Authors: Eve Carter
“Yes, he came with a woman. She was the one who notified me that he had collapsed.” I pointed at the dead guy who was now covered with a dark blanket. I stepped back as the paramedics wheeled the body past the two of us and out to the elevator. One of them gave me a wink as he rolled past, just at the moment the cop looked away.
“And where is she?”
I pursed my lips and snapped my attention back to the cop. “She—”
“Oh, let me guess. She bailed, right?” he interrupted.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “I didn’t get her name or anything.”
The cop noticed the dead man’s clothes still on the chair.
“Did you touch any of this?” he asked, pointing his black ink pen at the clothes.
“No, I figured I had better get downstairs right away, you know, to let you guys in…so I left. I never looked, I just left.” I answered with what I hoped was a straight face and forced myself to look directly at him as I spoke. As soon as he appeared satisfied with the answer, I broke my stare and turned to walk toward the door so he could no longer see my face. On the inside, I felt tense and desperately wanted to take in a long deep breath of air, but I didn’t. I paused at the door with my hand on the knob and turned back to say, “I should get back down to the front desk, officer. So if there’s nothing more you need from me ...”
He scratched a few more notes on that ubiquitous notepad and nodded, then spoke without looking up, “Just don’t leave the hotel. Stay at the front desk. I’ll need one more thing before we go.”
I gave a meek smile to hide the fact that my heart just jumped up into my throat, then quickly slipped out the door. I couldn’t breathe. What ‘one more thing’ does he need? To slap handcuffs on me and throw me into the backseat of the patrol car? My stomach was in knots and my fists were two balls of white knuckles.
The paramedics had already taken the body down, so I was the only one getting on the elevator. I plowed through the elevator doors and leaned up against the inside wall of the elevator car, hoping the firmness of the steel construction would somehow ooze into my body and still my nerves. The second the doors were shut, my lungs exploded with a gush of air. It felt like I had been holding my breath for hours.
When I got back to the lobby, nobody was there. I got behind the front desk and I perched myself on an old worn stool, staring at the restroom door that lay across the expanse of the dreary lobby area. I had picked up my novel from the side office and pressed open the pages to a random section of the book. The paper felt smooth and calming as I passed the palm of my hand across its surface. I wanted to look as normal as possible when the police officer came down from Room 1215. The words on the page couldn’t hold my focus. Instead the large round black and white clock on the wall pulled my attention. The hands on its face seemed to stand still, barely a noticeable movement to be seen, and the thumping of my heart beat was the only audible sound I was aware of in the silent lobby. I wanted the police to hurry the hell up and leave.
The familiar elevator ding startled me. I was so wired with nervousness, I nearly jumped off the stool. The officer sauntered over to the desk and handed me his business card.
“Here’s my card, Miss Carrington. I’ll be in touch with you tomorrow. I’m probably going to need more details on the description of the woman for the report. After I write it up, I’ll give you a call to make sure the statement is correct. If you have any questions, or need anything else, call me at that number.”
I watched the officer until the large plate glass door swung shut behind him. A blast of cold night air blew in before it shut completely, all the way to where I had posted myself behind the desk on my favorite stool. Although it was getting to be summer in New York, the air in the dead of night could still, on some nights, have the sharp bite of early spring. How ironic, 'the dead of the night'. Only a saying like that could come to life at a place like the Greymore Hotel.
The thought gave me a shudder as I leaned my elbows on the counter top and pressed my book flat to the surface. With my head down, I pretended to read. I don’t know who I was putting on this act for. No one was in the lobby. Everybody had left. The Draconian silence of the night was my only companion.
I waited like that, with my head down, pretending to read, for what I considered to be a sufficient amount of time to pass before I dared to retrieve my 'stash' from the restroom stall. I couldn’t even think the words, money, loot, booty or treasure, let alone say them. It was as if it were some kind of prize I had won. I guess I felt it was. To me, it was like winning the lottery, at least that’s what I told myself for the time being, a lottery that could land me in jail. That snake I felt earlier running up my spine was probably none other than the snake from the Garden of Eden who had coaxed me to take the money. And just like Eve in the story of temptation, I took the forbidden fruit
and
the risk that went with it.
I slipped off the stool and glanced around the lobby as I made my way across its emptiness toward my hiding place. My nervousness sharpened my senses as I proceeded, the sense of hearing being the most acute. I heard every tick of the wall clock as I carefully turned the latch on the restroom door and opened it gently. I was like a Ninja, stealthy and with nerves of steel. I prided myself on how confident I was, then my finger slipped on the latch, and it made a loud click that echoed around the lobby. I froze. My heart pounded faster and faster, louder and louder until I thought I could barely breathe.
Fuck.
