The story begins with the question for a person who is not me, whether I could do something I cannot, at a time when it’s not yet my time.
Your disappointment is great when you see that the book you just bought is only partly filled with written pages. The other pages are white, empty. You secretly peek in the back to see how the story ends, but that’s not known yet. The thing you have in your hands right now is an incoherent collection of short stories. And they aren’t even original stories, but seem like weak imitations of classics, like The Picture of Justin Poels, 1996, Justin’s Adventures in Wonderland, The Man in the High Apartment, and A Study in White. This book is made up of all the words that have been read and heard, but were never spoken.
The book turns out to be a magical book, because as soon as you want to read the white pages, the words appear. You feel like reading the sentences that want to appear in the empty spaces on the pages that are still unwritten. Black ink makes words readable, and you decide to help write the book that is the story of my life. You complete my sentences, you correct my stories, and sometimes you write the words with my own blood, when you, intentionally or unintentionally, hurt me. The page you’d eventually tear out will always leave a hole in my heart.
Words are put to paper, and look what has become of me. I’m there, but I’m not there yet. Being and Nothingness. You are, and I’m not, not yet. I’m an unfinished book, a story that’s still a work in progress, but that should’ve been handed in already. Our growth in being-human sometimes has a deadline. Sometimes we aren’t good enough yet, and we aren’t ready for a new chapter. You ask me something that I don’t know the answer to, that I don’t dare to know the answer to, and you turn the page to a new story.
When you want to read the story A Study in White, you are surprised to see that the pages are actually white. You can’t seem to see the words that were never written by me, words that only a few will ever be able to read, words that perhaps no one will ever be able to read. I’m an open book, but closed. And before you’ve finished me, the book is closed by you too. You’re angry, sad, disappointed, hurt. I’m a closed chapter in your life, rated with a mediocre review.
The story ends with the question for a person I could’ve been, if I could’ve done something I never did, at a time when my time is up. The white pages at the back of the book will never be used.
This story was written in March 2023 for a writing competition with the theme ‘Which book are you?’ I’m a book of collected stories of everything I have and haven’t experienced. It would be too much of a coincidence if the length of my life were exactly the same as the length of the book that I am. Blank pages will remain at the back, for those who wish to complete the story.
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