Notebook Novels & Stories

There were three shelves. The top shelf h⁠ad a stack of flat, serious‌ looking h‍ard drives. The middle shel‍f had a‌ row of‍ notebooks, all bound in the same gray leat‌her. The bott⁠om shelf had a bulky sa‍tel‍l‍ite phon‌e⁠ and a⁠ small, heavy lockbox. I reached for the notebook in⁠ the middle, the on‌e⁠ tha‍t looked most used. I opened⁠ it.

Levi told me flatly. Nodding obediently, I gave a faint smile before turning around and exiting the office, shutting the door behind me softly. Once I was at my desk, I carefully placed everything on it and took my seat, picking up one of the notebooks, admiring the feminine look and newness of it. "Why would he have a purple butterfly notepad with a black ribbon tied onto the front cover?" I questioned myself curiously as I stared at the notebook, wondering about his weird taste. But I quickly pushed aside those thoughts, and instead focused on work, not wanting to waste time.

Was it perhaps? There was a flash of discomfort a tiny crack in her well-planned triumph. The notebook. That fucking journal. It was a liability as well as an idiotic childish thing full of Ivys innocent ideas and observations. It included information on Sloans whereabouts schedule and secrets. the very things they were attempting to reveal.

I said, touched despite the emotional chaos still swirling inside me. “And this,” he added, offering the notebook. Seeing it up close made it even more beautiful — rich brown leather, smooth edges, and my name engraved in gold across the front. I took it carefully. I had already guessed it was a planner of some sort, but the weight of it in my hands told me it was something special. When I flipped it open, the truth hit me: A planner specifically designed for lawyers. Case summary pages. Hearing schedules. Pre-trial notes. The works!

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Then I go upstairs. Her office door is open. She's at her desk, writing something in a notebook — actual pen and paper, which I've noticed before and which I now understand is not an affectation but a security habit; handwriting doesn't exist on a network, can't be intercepted, can't be hacked. The notebook is black leather, unmarked, the kind you buy at a stationery shop for cash and never let out of your sight. She glances up. "Close the door," she says.

He looked at her for a moment. The desk was hers in the specific way that tools became theirs to the people who used them correctly—the specific angle she held the notebook when she was thinking, the two pencils always parallel at the top right, and the way she read research papers by printing them rather than reading on screen and annotating in the margins in a handwriting he had never been able to fully decipher.

She notices a little book under the scattered documents. She opens the first page 'Drago Morningstar' is written on it, strange name, she thinks. She opens the next page 'Nightmare' is written on it. The word catches her attention, " Nightmare" she mumbles. "Nightmare" Rachael mumbles. A little force bends the air around the table as breeze brushes some documents to the ground. Suddenly, the book starts to flip pages by itself and Rachael panics. She runs to a corner of the office and looks in fear .

I was planning on waiting anyway. I had left my phone on the coffee table next to his laptop. When I began looking around, I saw that the notification light was blinking. I reached out to take it. “Had someone called?” “No. I think you had a message though.” Hiro-san replied. “I did not check.” It definitel was a message and it had surprised me enough to make me sit straight up on reading it. “It’s from Hikaru-nii.” “Hikaru?” Hiro-san stopped what he was doing and looked at my phone as I opened the message. There were just two words on the screen-

I give him a slow, deliberate smile and a sharp wink. I’ve got this, husband. Konstantin stares at me for a beat, his hands resting flat on the table. A dark amusement flickers in his eyes, though his face remains stone. He leans in just an inch, his voice washing over my ear. “What is the notebook for, zhenshchina?” “Just some notes, Mr. Morozov,” I murmur, keeping my eyes fixed forward as the projector screen flickers to life. “I like to keep track of the details.”