While he searched the dilapidated houses for numbers, he continually looked over his shoulder. His shoes crunched over broken pieces of sidewalk as he hunted his destination. He wondered how a deliveryman would find his new home. Would any restaurant deliver to this part of town? He had been told that it was rough, but he had brushed the warnings away like one does gnats on a humid summer afternoon. A dog shot its nose into a short wire fence that bordered the yard to his right. It barked ferociously causing him to stumble.
“Jim!” A voice yelled his name from across the street. Jim looked and saw the round man who had arranged the affordable living situation for him.
There was maybe ten feet of lawn between the street and the old house. Its color was the yellow of a smoker’s teeth; it was streaked with brown lines where water drained regularly and left its stain. At the front of the house, the grass grew in dark, wet clumps and it seemed as if the sun rarely shared its life with the foliage in the yard. A broken driveway ran along the sidewall. It seemed too narrow for any car and ended just past the house as it ran into a forgotten woodpile. The rotted wood was almost black and was stacked as if thrown.
Jim reached the concrete square that acted as the porch and shook hands with Fred.
“Follow me,” Fred said in an upbeat tone that didn’t match the surrounding neighborhood. As he disappeared through the front door, Jim looked to the sky. The gray clouds were blocked by thick menacing branches of leafless trees; old trees that surely existed before the houses themselves.
The grand tour took less than twenty steps. One room, a kitchen, and a bathroom had been built in what might have been a closet before the house was made into three separate apartments. The one bedroom had chipped hardwood floors and was empty with the exception of dead bugs and matted gray dust balls. The kitchen and its appliances were decorated with cracks and crusted food residue. Spider webs adorned the bathroom, but helped cover the water-stained porcelain of the toilet and tub.
With his meager belongings moved from his car to the bedroom, Jim began the cleaning process. Sweat formed on his brow and the dust he knocked off walls and windows stuck to his skin. He cracked a window and felt the evening breeze on his face. The sun had disappeared, and the shadows of a lone streetlight danced across the barren yards and rusted out cars along the street. Jim felt the hairs on his arm rise, and he sensed he was being watched. There was no shade to pull, so he nailed a towel across the window.
Jim used a broom to jab at the cobwebs on the kitchen ceiling. Pieces of the soft tiles fell into his eyes, and he coughed up dust that had found his mouth. Jim closed his eyes and sneezed. As he did, the center ceiling tile fell to the floor exposing a cubbyhole containing a package wrapped in newspaper. Jim carefully pulled the package from its place and set it on the floor. It was the size of a cement block but not as heavy.
After looking at the package for sometime, Jim carefully unwrapped it, exposing a clear plastic bag full of snow-white powder. It looked like sugar, but after a moment Jim realized what he had found. There was a reason it had been hidden, and this powder had value. Jim suddenly wanted nothing to do with the package. He slid away from it as if it were an explosive ready to blow.
There was a whine from the back window. It sounded like the cry of a small animal. Jim wished the whining would stop, but it continued. He reluctantly went to investigate. The screen, well worn and carrying holes the size of golf balls, let in the wind. Jim punched it with his hand, and it fell away from the house. He slammed the window shut.
After an hour of pacing, Jim began to laugh. It was nervous laughter. The package surely had been in the ceiling for months. Its owner was probably dead. This thought felt comforting until he realized the owner possibly lived in the apartment before him. He shivered and was unable to steady his hands. He should have taken out a loan. He should have emptied his account to live uptown. He decided finally to rewrap the package.
As he secured the corner of the newspaper around the plastic, he froze with fear. The date on the newsprint was only two days prior. The owner of the package had hid it within the last 24 hours. Jim shook. The questions flashed through his mind. Would the owner be back? Could he leave it outside? Could he leave this place and be sure his own possessions would still be there in the morning when he could return with Fred?
Jim ran. He burst into the cold night air and scanned the street. The beam of the lone streetlight was swallowed by the night leaving the ground beneath Jim’s feet the color of coal. Earlier he had moved his car up the small drive to unload his things. The silence around him had volume and taunted him as he searched for his keys. He got to his car and dropped his head. A line of old cars was parked on the street with no regard for his driveway. His car was blocked in. He would be driving nowhere until morning.
Back in the apartment with the door and windows locked, Jim scrambled to return the package to its place. His hands shook as he reached toward the cubbyhole. The package fell through his left hand, and he caught the newspaper with his right. The newsprint ripped away and the clear plastic bounced off his shoulder and onto the floor. Jim gasped. The floor was streaked with the white powder. Jim stepped back, and his shoe moved some of the powder with him as he moved. The contents of the package now lay like sand across cracked linoleum mixing with dust and pieces of ceiling tile. Jim could not catch his breath. If the owner returned, he would not find his property intact.
Gripping the broom handle with white knuckles, Jim sat in the corner of the small bedroom. Every light in the apartment was on, but it didn’t keep the night from closing in on him. Jim strained his ears and jumped at the smallest sounds. The house creaked as it settled throughout the night, and Jim could not decide whether he was hearing a door or a window or the wind.
The sound that pulled him from a half sleep was not the wind. It was a thunderous boom followed by a sharp crack. It came from the front door. The lock, Jim thought, was gone. His own breathing became sporadic, and it seemed loud in his ears. He tried to use soft quiet breaths, but his body betrayed him. He panted with fear.
The footsteps across the linoleum were heavy and slow. They stopped and the apartment went quiet. Then the door to the bedroom swung open slowly. Jim rose to his feet pulling the broomstick back ready to attack. Standing in the doorway was a large menacing figure with stringy hair and a gold front tooth. He pointed a gun at Jim’s chest.
“You make that mess?” he asked slowly and calmly.
Jim couldn’t move. He dropped the broomstick and looked to the ground. He nodded and thought this might be his last moment on earth.
“You owe me money, friend.” The man looked to the kitchen then back at Jim. “You hear me?”
Jim nodded.
The menacing figure motioned with his gun for Jim to help him gather up his powder. The large man explained to him as they salvaged half the powder that by running a number of errands over the next few weeks, Jim would pay off his debt.
Several weeks later two detectives in shirt and tie looked at each other as if amused and laughed after they heard Jim’s story.
“Why didn’t you just call the cops that night?”
“Phone wasn’t hooked up,” Jim replied.
“The big guy’s name?” the other detective asked.
“He wouldn’t tell me.”
The two officers swapped another look. Jim heard one detective mumbling under his breath, “These punks do have imagination.”
“I’m telling you the truth,” Jim pleaded. He had called his parents with his one phone call and they were sending a lawyer. They were upset and didn’t believe him. He felt his hands shake and an unfamiliar fear ran through his veins. A fear mixed with disbelief and helplessness.
When Jim had envisioned the dangers of moving downtown, this was not one of them. He felt tears well up in his eyes. He tried to remain composed but an attempt at nervous laughter turned into crying.
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