The Note

She was standing on the street corner, waiting to cross the main road. She hated living here. The cars whizzed past, a harsh breeze against her skin, that smell of fuel through her nostrils. It settled around her feet, and it wasn't until the man next to her nudged her and said, ''think you dropped something,'' that she noticed it. She bent down to pick it up, knowing full well she hadn't 'dropped something' as she hadn't been carrying anything, as her fingertips grazed the surface, it took off, blowing in the direction she was going, yet dodging every car. She watched it. 'Strange' she pondered, looking around to see if anyone else had seen it. 

She crossed the road with everyone else, and settled into the rhythm of the busy pavement. As she approached the office and was waiting to cross the final road, a crumpled piece of rubbish appeared in front of her, again. A large lady to her left side shouted at her, ''I think you've littered, pick it up and find a bin, don't be lazy.''  She opened her mouth to defend herself then decided better than to and bent down to pick the litter up. A gust of wind then swept it away, and she straightened up and pretended nothing had happened. Looking around as she brushed her jacket of invisible crumbs, the large lady to the left just glared at her, and she quickly averted her gaze from her.

Fi was thirty two and worked in an office, nine until four in the afternoon Monday to Friday. She wore smart clothes when at work, and wore her pyjamas the rest of the time, unless she was going out for food, or to town. She had her shopping delivered because, well, frankly, she couldn't be bothered to walk around a shop.

She approached her office and by this point, she was more than self conscious of the judgement of others for a Tuesday morning. She hadn't littered, and she hadn't picked up the bit of litter either. As she pulled the main door open, a crumpled piece of paper shot through the gap and presented itself on the 'Welcome' mat. ''That's it,'' she thought, feeling quite angry that this damned little bit of paper was following her around. She tried to take a giant stride forward, to step on the piece of paper, wobbling as she did. She missed it. It moved. Fi glanced back at the door, which was definitely shut, so how did the paper move, there was no wind like there had been? She decided to ignore and pretend to not know anything about it if anyone asked. She confidently powered her way through the open plan layout, past the kitchen, ''morning,'' ''morning Fi'' muffled voices through cups of tea were heard. She found her desk and as she put her bag down to the floor she felt a breeze flick her hair from her shoulder. Fi had long hair which, normally she had in a ponytail. This morning, it was still a bit damp so she didn’t tie it up on the walk to work, with the intention of tying it up when she arrived. She was still bent over, getting her notebook out, but she looked up and around, hoping someone was walking past or there was a window open, to explain the breeze. But of course, there wasn’t. There wasn’t a window open and there was no one around. So what made her hair flick? She fumbled and fell into her chair. She loved her desk chair, it was so comfy, it had supportive lumps and bumps but it also had a massage function you could turn on to massage your lower back or shoulders. Fairly luxurious for an office she thought. Both her hands were flat on the desk, she sat bolt upright, and looked around. Feeling like a meerkat, she peered at everyone, watching them suspiciously. No one here ws causing this she decided, no one else was even aware there was a thing happening, she concluded. Reece passed her desk and asked her if the client was going to finalise today or would it be another five to ten working days. Fi felt her cheeks redden, and hoping Reece wouldn’t notice, she dropped her head, and started to tie her hair up then mumbled something about ‘’hopefully it’d be today.’’ Reece had wandered off and Fi was left sitting at her desk staring at a black screen. She shook her mouse and brought her screen to life. Her desk was tidy, nothing out of place, and everything with a place. She had a pen pot full of pens, even though she would only ever use one at a time. She had 3 rulers, because, well, she wasn’t sure, and she had four sets of post-it notes, yellow, pink, blue and green blocks waiting to have notes written on them. 

She typed her password in and waited. As she sat there, poised for the day, hands on the keyboard, ready to go, eyes on the screen, intently awaiting a prize,  a white, crumpled piece of paper gently landed on the keyboard. 

Fi gasped, then clapped her hand over her mouth, so she didn’t bring attention to herself. ‘’What is this?’’ she whispered. She went to take hold of it and it floated, north-west direction, onto the desk. ‘’For goodness sake,’’ she growled. She grabbed it, she had hold of it. Did she want to open it after all? What if it really was a piece of rubbish that she could just throw… 

‘’It wasn’t just a piece of rubbish’’ she reasoned to herself - ‘’if it was, how was it floating and appearing?’’ Fi didn’t have an answer to that, and she sat quietly to consider the fact it was floating and appearing almost as if by magic. Then she remembered it was in her hand, she noticed it was squirming almost, it was definitely moving and her fingers were still, she was not moving it. ‘Okay, this is really freaking me out now, open it’ she thought, trying to contain her anxiety. She started to unravel it, it was like a ball of string, an onion; it had layers and layers of paper, all crumpled up. Eventually she had two bits remaining. The final bit, and the piece of paper on top. She lifted the top layer off and underneath in excellently neat handwriting it said;

‘ If you don’t ask the question, you’ll never know the answer… Take the chance. ’

‘’WHAT?’’ she glared at the piece of paper, she had so many questions now. ‘Where had this come from? Why had it come to her? What does it mean? Has anyone else had one?’ Reece looked up from his desk and shouted across the office ‘’Deal?’’ Fi glared at him and abruptly said ‘’No’’. So abruptly that Reece got up and came over to Fi’s desk and stood leaning over, staring at the note. ‘’What’s this?’’ he asked, ‘’you tell me,’’ she quipped back. ‘’Have you had one?’’ she asked. ‘’Me? No, I don’t even know what it is.’’ Reece said. He read it over and over, then quietly said ‘’ Wherever it has come from, whoever has sent it knows you’re wanting more from life, and they are giving you permission to go find it, go get it. So, if I were you, I wouldn’t sit here all day, I’d go and change something, go and ask then find the answer to that question you’ve been wondering in your daydreams, don't be scared, go for it.’’ He walked away, glanced back, winked at her, and she knew he was right. She had been daydreaming for years, she wanted to do more with her life, but really didn’t think it was possible. The only person who knew was her mum. Her mum was now buried in the cemetery, so it wasn’t possible for this to have been… Maybe it was her mum, maybe it was that extraordinary mum she had, so out of the ordinary, she sends magic notes at exactly the right time. She googled ‘How to teach English in foreign countries’ and she knew that was her starting to take this chance. ‘Thanks Mum’ she whispered quietly and smiled.