A Blessing and a Curse

When I was a small boy a strange man appeared in my town. I happened to be playing in the street – a game called kerbie where you throw the ball at the opposite kerb so that it bounces back to you. I was playing on my own, as I often did at that age, when I first noticed him. It was one of those evenings where all the boys who would usually be playing with me were busy with Scouts or elderly relatives or, in one case, a bout of chickenpox.

It was a balmy summer night of the sort that now only exists in my memory and the street was deserted apart from myself, for it was dinner time. The only reason I was outside was because my mother was at work and my father had forgotten to feed me. So I was the first to notice the strange man and I noticed him at once. He was a tall man. A bowler hat perched on his head and a heavy-looking briefcase hung effortlessly from his arm. He appeared on the pavement at the entrance to the little alleyway that had once connected my cul-de-sac to the next one over. I did not see him come out of the alleyway, but I suppose he must have done. I was in the act of throwing when he appeared in the corner of my eye and I was powerless to stop the ball from sailing out of my hand and bouncing perfectly off the kerb and away towards the alleyway and the strange man. He stood perfectly still as my ball sailed through the air directly towards his face. But it never made contact. For a moment, the ball seemed to hang perfectly still in midair then, in an instant, it dropped to the ground without bouncing.

The man glanced down at the ball, then stepped over it and strode towards me with a sense of purpose. He spoke to me in a voice unlike any I had heard before and can barely conjure in my mind now. It was as if he spoke through a long, narrow pipe that was held directly against my ear. It was a small, faraway voice and yet it was perfectly clear.

“What’s your name, boy?”

I answered that my name was Solomon Stone, which was true, for why would an 8-year-old lie?

“Do you live here?”

I told him yes, that I live with my father who would be coming out any moment now. He smiled at this as if he doubted it. Suddenly, I felt the air grow cold even though the sun was still in the sky. The birds on the electricity lines overhead sat perfectly, unnaturally still. When I looked at my digital watch – a Christmas present – it appeared to have stopped, though the display was still active. The seconds had frozen in place. I looked at the man again and began to move away from him, but my feet betrayed me and rooted themselves in the ground.

“Don’t be afraid, Solomon, I’m not going to hurt you.”

He reached into the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out a small, black notebook, the kind that I had seen policemen carry on the television. He took my hands and pressed them closed around the notebook.

“I need you to do something for me. I need you to take this book and write in it. Write in it every day until I come back for it. The date, the weather and anything strange that happens. You are my eyes and ears. I can’t explain why right now, but I promise I will one day. And this is the most important thing: tell no one. If people know you saw me, you’ll be in danger. I can pay you. In this briefcase there is 20,000 dollars. There will be another 20,000 when I return. All you need to do is write and wait for me to come back. Can you do it?”

I was eight, but I was not stupid. I knew that we were poor. I knew that the reason my father forgot to feed me was not because he did not love me, but because he had been working the night shifts and day shifts all week just to make ends meet. This money would solve all the problems. I could tell my father that I found it, or something else equally believable. And besides, the man spoke so fervently and there was such desperation in his eyes that I felt it was my duty to help him. So I took the book and the briefcase and I made the promise. How could an 8-year-old argue with such a circumstance?

As soon as I said the words, the man relaxed. He turned and walked away, back towards the alleyway. I tried to follow him, but my feet still refused to obey me and I saw him disappear down the lane. The very moment he vanished my feet returned to my control. But when I hurried over to the alley in pursuit of the man, he was gone. There was no sign of him. There was only a wisp of smoke and a strange smell like rotten eggs and, if I wasn’t imagining it, the echo of a laugh.

I returned to my house, determined that I would tell my father despite the man’s warnings. But my father wasn’t home. The house was empty. When I went to the neighbour’s house and rang the bell there was no answer, nor at the next neighbour, nor the one after. I pressed my nose against window after window. The entire street was empty. And so I returned to my house and I sat at the kitchen table and I opened the notebook. It was blank. With great hesitation, I picked up a pen and began to write.

The weather is sunny.

A strange man gave me this book.

I have not stopped writing since that first sentence all those years ago. Yet the book is not full. I fill page after page and still there are more, though the book does not change shape. The strange man has not returned. The briefcase lies untouched and my father’s house is crumbling around me. My neighbours' houses are long gone, crumbled to dust a thousand years ago. And still I write. Still I wait.