Forget the Ninja shit. I grabbed the briefcase from the stall and bee lined it back to the side office and shut the door. Alert to any unusual sounds, other than my heart beating out of my chest that might threaten to interrupt my mission. Once safely in the office, I transferred the bundles of hundred dollar bills into my backpack. They barely fit. I tugged hard on my spiral notebook filled with notes from Literature class to make room for the bundles. They settled into the deepest part of the backpack as I removed it. I pulled so hard, I nearly flung a couple rubber band wrapped bundles onto the floor as the notebook finally pulled free from the tightly compacted space. I zipped it shut and shoved it far to the back under the desk in its usual place where I stored it every night. I stood up and let out a deep breath. The backpack looked huge and so obvious, but I didn’t think that anyone would suspect it contained thousands of hundred dollar bills.
I grabbed the, now empty, briefcase and went to the back alley where the hotel had a metal industrial garbage dumpster for compacting trash. I stretched the sleeve of my work jacket down over the heel of my hand in hopes that the polyester fabric would remove my fingerprints. I rubbed the latches and handle the best I could then gave it a toss into the open rusty brown container and turned on the machine, watching the briefcase get swollen by the giant metal monster.
Back at my desk, I glanced at the familiar clock on the wall. Its glass face reflected down at me, holding me captive, incarcerated behind this desk for hours. How was I supposed to just sit here and wait after everything that had happened? It was only four at night. I had another three hours before the morning crew arrived, and my body was still brimming with ‘fight or flight’ hormones and the flight ones were winning the war with my mind. The urge to run raged inside of me like a powerful Ferrari engine waiting to take off. I pushed my hands through my hair and blew out a deep breath in an attempt to calm my shredded nerves. I shoved my literature novel aside and settled in for the torturous wait, wondering what the hell I’d gotten myself into.
When Kathy Reynolds, the day clerk, finally showed up a little before seven a.m., I explained to her everything that had happened, except for the part about the briefcase, of course. I rubbed my temples and feigned tiredness, told her it had been a long crazy night and I just wanted to go home and crash on my bed. I asked her to inform Jerry of all the details and bring him up to speed. Truth was, I was anything but tired. I had a backpack full of adrenaline rubbing up against my back.
Kathy was quite affected by the news. It was a highly unusual event after all. Even though I worked at a hotel that had long passed its glory days and we’d had our share of incidents, such as wild bachelor parties where young guys took sport in trashing the rooms, this was the first time someone had actually died at the Greymore, at least to my knowledge.
With the most casual attitude I could muster, I grabbed my backpack stuffed with bills and slung it over my shoulder as I prepared to leave.
“That looks heavy,” Kathy commented as she eyed the bulges.
“Well, yeah, it’s all my school books. They are heavy as shit.” I gave a nonchalant laugh to cover my guilt and hurried out before the Spanish inquisition could begin.
I flagged a cab and piled into the backseat, finally able to breathe again. I hadn’t realized I had been holding my breath as I hurried out of the building. Instinctively, I raised my hand to my brow, wiping away beads of sweat with the back of it. During the last couple of hours at work, I had run several ideas of what to do with the money through my mind again and again. Besides paying for Grammys treatments I wanted to pay of my student loans. But I couldn’t just go to the bank and pay off the loan in one go. People would ask questions. A record of that much money would raise a red flag with the FBI or the IRS for sure. I would need to pay it off slowly, a little bit at a time, so as not to raise suspicions.
As soon as the bank opened, I would go there to rent a security deposit box. Tell them something like I needed it to safely store some jewelry my ‘late’ grandmother had left me. No one there would know that she was still very much alive. Thinking about Grammy made me realize that as much as I hated it, I would have to lie to her. I would have to tell her I had won the money in the lottery or something like that. That didn’t sit well with me. I had never lied to her before. I pushed out a quiet laugh. What the fuck, look at me. Here I was, all worried about lying to Grammy after I just lied to the police.
Grammy was special, she was family, the one who raised me and cared for me when my own mother didn’t want me. The one who taught me right from wrong. Now I was behaving like her lessons had fallen on deaf ears. Being deceitful to her would be shameful, disloyal, rotten…the list of negative descriptors just went on.
But I rationalized it didn’t matter. That old man didn’t need the money. I was sure he didn’t have anyone who needed it, like a wife, unless he was cheating on her with that hooker. He didn’t look like the type that was married. That’s for sure. My mouth felt dry and my pulse picked up a notch. Oh no, I was working my way down the list of the seven deadly sins, or was it the Ten Commandments? I forgot.
What was I to tell Grammy? I could tell her I got a raise and set up a payment plan with the hospital for her treatments? Nah, telling her that I won the lottery was better. A simple raise would not be enough money to pay for those treatments. They were expensive.
