"The Blank Book" (Part 1)

by Joseph Linhardt, ©2003

Jake Brinson and Aaron Connell were two typical teenaged athletes. Jake, at fifteen, was athletic, tall, good looking with average intelligence and dark hair. Aaron, who was also fifteen, was shorter than Jake, but equally athletic. Unlike Jake, Aaron had deep red hair that had earned him the nickname “Firebrand” on the football team both he and Jake played on. 

Along with football, both boys enjoyed many of the same things, but the one thing that neither enjoyed very much was reading. Except for their schoolbooks, they rarely ever read anything—not even the Bible despite their professed Christianity. They spent most of their time studying diagrams of football plays or watching their favorite sports teams on television.

These two friends lived in New York City and lived the lives that athletes in high school lived. But, what neither boy knew, was that their lives would be changed drastically and suddenly.

One sunny, crisp September thirteenth day, the two friends were walking down a busy sidewalk that had tall buildings reaching into the sky on either side of the street. School had just let out and they were talking as they walked down the street, when suddenly, Jake stopped dead in the middle of the sidewalk.

“What’s wrong?” asked Aaron, stopping with him. Jake pointed a little way up the busy sidewalk. Aaron looked. He could barely make out a book lying on the sidewalk a short distance away. It was lying near a large blue postal box.

No one was stopping to pick up the book, so Jake walked quickly toward the book, dodging the people busily walking down the sidewalk. In a moment, he reached the mailbox. He picked up the book, looking at it curiously. 

Aaron came walking up behind him and looked, with little interest, over Jake’s shoulder at the book; it had a simple dull red cover, and a black striped border that ran around both sides of the cover. There was nothing extraordinary about the book. Looking for a title, Jake turned the book toward the front, but there was none. He flipped the book to its other side, but there was no writing at all.

“That’s weird,” muttered Aaron. “Check in the front cover and see if the title is in there.”

“Huh, which side is the front?” quipped Jake. He opened the book, hoping to find any kind of information. But Jake couldn’t find anything, not even the name of the publisher. Curious, they flipped through more of the pages, but with the same result. It was completely blank.

This puzzled them both. Why was the book blank? That didn’t make sense. A book was supposed to have a story, or a lesson, or math problems or… well, something written in it, but this book had nothing. It was weird. Neither boy could explain it, but each was feeling intrigued by this, even though there was nothing interesting about the book.

“What are we going to do with this?” wondered Aaron. “There’s no address to return it to.”

“Yeah,” agreed Jake. He thought for a moment. “Well, since we don’t know whose it is, let’s take it to the police station. They have a lost and found there.”

“Good idea,” replied Aaron. “But, let’s do it tomorrow,” he said, “it’s already a quarter to four, and I have to get home before four.”

“Okay. I guess I’ll take it home,” replied Jake, and then added with a grin. “Unless you want it!”

Aaron laughed. They started walking again.

“Yeah, right!” 

That settled, the boys started to walk home. Since they lived on the same block, they could walk and talk together. The topic that dominated their conversation was the blank book, but since they knew nothing about it, all they could do was guess what it was for.

Finally, the two boys arrived at Aaron’s house and went quickly up to his room. Aaron shut the door and turned to Jake, who was sitting on the bed, taking a closer look at the book.

“This is weird,” said Aaron. He sat beside Jake. “This book is totally blank…but why would anyone make a blank book?” wondered Aaron.

“I don’t know,” replied Jake as he flipped another page. “Maybe it’s a diary, or something.”

Aaron shook his head. “Naw,” he said. “If this book belonged to anyone, then there would be an address or name or…well, something. But there’s not.”

Jake thought about that, and nodded in agreement.

 “Let’s take another look,” he suggested. “Maybe we missed something.”

Aaron doubted that, but what else could they do? Jake opened the book again; they looked inside at the first few pages they thought were blank.

Jake almost dropped the book. Aaron’s sudden intake of air was audible. Black letters, printed in neat computer font, were printed on the first pages!

They both gasped and stiffened, their eyes glued to the pages; written on them was a detailed account of what they had just done.

Two boys, Jake and Aaron by name, who never spent time reading books, were walking down a busy New York City sidewalk, when they found a red book, lying by a blue postal box. Curious, they picked it up, and opened it. However, the boys could find nothing written it, not even an address to return the book to. Since they couldn’t return the book, Jake and Aaron decided to take it to the police station the next day…

Continue on to Part 2...

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