The Black Notebook

by Isabelle Snow

  I shook my head, trying to shake those thoughts away. I was just getting back into the story when someone’s head peeked into my peripheral vision. I looked up slowly, dragging the moment out before I’d have to break my peaceful silence and solitude.

  A freshman, Eunice, stood awkwardly on the balls of her feet, her smile expectant. I knew her from all the times I’d helped her in math club. Yes, I was in the math club. Sue me.

  “Hi there,” I said, noticing the shy vibe she was releasing.

  “Hi Seven,” she said in a small voice.

  “What’s up, Eunice?”

  “Well,” she said, sounding a little excited. She took the seat beside me so abruptly that I actually leaned away a little. “Seven,” she said, grinning. “It worked. Your advice worked!”

  “Oh…” I said, “really?” What was her secret again? Eunice…Eunice…she was probably the one who found out that her brother was dating someone way older and way out of his league. But no, her excitement didn’t seem to be for that kind of secret. Maybe she was the one who taught me how to rig some of the security cameras the school had placed at “hidden” corners—no, wait. I hadn’t even given that person advice back then. I was only interested about the new information I’d obtained. Ugh.

  “Um, that’s great!” I just decided to reply, trying not to make it obvious that I had no idea what we were talking about.

  “I mean, no offense, but at first I thought it wouldn’t work,” she gushed, gesticulating wildly, “but I just decided to trust you and see where it went and it did work! It did!”

  I laughed. “Yes, it seems so.”

  “I have to apologize to you though, Seven,” she said, suddenly looking serious.

  “Why’s that?” I asked.

  “I mean, I shouldn’t have burdened you with my secret. In a way, I got you involved.”

  I still had no idea what we were talking about. “Oh, no, it’s okay,” I reassured her with a smile. “I’m glad, um…to have helped.”

  Eunice suddenly grabbed my hands in hers and leaned really close, saying, “Thank you so much, Seven!”

  “Uh, yeah sure, anytime,” I said awkwardly.

  “I’m serious,” she said, her eyes shining. “Thank you. I owe you.” The word “owe” seemed to ring in my ears, but it was only when she asked, “Is there any way that I can repay you?” did a mere idea in my head start to materialize and solidify into a plan.

  A grin slowly spread across my face. “Well…there is something you could help me with…”

  ***

  I leaned forward from my hiding spot behind the lockers and peeked through the spaces between two people talking a foot away from me, trying not to listen in on what they were talking about. My attention was solely on the redhead glancing around the hall, as if searching for someone.

  Colin was probably expecting me to bring his physics books and essay report around this time. I waited patiently, looking out for Eunice.

  The plan was that she’d bump into Colin, scattering her things, and while Colin would be helping her gather them, I’d sweep in and grab the black notebook that was peeking out of his back pocket. I specifically emphasized to her afterwards that I had my reasons for doing this, reasons that I would like to keep to myself, meaning that she was not to tell anyone about this.

  If you thought about it, it was technically the first sort-of secret of mine that I shared with anyone at school. I just hoped Eunice felt like she owed me enough that she’d fulfill her promise of not spilling a word.

  Right on time, Eunice appeared into the scene, running as fast as she could, while carrying a pile of books. She hurriedly dodged people in the hall, making a beeline towards our target.

  As Colin cast one more look around the other heads in the hall, Eunice collided dramatically into him, her arms letting go of the books she was holding. They both fell to the floor in a harmonic arrangement of thuds and grunts, and though some looked back to see what the ruckus was all about, others went on ahead to their classes.

  I saw Eunice get up slowly, her mouth moving, probably apologizing to Colin for not looking where she was going. I couldn’t see Colin’s face as he’d gotten up and was helping her.

  This was my cue. I stepped out of my hideout and walked determinedly towards them. The black notebook was sticking out of his pocket, almost as if it was welcoming me.

