Write Back

It just looked like an ordinary black notebook. I found it in a box while cleaning up the garage. It didn't stand out in any real way aside from the odd choice of parchment for the pages rather than regular paper. I don't even remember how I got it; yet, I got this weird sense of déja vù about it. I swore I found it before.

"So, you found a notebook. Big whoop," my cousin Barry shot at me. "We need to be finding stuff we can sell for real money. That piece of crap you call a car ain't gonna fix itself."

I fished out a pen from a nearby drawer and wrote out a list of what went wrong with the old Tempo. That wasn't hard since all those engine issues cropped up over the past couple of weeks. The mechanic told me that if I had replaced those fans belts, the other issues in the engine wouldn't have cropped up. I groaned at the implication. If I had just spent $50 to replace those belts, I would've saved myself hundreds of dollars in repairs. I guess I just had to punch myself in the gut because I double underlined "Replace Fan Belts" in the book.

I closed the book. Suddenly, I was hit with a throbbing headache. My eyes slammed shut as the pain spiked. It felt like my cerebrum was splitting in half. After what felt like an eternity, the pain subsided, and I opened my eyes. What I saw replaced the pain with confusion. The garage which I had spent the day cleaning out looking for stuff to sell was back the way it was. It looked like absolutely nothing was touched. I know I didn't just imagine that I spent the day cleaning out the garage.

I went back in the house trying to retrace my steps. Barry was sitting on the couch in the living room watching the Bruins wiping the ice with the Penguins. I couldn't help noticing how clean he looked aside from the telltale orange on his shirt that would always tell me that I needed to restock the Cheetos. He didn't look like he had spent ten minutes in the garage, let alone all day.

"You alright, cous?" he called out.

"What happened to the garage?"

"What do you mean?"

I groaned. "We were cleaning it out looking for crap to sell."

It was Barry's turn to look confused. "Why do we need to sell anything?"

"MY CAR!" I shouted. "REPAIR BILLS! RING ANY BELLS?"

"What, did something else happen?" he asked.

"THE FAN BELTS!!!"

"What, were the replacements defective or something?"

I stopped dead in my tracks. "Replacements? What replacements?"

Barry sighed. "The ones you got two weeks ago. You got them and had Darryl install them. He said you made a smart move. You would've trashed your engine if you waited."

My jaw dropped. What did he mean? My car's engine WAS trashed. I knew it was. Without a word, I stepped out to the driveway to check out the old Tempo. I popped the hood and looked inside. My trip to the mechanic clued me in on what to look for. I saw brand new fan belts. I stepped back and nearly fell backwards. How did those get there? I ran back inside and grabbed my keys. I got in the car and started it up. It was purring like a kitten, not a trace of the wear that I knew was there the day before. I shut off the car and slowly stumbled back inside the house, confusion overwhelming me.

"What's up with you?" Barry mumbled through a mouth full of Cheetos.

"Do you remember me mentioning a little black notebook a little while ago?"

Barry swallowed before speaking. "Not today, no. You mentioned it a couple weeks ago."

My head shot up. "What?"

"Yeah. You found a notebook in the garage. It brought up some car stuff. You said you didn't remember writing it, but it was in your handwriting."

"Where is it now?"

Barry shrugged. "Probably in your room somewhere."

I dashed to my room in record time. It didn't take long to find the book; it was in the drawer of my nightstand. I opened it and found the very list I wrote that day. It even had the "Replace Fan Belts" double underlined.

I fell on my bed to think about it. Somehow, this book sent a message to me in the past. My past self acted on that information and changed history. That certainly explained the déja vù feeling earlier, but why didn't I remember what my past self did? Could this be one of those time paradoxes that Star Trek talked about all the time? However, thoughts of the larger implications of changing history drifted away as something else came to mind. I had a tool that would allow me to improve my life drastically with only the effort it would take to move a pen. Why not cash in (with the emphasis on "cash")?

