walk over to return it. Don’t open the door for anyone, okay?”

“Yes sir.” She says as she skips off to the bedroom.

Evan waits until the bedroom door closes and quickly grabs his keys and exits the apartment. He swiftly hikes through the rain and water puddles to apartment 204 just across from his and knocks on the door.

After a moment, the door swings open and the smell of freshly made Jambalaya hits him like a wave.

“What’s up Mr. E?”

“Danny, who is that?” Ms. Angie, Evan’s 65-year-old neighbor and friend, steps in the doorway drying her wet hands with a paper towel. “Evan! I am so glad to see you. I have something for you and the babies!”

Evan smirks and shakes his head. She returns seconds later with a large brown paper distinctly prepacked and filled with Tupperware filled with delectable, scented food selections. She presses the bag into his arms insistently.

“I was about to call you or send Danny over with this for you guys but now I don’t have to do either. I wanted to have it ready before you picked them up, but little miss Evangeline could not wait until she saw her daddy. She counted down with me, from the time you two hung up, the minutes until you got here. Good thing you were on time or else you might have been in trouble.” She takes a step back and smiles, crossing her arms. “What else can I do for you? Is everything okay?”

“Yes, everything is fine and thanks so much for this, but I told you I was cooking dinner tonight,” Evan replies. Ms. Angie makes a face at him and they both let out a chuckle. “I just came over because I found your notebook in Ev’s backpack. Figured one of you guys may have put it there by accident. I didn’t open it or anything.” Evan extends the notebook towards her, and Ms. Angie looks at the notebook then at her 16-year-old grand-daughter Danny. Danny flashes a confused look at her grandmother and they both turn to Evan.

“Evan, we haven’t seen that before, but you hurry on home and feed those precious babies.” She gently pushes the notebook and his hand back towards him and fans her hand, gesturing towards his apartment. “Maybe you should open the notebook, it may have a name for who it belongs to inside.” She smiles at him.

More confused than before, Evan decides not to argue with her. Her persistence imminent. He thanks her again and turns to trek back to his apartment with the notebook in tow.

Later that night, Evan checks in on sleeping Evan Jr. and Evangeline then softly closes the bedroom door and walks back into the kitchen. He lifts the notebook and opens the cover.

This Book Belongs to TABB

The handwriting looks familiar but not familiar enough to make the owner known to Evan. After flipping through the first chunk of empty pages, he slightly lifts on one of the ribbon bookmarks. The bookmarked page also has an empty page. In spite of the lack of writing or markings on the page, something else between the pages catches Evan’s attention. A playing card, face down tucked in the crease of the notebook pages with the word ‘YES’ handwritten in pen scribbled on the back of an otherwise typical playing card. Lifting the card from the crease and flipping it over between his fingers to look at the face of the card, he finds the word ‘NO’ handwritten on the Ace of Diamonds card.

Evan places the card onto the table and shakes the notebook lightly to see if any other cards are inside, to no avail. He places the closed notebook down on the table next to the playing card and spots something he had not before written in what appeared to be white dust on the back cover.

1899

Evan attempts to dust off the numbers with his right hand.

BANG! BANG!

Evan jolts at the loud knock at his front door and quickly moves to the door to look through the peep hole. Swiftly he opens the door and takes a step outside and attentively scans his environs. As he glances to his left, he notices a small cardboard box with his name penned in big, bold, capital letters across the top. Evan cautiously inspects his surroundings a second time before taking a slow step towards the box.

The box is sealed with clear tape and his name is inscribed on the box a second and third time. The rain beats down onto Evan’s head as he ponders touching the package. Finally, he decides to pick up the box. Choosing a corner to pull, Evan opens it with one smooth motion. The glimpse of a yellow envelope with ‘EVAN’ stamped on the front is inside.

Evan shuffles back inside the apartment, closing and locking his door behind him. He can feel his face warm and his palms begin to sweat as he pulls the envelope from the box and begins to open it and dump its contents onto the table. Two stacks of 100-dollar bills drop onto the table, each stack wrapped with a band of paper with ‘$10,000.’

Evan takes a step back from the table and looks around the room. With his thoughts racing, Evan grabs the box and flips it upside down to shake out any items inside. Crumpled sheets of white tissue paper and pale pink packing peanuts fall onto the kitchen table and spill onto the floor around Evan’s dripping feet. Glancing back at the table, he notices the notebook again. The box falls to the floor and Evan once again lifts the notebook, opening the second bookmarked page.

It is time son.

Trying to gather the disorganized events, since arriving home earlier in the evening, Evan glances at the copy of the same photo of his parents standing in front of their café on the it’s opening day, he has hanging in his kitchen. His heart sinks as he notices, his father is no longer in the photo…