  I quickened my pace and soon I was within five feet of Colin. Four feet, three feet—until I was directly behind him, my arm swiftly reaching down to snatch the notebook. And then miraculously—and for a moment, unbelievably—it was in my hands.

  I didn’t have the time to enjoy my victory though, because Colin immediately whirled around, probably having felt the sudden disappearance of the notebook in his pocket. He spotted me before I was able to escape, but I didn’t waste another minute.

  I took off, pumping my arms in a futile effort to speed up. I didn’t even try to look back, afraid that if I did, I’d slow down and Colin would be upon me. My mind searched for places I could hide in and wait for him to leave, but when I was about to enter the girls’ bathroom, I saw him from the corner of my eye, merely a few feet away. He was surely going to catch me.

  I pushed past some people, who complained irritably, and continued running. I cut around a corner and immediately spotted the janitor’s closet. I dashed towards it and closed the door behind me.

  The room was about half the size of an ordinary classroom and as the smell of floor wax entered my nose and the sound of my panting echoed against the blurry window of the door, I looked out to see if Colin was still there.

  A dark figure ran past and I instinctively pulled away. I could hear a pair of sneakers squeaking against the newly polished floor, and for a moment, I thought Colin wasn’t going to find me.

  And then the squeaking suddenly stopped. My heart seemed to stop as well.

  The squeaking came back in seconds but it sounded as if it was getting closer and closer. Dread was like a cold finger tracing the line of my spine. I slowly turned back to look out the window, only to see Colin standing on the other side of it.

  With a yelp, I jumped away from the door, just as Colin opened it, strode confidently into the room, and kicked the door shut. I backed away from him, and only realized that it was a mistake when I felt the shelf holding extra rolls of tissue and cans of paint pressing against my back.

  He didn’t stop walking until he was right in front of me, his hands planted on the shelf at either side of my head. He looked at me from under his lashes and I held my breath as memories of last Friday’s party rushed into my head. I was trapped.

  “And where do you think you’re going?” he asked, sounding just a little breathless.

  “Nowhere,” I said quietly. My fingers frantically clutched the black notebook. He looked down at it and plucked it out of my hand as easily as if he were taking a candy from a baby.

  “Hey!” I immediately protested, extending my arm to take it back, but he held it too far away from me. I felt my heart sink as I watched my plan and short-lived victory crumble to pieces. “It’s mine, Colin!” I said, trying not to lose that small hope I had in getting it back.

  “It seems you have forgotten that you’re supposed to be my slave for today,” he said, ignoring my desperate pleas. He smiled. “You know, I should punish you for this—”

  Before he could finish his sentence, the doorknob behind him started jiggling. We both looked sharply back at the door and when I saw two silhouettes through the glass window, I wanted to slam the heel of my hand against my forehead for almost forgetting. I quickly grabbed Colin’s arm and dragged him behind the shelf, forcing him to get down on his knees as I did the same.

  “What are you—”

  I clamped a hand over his mouth and whispered urgently, “Quiet!”

  In the next second, the door creaked open and two people entered the room. I poked my head out, trying to see in between cans of pain
t if I was correct in guessing that it was Jake and Tiffany who had just entered the room.

  “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you,” a guy’s voice said huskily as one of the people locked the door behind them. I could see two bodies pressed against each other and hear the sounds of wet kissing and moaning. I made a face.

  Yup, it was definitely Jake and Tiffany. It was a good thing that I remembered their secret in that split second or else the couple might have thought that Colin and I were just like them—sneaking into the janitor’s closet every free period to make out.

  I didn’t realize I was still pressing my hand against Colin’s mouth until I felt something wet on my palm. I immediately took my hand away and turned on him, uttering, “Ew—” I was able to stop myself though, before I could say another syllable, and waited as the couple paused in their rigorous make out session.

  “What was that?” I heard Jake whisper. “I thought I heard something.”

  “Maybe it was a rat,” Tiffany’s voice sounded dazed.

  “I still feel like it was a mistake for you to tell Seven about this—about us.”