The thought of lying to her made my stomach twist, but I couldn’t figure any other way. The important thing was that she would have the chance to get better. That would more than justify the means… and my path to hell, paved with my good intentions.
As the cab pulled up in front of my apartment, I coped with my misgivings about the money the way I dealt with all of my problems in the past, I shoved them deep down into the back of my brain where my guilty conscience resided and ignored them. I was excited about the possibility that I would finally be able to help the woman who raised me and repay some of her kindness and love. I didn’t want that euphoria to be overshadowed by guilt right now.
As I entered my apartment complex, it was quiet. Time to count the money and divide it into neat piles before going to the bank.
To my surprise, I heard noise coming from the kitchen as I entered the apartment. All the night’s many events had made me completely forget that Joey was staying over. She was sitting at the small wooden kitchen table, drinking coffee while texting on her phone.
“You’re up early,” I said as I plumbed down on a chair.
“Yeah, I have to help my mom pick out her wedding dress.”
“Wedding dress? What number is this one?”
“I know. Can you believe it? This makes number four.”
Joey’s mom was only forty-four years old. She must be going for some kind of record.
“How was work?” she asked, her gazed still plastered on her phone. From her raspy voice and her swollen face, I surmised that she was hung over. Clearly it had been a ‘wet’ night. I switched my backpack to my left shoulder as I peeled off my jacket and hung it on a peg inside the coat closet. I didn’t want to let loose of the backpack for one minute.
“It was okay, except for this guy dying from a heart attack while having sex with a hooker.”
I heard an audible gasp as she released her phone from her gaze. “That’s not funny, Dani. My uncle died of a heart attack.”
“Sorry.” I adjusted the backpack on one shoulder and started down the hallway toward my bedroom. I paused before I got to the door of my bedroom and turned back so Joey could hear me from her spot in the kitchen. “I swear. It’s true. Some old dude died from a heart attack tonight while banging the shit out of a hooker in room 1215.” I walked back down the narrow hallway to the kitchen and stuck my head around the corner and added, “While snorting cocaine…”
Joey rolled her eyes. “And why do you think it was a hooker?”
I took a few more steps into the kitchen. I guess our conversation wasn’t over. I hadn’t counted on her being awake this early and in the mood for a chat. I just wanted to get into my bedroom and deal with my secret stash.
“For one, she was thirty years younger than him, and she was in a hurry to get out of there. What else would she be?” I shrugged. “Plus, I’ve seen her other times at the Greymore, other nights ...
lots
of nights.”
Joey frowned and glanced down. Her long dark pony tail fell to one side, spilling down her left shoulder. Joey always looked beautiful, even first thing in the morning with her hair pulled back. She just seemed to always have that look, the kind of look all the guy’s wanted. “Damn, that must be a tough life. Forced to make a living, screwing old guys, just to put food on the table and then they die on you.”
Anyway, I’m going to bed. Goodnight.”
“What’s with the heavy backpack?” she suddenly asked.
I shugged. “Just school books…heavy as shit.” With that remark, I escaped into the safety of my room and pushed the door shut. I gently pushed the lock on the door so Joey wouldn’t hear the click.
I walked around my bed to the side farthest from the door and dropped the backpack on the small wooden table in front of a wing backed chair that sat in the corner of the room near the window. I unzipped it and dumped all the money out onto the table.
Oh my fucking god. What a sight. Bundles of hundred dollar bills covered the entire surface of the table. Never in my life had I seen so much money. I kneeled down next to the table and grabbed one of the bundles and started counting. There were fifty bills in each. All one hundred dollar bills. When I had finished stacking the bundles in neat rows on the table, I counted fifty bundles. I plopped down onto my butt, sitting hard as I landed. I was staring at freaking two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Fuck. That’s a lot of money.
Feelings of guilt flooded my body, making my blood rush through my veins. I felt like a scorching furnace was roaring inside of my belly, blowing fire out to every extremity of my body. I felt hot in my face, like I was embarrassed or…
I swallowed hard. At least no one could see. I was not supposed to do something like this. After all, I had been raised as a good Catholic girl by Grandma. ‘Thou shalt not steal,’ right?
Exhaustion overrode any guilt feelings that arose. I hadn’t slept since before going to the fight with Joey and Krissy. My mind was beginning to turn into a thick New York style fog. I placated myself with the notion that I was doing this for a good reason. To give Grandma a better life, a longer life.
I found a black trash bag I had shoved in the back of my closet. I stashed the money in there, placing the bag of money back into my backpack.
I glanced at my alarm clock. It was almost eight a.m. Two more hours until the bank would open. There wouldn’t be enough time for a solid eight hours sleep, but I could catch a few winks. I had a long day ahead of me.