I opened my laptop and Googled the results of the last few weeks of the state lottery. I thought about going for the Powerball or Mega Millions, but that would've probably looked too suspicious. According to Barry, I found the notebook and acted on it two weeks prior. I pulled up the Match 3 results from that day. I grabbed the notebook and pen... and hesitated. My conscience was eating away at me. This was quite clearly cheating. I told myself that I was just going for the state prize and not trying to get rich. I made up my mind. I wrote the winning Match 3 numbers along with the drawing date. Taking a moment to make sure the ink was dry, I closed the book.

The headache returned with a vengeance. I fell out my bed, shrieking in pain. I never had a migraine before, but it couldn't possibly be as torturous as this. Finally, the pain subsided. It felt like I was on pins and needles for ages, but the clock on my nightstand told me that it was only for a few minutes.

I barely had time to register that when I heard a knock on my bedroom door. Barry's voice came through. "Are you alright? I heard you screaming!"

I forced myself back to my feet. My legs were still shaking. I got to the door and poked my head out the crack.

"I'll be alright. Just a headache."

Barry looked suspicious. "I don't know. Even my worst headaches never made me scream loud enough to wake the neighborhood. You sure you're alright?"

"Yeah," I said weakly.

"Okay," Barry said, clearly unconvinced. He turned to get back to the hockey game he was watching when he turned back around. "By the way, have you decided what you're gonna do with the money?"

My eyes popped open. "What money?"

Barry raised an eyebrow. "You sure you're alright? Normally, someone would remember getting a check like that from the state lottery."

My jaw started to drop but I caught myself. "Oh, that money. No, not yet."

"Okay," Barry said. "But you'd better do something with it soon. I wouldn't want to keep a check like that lying around."

After Barry turned back towards the living room, I shut the door and dove for the drawer of my nightstand. I opened it and found a check for $20,000. I went back to my laptop and pulled up the lottery website again. I deliberately chose a day with a low jackpot, and it worked. The site showed my winning and electing the cash option with taxes withdrawn. $20,000 was mine to keep.

I was excited. The plan worked! I could only imagine everything I could do! I could dodge traffic! I could win more contests! This kind of power to change reality was incredible! However, my excitement mutated into guilt. I couldn't ignore the fact that I cheated to get this money. Sure, because of the circumstances, no one will ever know I cheated, and I certainly wasn't going to tell anyone. Nonetheless, it was still dishonest. I also couldn't ignore how severe this headache was compared to the first one. It must have been caused by the reality shifts. If I kept doing it, the pain would probably kill me.

I spoke to Barry, but he only knew about the car parts. He didn't know about the lottery numbers, and I kept it that way. He was indignant when I told him that I was only going to keep $15,000 to use for bills, some savings, and maybe a new TV and an Xbox Series X while the remaining $5,000 would go to charity. However, he calmed down when I reminded him that we had to rely on the food bank a while back when we had some employment trouble. It made sense to give some back.

A couple of days later, after doing what I intended with the money and contending with some considerable headaches that felt like aftershocks, I went back to my room and pulled the notebook out of the drawer again. I knew what I had to do. I grabbed a pen and wrote...

You don't know this, but the notes you were getting were from yourself two weeks in the future. Your actions changed reality twice, causing severe brain damage to your future self. If you did anymore with this book, it'll likely kill you later. Burn the book.

I put the pen down and placed the book on a metal tray. Ready for what was to happen, I closed the book. I was ready for the searing pain this time. While the pain was excruciating, I forced my eyes to stay open at a squint. I could see the book as it dissolved into a pile of ash. While the pain was severe, it was much shorter in length, or, at least, it felt that way.

As the throbbing subsided, I breathed a sigh of relief. Who knows how much more that book could've done. However, as I went to bed to try to sleep off the remaining milder headache, I found myself worried. Over the course of the weekend, I dramatically changed history for myself twice, not counting burning the book. I only saw a couple of the immediate effects. How much more could have been changed by those actions? I saw It's a Wonderful Life. There could have been serious repercussions for changing history. This is not the same reality I knew my whole life.

With thoughts of insane changes to the world because of that book dancing in my head, I somehow drifted to an uneasy sleep.

Like this little story? Want more? Let me know, and take care.