  “Baby, it’s fine. Everyone tells Seven their secrets. She hasn’t spilled anything to anyone.”

  I could imagine Jake scowling as he said, “How would you know? She’s not a psychiatrist. She’s just another teenager like us. She could easily tell somebody—”

  “And you, pretty boy, should just stop worrying and kiss me already.”

  He hesitated and then I heard Jake chuckle and say, “Whatever you say, ma’am.”

  I let out a barely audible sigh of relief. Once I was sure that Jake and Tiffany were too involved in their world to notice us, I turned on Colin and whispered right in his ear: “I can’t believe you licked my hand!”

  Colin grinned in the semi-darkness at me and said in an equally low voice, “What I can’t believe is that these two are actually a thing.”

  I stared at him for a moment. “Wait, what? You didn’t know about this?”

  He shook his head and shrugged, asking, “Should I?”

  I was more than slightly stunned. How could he not know about this? I thought back. I was pretty sure I wrote about this secret in the black notebook—in the first page, to be exact. And seeing how long it’d been with him, he should’ve read about this already.

  That is, unless he didn’t sneak a peek…but I would’ve bet my life that Colin wouldn’t have been able to resist.

  “Well…” I said, “didn’t you read it in here?” I pointed at his jacket pocket, where he’d slipped the black notebook in.

  At first he looked confused, and I wondered if perhaps he hadn’t actually peeked inside the notebook, like I thought he did, but after a minute of silence, he replied, “I, uh…I didn’t reach that part yet.”

  I furrowed my eyebrows and shrugged to myself. He probably didn’t read it page by page, I thought, or maybe he just skipped some parts.

  After a few moments of listening to Jake and Tiffany eat each other’s faces, I found myself staring at Colin. Slivers of light pierced through the glass window and in between the cans of paint, cast shadows across Colin’s face. I realized he was staring at me too.

  The small amount of light made his eyes glint and for a second I imagined him being the Cheshire cat from Wonderland and I was Alice, about to embark on a dangerous adventure in the dark forest.

  “This is like listening to porn,” he whispered to me. I snickered and quickly covered my mouth with my hand in an effort to drown out the sound. I lightly pushed him by the shoulder and gestured for him to be quiet. He merely grinned at me.

  Finally, after what seemed to have been an eternity, the bell rang and Jake and Tiffany detached themselves from each other. Breathing heavily, Jake said, “I’ll see you later, babe.”

  “Bye,” Tiffany said, giggling.

  The door clicked open and Jake left the room. After ten minutes, Tiffany did the same. Colin and I slowly got up from our hiding spot, our knees aching from how long we’d been crouching on the floor.

  “Finally,” Colin said, stretching his arms and yawning. “I thought that would never end.”

  “We are in so much trouble,” I said nervously, pacing across the room. “We just skipped an entire period of calculus!”

  “Relax,” he told me complacently, “Mr. White’s probably only going to give us detention.”

  “Only detention?” I asked him incredulously. “I’ve never been to detention!”

  “Don’t worry, alright? Detention’s not going to eat you. It’s just forty-five minutes in a classroom where a teacher’s supposed to watch over you and you’re not supposed to talk. It’s really boring but it beats suspension hands-down.”

  I dragged a hand down my face, knowing there was nothing I could do about it. I was also still pretty bummed about the fact that I’d failed to take the black notebook back—again—but I just sighed and reached for the door. “Come on, if we don’t hurry up, we’ll be late for our next class.” I opened the door, blinking at the sudden light. Colin stepped out along with me and I was just about to rush to my classroom when he held me back by the arm.

  I looked back at him in surprise. “What?”

  “One last thing you have to do as my slave,” he said, pulling me closer to him. He took something from his pocket and raised it above our heads. It was his phone. I looked up at it at the same time he said, “Say cheese.”

  I told myself to ignore the fact that the sides of our heads were touching, almost as if we were a couple leaning against each other, and obliged, “Cheese.”

