Life; As It Happens: 4 - The Safe

[Cactus]

June 4, 2018, 5:48 pm
W 107th Avenue and West End Avenue
Bloomingdale, New York City

Michael Schultz looked around the room with dismay. His skin crawled, and everything about this felt wrong. Of all the places that he wanted to be after a long day of work, this sat around the bottom of the list. In a perfect world, he would have been in and out in under a minute. Unfortunately for Michael, he didn't even know where to start. Swallowing his pride (and he hoped no other wayward bacteria), he asked for help.

"So where are we talking? Your desk? Your closet...?" He couldn't resist a jab. "Ed, bud... you're a slob."

As the well-built twenty-something stood in the centre of the small room, phone to his ear and a disgusted look on his face, Michael Schultz had to remind himself that not everyone was as anal-retentive about neatness as he was. And yet...

"Damn, man. This is nasty."

On the other end of the phone that Mike was holding up to his ear, his roommate Ed Tough was giving him the third degree about the fact that it was his room, that it was more clutter than grime, and that it wasn't that bad. Truth was, Mike was only half listening. The smell of old clothes and someone else's domain wasn't much to his liking, and since he'd only ventured there in search of a particular USB cable for his laptop, he preferred to make his stop as quick as possible.

"Fine... yeah, I'm sure I'll find it. If not... what, half an hour? Great. Alright, later."

Ending the call, Mike made a mental note that as soon as he found this cord, he was opening a window, maybe cycle the air a little. Then he'd head back into the living room to light a few candles.

After that, probably take a shower. Fuck, this room grossed him out.

Ordinarily Mike would have let Edward's room sit as it was, but in this particular instance, he didn't really have a choice. Ed was more of a technology guy than Mike was, and when he'd brought the hard drive with the latest work presentations home with him, he'd totally blanked on the fact that it required a special kind of cable that older laptops didn't accept. To plug it in, he'd need an adapter. He wasn't even sure what a 'Thunderbolt' cable was, anyhow, but Ed had thankfully been all over it.

Technology annoyed him about as much as clutter. Maybe even a bit more.

As he opened the desk drawer of Edward's desk, Mike's mind went over the events of the last couple of weeks. He'd been incredibly fortunate to land a pretty sweet internship directly out of university, and so when they'd summoned him in to the board room one Thursday afternoon for a meeting with some of the senior vice-presidents, he'd been overjoyed to learn that they were offering him a permanent position. Higher pay, full benefits, and the opportunity to join a well-established team? This was exactly the kind of thing that Mike had been angling for. His hard work had paid off in spades.

More money, of course, meant more disposable income and maybe a nicer apartment somewhere, but Mike had held off. He didn't want to spring that upon his friend. Ed was still finishing off the final year of his own education and Mike had promised him that he wouldn't move out until he was finished. The two had become pretty close over the past couple of years; with what Mike had learned about Edward's history and background, he felt a strange sense of almost fraternal responsibility for the young man. The two didn't always see eye to eye, and Edward was way more in touch with his feelings than Mike figured he'd ever be, but they'd had some wild nights and ridiculous adventures through university. Not to mention, Ed was the kind of guy who'd drop whatever he was doing to help out a friend. Those kind of people were worth holding on to.

"No cords in here, but a... is this a plate?"

Mike closed his eyes and felt himself die a little inside as he shut the drawer. It looked like a clean plate, but why...? No. Some questions were better left unasked. Moving his search to the computer area of the desk, he gently moved Ed's monitor back to look behind it. There were a ton of cables behind the monitor, but nothing that looked like what he needed. Dammit.

Disposable income. That was another reason he'd justified his decision to keep living with Ed. It wasn't an emotional decision, it was a logical one. Rent in New York City wasn't cheap, and the longer he got to split everything with someone, the more he could save, maybe the more he could chip away at his student loans. With the money he'd be starting at, if he lived frugally for a little while, Mike figured that he could pay the vast majority of them off in no time.

At this point, he wistfully thought to himself, it might be easier to just trek out to the store and buy this damned cable. The nearest store was more than halfway back towards work, so it wasn't exactly an optimal solution. Continuing on, his search brought him over to the television that Ed kept in his room, but it quickly became apparent that he was going to come up empty over here, too. At this level of frustration, he'd usually head over to the kitchen and crack a Corona, but he was trying to cut back on the drinking since starting a true nine-to-five. Where would this thing be?

Glancing around the room, Mike got down on his hands and knees and looked underneath Edward's bed. There was a space there, big enough for a Tupperware container, or a suitcase, or...

"A safe?"

Okay, now that was weird. Why the hell would Ed have a safe? Their neighbourhood wasn't that bad. Living in the student district of town had its advantages, and aside from the odd mugging or car break-in, things were pretty good. Mike's curiosity was piqued. Being very much an advocate for people's privacy, he was never one to go snooping through anyone's things. Thanks to an unhinged ex-girlfriend, he'd been on the other side of that before, and it wasn't fun. Of course, this wasn't an ex snooping through his cell phone or a boss going through an employee's emails. This was: why the hell did his roommate have a hidden safe?

Forgetting for a moment about the computer adapter, Mike held his breath as he moved a bedsheet away from the half-covered safe. The door was ajar, his roommate obviously not caring to close and lock it. With a little trepidation at what he'd find inside, Mike reached out and opened the door all the way.

Inside of the small mini-safe, there were only a few items, and most of them made sense. Mike glanced past some immigration papers, a student visa, his Canadian passport, but what really intrigued him was the small silver case that sat near the back of the safe. Looking to be about the size of a textbook with triple the depth, Mike fished the case out and held it in his hands. It wasn't heavy. Seemed like there were a few things inside of it, but it was hard to tell what those things would be.

"Am I really this fuckin' guy?"

He pondered it for a moment. Mike felt a little slimy. If there was some sort of crazy sex implement within, he was going to feel very, very disgusting and that shower would quickly jump to the top of his list. Complete with a beer. No, better yet? A shower beer. Ugh. He shuddered. Better just get this over with.

Clicking open the tabs of the case, he flipped the lid open, and instantly all of the levity went out of his mind, quickly being replaced by an emotion that surprised him as much as it jolted him. He certainly didn't feel disgusted by the contents of his roommate's safe. No, this was a whole different beast all together.

"Son of a bitch."

This was anger.

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