The Black Book

Dedicated to: Stefani Germanotta

The boys at my school picked me up and threw me into the dumpster like I was trash, and there, in that low, dark void of a space, I found a Sine from Above. There at the bottom, rendered almost invisible in the darkness, I saw a golden glint catch the faintest trace of light that revealed a little black notebook. Despite being an unhygienic social faux pas, I took the souvenir from my impromptu dumpster diving session that day. After securing it in my bag I climbed out of the hole.

I saved opening the book until I was at home and in the safe, locked confines of my bedroom. I knew I didn’t want to answer any questions about the book. As I held it in my hands, I admired the beauty and quality of its soft leather, which somehow felt warm to the touch. I took in the rich pages, golden accents, and unmarred spine with appreciation. When I blew through the pages, it sounded like wind rousing the leaves of a tree. It seemed that the notebook was pristine, brand-new, and unused, like it was waiting for somebody to get thrown into that dumpster and find it. There were only five words printed in the whole book.

“Thoughts

Owner of this book: ________________________”

The journal was so special that I cringed at the thought of defiling it with some ugly, clumsy signature. So, I sat there and practiced a number of times before I was confident I could pen the perfect John Hancock. I took a deep breath, let my hand glide and loop over the page, and just like that the book was mine. I’d never successfully kept a diary before, not because I didn’t want to, but because when I was young my sister always managed to find it and would mock me for my entries. She would parrot them back to me, and even to this day, the memories of humiliation still freshly redden my face. I took this journal with me everywhere I went so that nobody would have the chance to so much as touch it. In addition to assuring both mine and my new journal’s safety, I also enjoyed the satisfaction of simply having it around. It was pleasant to look at which inspired me to write often. However, I never carelessly jotted just any old thought into it. I always kept two notebooks on me. My beloved and another journal for the first drafts to weed out the fluff and garbage.

Even though there was a dark memory attached, I had to record how I came to own the journal. I grimaced but proceeded to tell the tale of how I found myself at the bottom of that dumpster and more importantly, what I found there. I was unhappy with the first attempt. It was too literal, and not quite worth the read, so I reworked it again and again until it felt right, taking some creative liberties in the process.

In my version, for example, all the boys that were involved in throwing me in the trash mysteriously developed an unshakeable sour body odor wreaking of hot garbage. I took some devilish delight in that part, I must admit. I then went on to detail how in this very journal, my first best-seller was conceived. The money I would be rewarded with would fund the start-up for my first real business venture. My love, my baby, my Haute Couture fashion line called Feral Animal.

As I look back, I realize that all my most precious possessions have come to me as gifts, and coincidentally, or perhaps not so coincidentally, those gifts kept on giving. Among the highest ranking are this God given day, my impeccable health, the car from my father, the sewing machine Cassidy gave me, the little black notebook bestowed by fate, and the freedom I gave myself. In the right place and at the right time, Cassidy, a girl I went to high school with overheard me in mid conversation talking about how I needed to get my hands on a sewing machine. Life has a sense of humor, and I believe it loves the arts. Only a few days before Cassidy offered me her Singer sewing machine, I saw a movie called The Dressmaker. It starred Kate Winslet, who crafted her couture on a Singer sewing machine. I'd always been interested in fashion and the idea of making my own designs, but I lacked vision and direction. This all changed that fateful day I crash landed in the dumpster. “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” they always say. I had such high regard for this notebook that it allowed the entries to be transformed from mere words into a sort of magic because I believed it was wrong to waste a single bit of space with any word or image that I did not love or at least feel strongly about. Little did I know that my visions would sprout from the pages.

It began with the boys, because doesn’t it always in adolescence? I sat in my English class lazily looking out the window and fidgeting with a pen until the final bell rang. Dominic lumbered in late with a flushed red neck, and instantaneously a stench permeated the room. Protests and exclamatory statements soon erupted from the other students, questioning what was that smell? My eyes widened as Dominic grew absolutely crimson and said nothing, silently slumping into his seat. The accusations started to swirl about who smelled. I felt conflict in my gut. On the one hand, I still had a clear image in my brain of Dominic laughing and opening the lid as the others hoisted me up in the air. The mercilessly merry laughter sounded the same in this room now as it did on that day. In that moment, I knew that what I believed about the book was true. It was magic. In truth, I felt pangs of regret as I watched Dominic squirm in teenage anguish, but this revelation made my mind gape at the possibilities. I vowed to myself there and then that I would never use the power of the black book for evil or to cause any harm to others again. I prayed, asked for forgiveness, and decided that I would reimagine the space I once dedicated to their humiliation. But...that would take time. They would have to sweat it out until I could paint over my words that had cursed them. If a teenage boy doesn’t smell like shit for a week, is he even a teenage boy?

I painted a dimly lit portrait of a beautiful nude woman riding naked through a rose garden. It was more fitting of the black book anyways. After I painted the roses red, I set out to work on writing my best-seller. I knew it was only a matter of time before that same woman was galloping through her garden, waving a check for $20, 000 in her custom gloved hand.