  There was a sound of the camera taking the picture and then Colin pulled away from and went, “Alright, you’re free to go.”

  “What was the picture for?” I asked, trying to stifle the smile that was tempted to creep up my face.

  “Think of it as a souvenir,” he said, smiling softly at me, “of the day when you were my slave.” With that, he turned on his heel and jogged off to his next class.

  I stared after him in wonder. “He really is a free spirit,” I said to myself before heading to my own class.

  ***

  Colin was right: Mr. White had given us only detention for skipping classes, and a warning that if we did it again he’d be forced to give us a heavier punishment.

  He was wrong about it being only forty-five minutes, though. Apparently, that was only for ordinary school days. Since it was already spring break, we were to have detention for the whole morning tomorrow.

  I sighed as I fumbled for my keys and fitted them through the hole. I used my shoulder to push open the front door, which creaked in its familiar tones. When I turned back to lock it again, I could hear the sound of a cooking show on the TV.

  “Mom?” I called, padding over to the living room. A chef expertly tossed ingredients into the pan, one of them being strips of bacon. At the sight of the sizzling meat, my stomach started grumbling.

  I glanced at the half-full glass of juice on the coffee table and reached for the remote to turn the TV off. “Mom?” I called again, but there was still no answer. I looked around. It all seemed so empty without my mom’s presence around.

  I dropped my bag by the couch and went to the kitchen, hoping to see her busily cooking while trying to keep her marked territory spotlessly clean, but I only spotted the burning meal left on the stove. Waving away the smoke, I hurriedly switched the flame off and took the pan away.

  That’s odd, I thought, as I placed the burnt pan in the sink to cool off, Mom wouldn’t have left it just like that.

  Worry hung on my back like a parasite as I went off to search for my mom. I made my way around the house, checking the rooms, but she wasn’t in any of them. I walked down the hall and towards the bathroom, but the sound of someone retching made me pause. Disturbing sounds of splashes followed afterwards. I swallowed with uneasiness.

  “Mom?” I asked uncertainly as I stepped closer to the closed bathroom door
. I knocked first, but there was no verbal answer. I pressed my ear to the wood and listened. Someone was definitely puking on the other side of the door, and I was afraid that that someone was my mom.

  I started knocking more urgently. “Mom! Are you okay in there?” When she didn’t answer again, I twisted the knob and pushed the door open. I looked down and found my mom bent over the toilet, holding back the strands of her short black hair with shaking hands.

  I watched as she retched even more into the bowl and the sight made me want to empty my stomach as well. She pulled away, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand and taking deep breaths. I ran over to her just in time as her eyes rolled back in their sockets and she fell. I caught her in my arms before she could hit the floor.

  “Mom! Mom!” I shouted frantically, panic clouding my thoughts, “Mom!”

  Entry 10: Plan H – Reverse Psychology

  Date: March 25, 2013

  I weaved my fingers together. I unwove them and ran them through my hair. I cupped my hands over my nose and mouth and let out a shaky breath. I weaved my fingers together again.

  I subconsciously glanced up at the clock for the fifth time and saw that it was four twenty-five in the afternoon. One minute had passed from the last time I checked. It had been fifteen minutes since the ambulance had pulled itself in front of the hospital and brought my mom in a gurney, but it felt more like an hour.

  I was seated on one of those uncomfortable chairs placed out in the white halls of the hospital, and just two seats away from me was a woman hysterically crying. I had no idea if something terrible had already happened to her or maybe she was just really, really worried, but I certainly didn’t want to face whatever was about to come alone just like she was.

  I reminded myself that I’d already called my dad and that he said he would be over right away. That reassured me a little.

  After a minute or two of more restlessness and sickening anticipation, my dad finally arrived. He was still clad in the blackish-gray suit—the one with the pink pinstripes that my mom and I got him for Christmas two years ago—which I saw him wearing this morning before he left for work. But now his tie was loosened and the first button of his shirt had been freed.