Something Special

I was in a hurry. I drank my latte and ate my croissants as fast as I could. I paid, left a tip, and took the first taxi I saw. I had to attend a meeting in 30 minutes on the other side of the city.

After an eternal and busy day, when I was returning home on the bus, I noticed my light brown diary was missing. I searched for it thoroughly in my black backpack but couldn’t find it. I desperately tried to remember where was the last time I took my diary out. “Maybe I left it at the office. I didn’t catch a breath today,” I thought.

The next day, I asked my working partners if someone had found a light brown diary, but no one had it. I searched the box where we placed all the missing objects, but no diary was inside. “It has to be somewhere. If I didn’t leave it here or in my home, then it must be in the café.”

I passed by the café, which was a few blocks away from my home, and asked for my diary. “Oh, the waiter who recently left said that a client had forgotten a diary,” as soon as I heard this, I immediately left the café running.

A tall, skinny man of approximately 60 years was waiting for a bus on a deserted street. I approached the man, who looked at me with fear.

“Excuse me. By any chance, do you have a diary? It is light brown, and I forgot it at Merelo’s Café.” I asked the man.

“Oh!!! I thought you were going to steal me.” The man took a deep breath and took out from his old backpack my diary, but when I tried to grab it, he stopped me.

“Wait!!! I could have looked at what is written in your diary. You know what I’m talking about. You know what I want,” the man raised his eyebrows, and I looked at him as I couldn’t believe what was happening. Was he blackmailing me for a simple diary?

“C’mon, man! I’m tired and don’t want to argue. There’s nothing important in it.” I tried convincing the man, but he still wouldn’t give me the diary.

“Then, I can take a peek at it. If you don’t mind, of course.” The man started slowly to open my diary.

“Wait!!! How much do you want?” I asked him, and he stopped. He closed his eyes and babbled, thinking how much money he could win.

“You know what? I changed my mind. Maybe there’s something interesting in this diary. Something that might be useful.” I gave up and wanted this lame discussion to finish. When the man opened the diary, he was disappointed: he passed all the pages but only found blank pages. There was nothing written in it.

“All yours.” I took the diary from the man’s hand, gave him some money, and got away without looking at him.

I kissed the diary when I arrived home: it was a gift from my grandma before she passed away. “A diary to write your stories and the ideas for them,” I remembered those words well. “Maybe I can write about this,” I thought and opened the diary.