If you’ve ever wondered how much damage a man can do with a pen and a mildly inflated ego, allow me to introduce Martin Keene. Martin wasn’t dangerous. Not in the “mysterious stranger in an alley” way. More in the “accidentally microwaves tinfoil and sets off the fire alarm” way. But fate, apparently, has a wicked sense of humour—because one damp Tuesday afternoon, Martin found a black leather notebook on the number 12 bus. It was wedged between a discarded takeout container and a suspiciously sticky floor patch. A small note on the first page read: Everything you write here will happen exactly as you write it. Naturally, Martin thought this was the diary of someone deeply unwell—possibly an amateur magician, possibly his ex-wife. He decided to test it.
“I will find a $20 bill on my doorstep.”
The next morning? Twenty crisp Canadian dollars, right where the Amazon packages usually sat. Martin’s first thought: Cool.
Martin’s second thought: What else can I get for free?
Within a week, he had written himself a raise, a car with heated seats, and disturbingly perfect hair. He didn’t bother asking why this was happening; Martin had the moral curiosity of a houseplant.
But then he got cocky.
One Friday, he wrote: “Sarah will call me to apologize.”
Sarah was his college girlfriend who once told him his personality was “like a damp sponge.” But before she could call, Martin saw the news: Sarah had died in a freak treadmill accident at her gym.
He rewrote the sentence—crossed it out entirely—but it didn’t matter. She was gone. The notebook had a one-way policy.
Panic set in. Martin tested it again, carefully:
“My neighbour’s yappy dog will disappear.”
Two hours later, the dog choked on a chew toy shaped like a squirrel.
Martin’s hand started shaking whenever he picked up a pen. The temptation was unbearable, though, because he could write anything.
He tried to be good. He really did. He wrote harmless things like:
“It will rain tomorrow.”
“The Leafs will lose again.” (This was cheating—some things were already inevitable.)
But accidents happened. A moment of road rage led to:
“The guy in the silver SUV will get what’s coming to him.”
Cue: SUV vs. runaway cement truck. SUV lost. Badly.
And then, the big one.
His sister, Elaine, called to tell him she’d just gotten engaged. Martin hated the fiancé—thought he was a walking LinkedIn profile. That night, drunk on whiskey and pettiness, Martin wrote:
“Elaine will realize she doesn’t want to marry him.”
The next morning, Elaine was dead. Heart attack. Thirty-three. Perfect health. The obituary called it “sudden.” Martin called it “my fault.”
He decided to destroy the notebook. But every time he tried to rip, burn, or drown it, the pages remained crisp and smug. The final straw came when he opened it one last time and saw something written in his handwriting that he swore he hadn’t written:
Martin Keene will die in a way he never expected.
No date. No cause. Just that sentence.
For weeks, he lived like a man in witness protection—no driving, no cooking, no standing near open manholes. Then one day, while making toast, he choked. On a piece of bread. Half-chewed, ironically shaped like a heart.
His last thought wasn’t Why me? or Help. It was:
God, that’s lazy writing.
The notebook? It was back on the number 12 bus by morning.