The Notebook

Renada rubbed her forehead. The headache refused to leave, even with six aspirin consumed in an hour and a half. She considered the half-filled bottle containing the little button pills.

Should I take another two already? It could be dangerous taking so many so close together.

Just then another sharp pain incised her right temple, zipped through her eyes and, like a bolt of lightning, exited through her left ear. She jerked the bottle from its place and forced the lid off. Four small white cakes fell into her palm. They were tossed to the back of her throat and washed to their destination without any further deliberation.

The source of the migraine, Renada knew. It was the fifth time in three days that Robert had just dropped in for an unexpected visit that quickly turned into a two-hour harangue about her trying to understand and just do things his way so that 'it would all be so much easier.' He never bothered to define what "it" was nor what was supposed to be so difficult. But he was adamant that his way of handling things, which he conveniently never defined, was the easier way.

There were the accusations that she was not trying to get work to keep up her end of supporting herself. She wondered how, even if she could find the copy of her old resume and the disk on which she'd stored it, that she could possibly clean it up and find employers to whom it could be submitted with Robert breathing down her neck and creating so many disruptions. This argument was not logical.

It was the fourth day that she had found him doing unrequested yard work and weeding that required four hours of yet another type of 'visit.' She sighed.

"You know I have a gardener, Robert. You hired him. Why not let the gardener do his job? It's pretty silly to waste all that money and time that could be spent doing something much more constructive."

Her argument was logical but negated by his return and the routine repeated.

She wistfully looked at the stack of textbooks on the farthest corner of her desk and the neat sheets of notebook paper. She'd enrolled in several classes, unbeknownst to Robert, in order to rebuild her scholastic records and brush up on current trends in her former area of expertise. So many of his visits were on the day before or the day that the assignments were due that now all of them were late. She knew, although she knew the material quite well, she was destined to fail the classes or drop them because she was so far behind. She batted her eyes slowly and she turned away from the visage of the impossible class assignments.

Adding to her dismay was how some of her projects simply disappeared overnight. They were small things to the ordinary person but they also spelled freedom and a step into the outside world again. But the projects disappeared and only reappeared either the day that they should have been submitted or else the day after.

How could that happen? I'm the only one here. True Robert has a key, but I lock all of the screens and there are no signs of broken glass anywhere.

"What's this?" She noticed Robert's notebook on the corner of the floor near the door. It was unlike him to leave things during or after his visits. She was curious. She went to the door and picked up the small pad.

Slowly she opened to the first page. She stared at the page in amazement. She turned to the next page. She snatched the next one and the next and the next until she reached the end of all pages with writing on them.

Each page had the date written in the top right-hand corner. Beneath was a list of things to do. On each page, somewhere along the top of the list was the word "Renada" in bold capital letters.