Rightful Owner

“What a day!” Marguerite thought as she plopped herself down on the blanket in the middle of the park and gazed at the rapidly changing colors of the dusk skies. A child’s humming voice in the distance prompted her to turn her head and look to the left.

“Hmm, that’s odd. I didn’t see you here,” she remarked as she noticed a small black notebook lying on the grass next to her blanket. “Always Return to its Rightful Owner” was the inscription in gold on the cover.

“Must be an important book. I better see who it belongs to and return it.” Marguerite opened the book to a blank front page. She turned the page and found the words “Where Imaginations Meet” and a name and address which was not far away. She jumped up and decided this was exactly the kind of adventure she needed to take her mind off a tumultuous day. She had no idea what was in store. Marguerite shoved the blanket into her backpack, and off she went. As she moved through the park, one by one, she noticed things were looking a little odd. It was as if she entered into a time vortex and was now in the park as it was a hundred years ago. At first, she thought maybe someone is having a costume party. But as she entered the street side, she noticed carriages and not cars. “What on earth is happening? Someone really went all out on their event planning!”

Unperturbed, she opened the book again to remind herself of the address. Then she looked up to find the cross streets for her bearing, only to be met with a completely new city. “WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!?!” She closed her eyes and reopened in disbelief and hope that her mind was just playing tricks on her, but alas, she was God knows where.

“Excuse me! Excuse me! Where is this?” She asked a passerby. “You’re on George Street,” he replied. But he replied in an accent that prompted her to ask where he was from. “What do you mean?” He asked, a bit confused. “Where were you born?” She asked. “Right here in Sydney,” he responded. “AUSTRALIA!!!!” She exclaimed. “Are you alright?” he asked. But before she could respond, she had opened the book again only to find herself in a whole new world.

This time she found herself in a caricatured maze. Everything looked as if she was in a cartoon. “It must be this little black book,” she thought frantically. “But more importantly, how do I get back to San Diego???”. By this time, she was almost in tears. She kept opening the book, and each time she opened it she landed in a new place, each time hoping it would be back in San Diego. Some places were scarier than others, while some gave her a sense of calm.

As she opened the book at a place of serenity, she just stood there. She closed her eyes before reopening the book and said over and over again, “Please, let the next stop be back to Embarcadero Marina.” She opened the book once more, opened her eyes, and she was not there. Instead, she was sitting at the head of a large conference room table. “Marguerite, Marguerite? … You’re gazing off again. Are you sure this is what you want?” said the lady sitting adjacent to her. Marguerite was confused. But before she could react, a handsome young man came into the room and handed her backpack to her. As she was coming to, she noticed the small black notebook still in her hand. She opened it, almost exhausted and hopeless. She opened her eyes and realized she was now gazing at the familiar dusk skies. She jumped up! “Oh, thank heavens it was just a dream! I must have dozed off. Whew!” She breathed a sigh of relief, grabbed her things, and headed home.

She was thinking about this weird dream all the way home, but she was ever so grateful it wasn’t real.

She got home, plopped herself on the couch, and turned on the television. Too drained of energy to move but feeling hungry, she reached into her backpack on the floor for a bag of chips she knew she had in there. While fumbling for the chips, she felt something unfamiliar. She pulled it out, and it was a package in brown paper. Upon opening it, she realized it was a stack of cash with a note on top, in her grandfather’s writing, that said “$20,000, Rightful Owner - Marguerite Lee.”

Marguerite passed out. Cash in hand, shocked and spent from her journey.