The Miraculous Archive

Chuck gave us a list of 10 titles to work with... I chose above title and below is what I did with it! Enjoy!

It was impossible.  

Totally and completely.

How as she to fix this problem was beyond her?  

Tess opened her PO Box and sighed at the envelopes waiting for her inside the tiny dark hole, knowing they were bills she had to pay.

She hated her life.

There wasn’t enough money in her life.

By the time she paid her rent, bought her food and paid her bills, she didn’t have any money left to put away for savings… and she was working full-time.

Pulling the envelopes out she found they had been hiding a parcel pick-up card.  It was red – this meant, it needed her signature – so she locked up the little door, pulled the key out and made her way inside the place.

It was starting to rain when Tess got home with the large box in her car.  As she pulled into her car port, she looked over at the opened parcel in the passenger seat and wondered exactly what was in that box, and who in the hell had sent it to her.  So, instead of waiting for the rain to get heavier, she got out of the car, after grabbing her stuff and went inside where  - within minutes – the light rain turned into a downpour.

“Well, at least this was a good thing for once today.” She groaned turning on the kettle. 

Once she made herself some coffee, she sat down, paid the bills (and was once again broke for the month) and then looked at the unexpected parcel.  She inspected the wooden box, wondering how to open it, when the lid slid off and a large blue book was exposed.  It wasn’t much to look at – in fact she thought it was kind of ugly – but it was something of a curiosity as she’d never seen anything like it before.  There was a note inside the box:

‘Tess, you don’t know me very well.  We met at a bookstore a few years ago and you said you were curious about the book I was reading at the counter here in San Fran.  Well, I had promised you this book once I was finished with it… now my time has come to hand it onto you. 

If it’s arrived at your postal address, this means I have passed away.  I was suffering from the Big C when you met me but it caught up with me.  This book is called The Miraculous Archive.  It doesn’t look much, but it’s lots of fun – just don’t let it out of your sight!  In the wrong hands it’s dangerous!  
Your friend in this life and the next, Michael.’

She remembered now!  Wow!  It had been around five years since her vacation in the USA, and he remember her?  Well, that’s something!  She hadn’t remembered Michael too well, but then, she had only visited his store in San Francisco once on a stinking hot day to find a notebook to use as a diary and he tossed a pen for a good price and they chatted about this book for around ten minutes and that was it!  She never went back… and he did promise to hand it onto her when he was finished with it.

Tess put down the note and pulled the book from the box carefully.  It felt heavier than it looked as she sat down in her favourite easy-chair, put her coffee on the little stand by the arm and opened it to the first page:  but it was blank.  She turned to the next pag and it was blank as well!  Flipping the pages between her thumb and first finger, she found they were all blank! She just didn’t get how this was going to be an archive if there was shit all in it!  Tess rose from the chair, walked to her tall bookcase across the living room and slotted in next to her other books she considered useless – yep, her textbooks from high school.

Weeks passed and Tess’s life moved on.  She found herself a better job with better pay and for the first time in a long time, she could finally start saving up for something.  She opened a bank account and started saving up for a holiday overseas – her next big thing on her bucket list.

She didn’t take much notice of the big blue book on her shelf as it was empty.  And so, when she scored her first two weeks’  holidays, she found she wanted to do nothing more than give her home a good clean out – and do up her garden too.  She wanted to make her place feel good – as good as she needed to feel when she arrived home each day. Halfway through the dusting, she looked at The Miraculous Archive and found it had a newer look to it – a much cleaner appearance than it did than when she first collected it from the post office.  So, she put down her dusting cloth and pulled it off the shelf and sure enough, the book looked, felt and smelled as though she had just bought it brand new! 

“Woah… this is…” she didn’t want to say ‘miraculous’ in case she was going to jinx it.  On opening the cover, the pages were gorgeously new with brilliant gold-trimmed edges!  She wondered how this book became so … so, “Now what do I do?”

As though it had heard her question, the book gave her the answers: ‘Do with me what you wish… I am The Miraculous Archive, a living entity of information.  Ask me a question about anything and I will endeavour to give you an answer.’

Slapping the book shut, Tess dropped it to the floor!  It landed with a loud thud as she took a step back.  And stared at it with tears filling her eyes, she realised her life could be a success if she asked this book the right questions… 

but could it also lie to her?