A New Life

My hands were shaking when I turned the keys to the front door. All of my hopes and dreams were riding on this very moment. I had every penny of my savings on this house at auction to start my flipping company. I was handy and loved repurposing something old and making it beautiful once again. This house held all of my dreams and my future. I had stomached my mindless accounting job for years to be able to save enough to make this dream purchase possible.

When I pushed the door open a musty smell hit me immediately. Ok well it had been closed up for over a year this is to be expected. I tried to flick a light and there was nothing. Ok first order of business, turn the power back on. Luckily, the house had tons of windows to let in the light from all directions.

I walked around the house. It was a good size four bedrooms, two baths, a decent size kitchen, dining room and a large living room. As I walked around a sense of relief hit me. Nothing seemed like it was going to crumble apart. I couldn’t see any major damage by first glances. Honestly it was better than I could have ever hoped. The kitchen had beautiful wood cabinets that I could repaint and give a fresh look that buyers would love. I walked to the living room and crossed my fingers. Please be wood, please be wood. I knelt down by the corner and pulled the carpet and then started to cry. There is hardwood flooring under here!

I didn’t plan to start work today but I couldn’t help myself. After a few hours I pulled out the entire living room and all of the bedrooms. Ok so some boards were going to have to be replaced and I would need to nail some back down and refinish these off but these floors were going to be beautiful when I was done. Everyone wanted hardwood floors these days and my budget was tight. This was a huge win for my company.

The next day I came in with tools ready to pull out the floor boards that were going to be needing replacement. The main bedroom only had one that was pretty badly warped. I pulled the board up beneath it and to my surprise I found an envelope that read “To the new owner” as well as stacks of black notebooks. Well that would explain why this board was so messed up. Well the new owner would be me. I tore open the envelope and found a letter.

To the new owner of my home. It makes me so happy to think of the new life this house will have. One full of laughter, tears and love. But a new life. The notebooks are full of the life that was in this house before you. I didn’t have family at the end and it seemed a crime that no one would know all that was seen in this home. . I have left something for you. All you have to do is follow these clues and you will be all set. I always loved a good puzzle.

I live near the blooms in the night.

I don’t live by sunrise or sunset.

I am three Stilettos from the boarder and a shovel from the blooms.

I am half of my previous owners current depth.

Oh my god! I bought a place with buried treasure. Well this is amazing and quite the exciting twist. It clearly is something buried by flowers. I ran down the stairs leaving everything else and headed towards the backyard. Now I get to play Nancy Drew! Could this day get any better?

I walked outside and it was pitch black. The yard was absolutely enormous crap this was going to take forever. I flicked on my flash light and surveyed the garden. Well great there are tons of flowers. How am I supposed to know which ones only bloom in the night? After an hour looking over all of the plants and taking pictures of every single one, I called it a night. I needed to do some research and a shovel.

I raced home and didn’t even bother to eat. After four hours on the internet I think I had figured it out. My pictures showed a moon flower back in the corner which are supposed to be night blooming. It took all of my will power to not go over there in the middle of the night to start digging. The last thing I needed for my renovations though was annoyed neighbors thinking I’m hiding a body.

I woke early like a kid excited to go see Santa. I brought one of my stilettos and measured three from the garden boarder and cornered it off with the length of the shovel. Ok so under this space but three feet under. This lady must have been a trip when she was alive.

It took me a bit to get going but after about twenty five minutes and widening of the measurements on each side, because her feet were probably smaller than mine, I finally hit something that gave a ding. The adrenalin was pulsing through me as I pulled an old lockbox from the ground. I opened the box and found another small black notebook. Underneath there was another compartment but it was locked. I opened the notebook and found another note.

Bravo you did it! I hope you didn’t mind the little work but I worried about leaving it in the house for just anyone to find. My life was filled with love, happiness and of course grief. This is the home my husband and I purchased when we got married at eighteen. This was the home where our son had his first steps, his little hand prints are the ones you see on the front porch, and this is the place I stood when I learned of the accident killing my husband and my son. I didn’t have much and I didn’t have and family at the end. So I left this for you to start your new story off with a smile. My notebooks aren’t meant to make you sad or make you destressed but to make you cherish everything and every moment. Use this notebook to write all of the fun and happy memories, about wanting to scream, the tears that are shed and most important about the moments of love. I had a painful life but I definitely had love and this house was filled with it. Now it’s your turn.

Last Clue some may call it the unluckiest page but it’s not for you, just for me.

Hmm unlucky. I opened the book to page thirteen and found nothing, I flipped the pages of the notebook upside down and still came up with nothing. Wait, maybe she was talking about the first set of notebooks! I raced into the house and upstairs to the bedroom with the lockbox. I bent down to the stacks of books and pulled the first one. There wasn’t a key on page thirteen in this notebook but I couldn’t help myself and I read a bit.

Today we brought our sweet son home. It was the happiest day of our life having him born. My husband is the love of my life but this sweet boy added something so much more.

I sat on the floor and kept reading. Twenty minutes in tears poured down my cheeks as I realized what she had meant. Her worst page in her life. Sure enough as I flicked through journals I felt the weight and found a key on top of the page. The page started with.

I buried the two parts of my heart.

Oh my god this poor woman. I continued to read the page and felt the pain this woman had written. After that page I decided to grab my keys and go home with all of the journals.

It took two months for me to finish all of the renovations that needed to be done. When I listed the property it sold in only two days. After all of the costs I had made a large profit. This home had my dreams coming true.

To remember the owner of the house I made the floor board a hiding safe for the new owners. Everyone needs a place to hide special things. As I passed the keys to the young couple with tears in my eyes I said, “Remember that safe I showed you in your room. The previous owner left you something.” I smiled at their confusion and waved goodbye and walked from a house I would never forget.

After reading her journals I couldn’t take the buried treasure. She had left over twenty thousand dollars in that box. But she had meant for that money to be for the new family that was creating the new life here, not for me. I was just there to transform the home a little between the lives in the home. Don’t get me wrong that money would have been amazing for me but it wasn’t mine and I know it would eat me alive my entire life if I took it. I reset everything to the same place, I even put the notebooks of the first owner’s life back with the key on the same exact page. The notebooks showed the true meaning of a life well lived. She had a life full of heartbreak but she kept living and wrote about the moments of joy she experienced as years went on. Towards the end of her life she had written how she dreamed frequently that the house was full with a young happy family. Knowing her dreams were coming true left a smile on my face as I drove off, the young couple were expecting twins.