A Tale of Two Worlds

I am alone.

The sun gleamed high in the afternoon sky. David floated facedown, pissy drunk in his Society Hill Olympic rooftop pool.

Heaps of burned cash sat atop the firepit. He thought if he could destroy everything he had, he could destroy the throbbing pain he felt in his heart.

“What is the point of all this money now?” he thought.

David romanticized thoughts of drowning himself right there in his own despair and chlorine… He was on the edge and had jumped off of it. A rare bottle of Dalamore 62 that took 100 hours to craft, he had drunk through half of the bottle in a matter of hours.

Soraya… My beautiful Soraya...

Her radiant beauty. Her long, dark, flowing hair. Obsessive thoughts flooded through his mind as he fantasized over her full lips, pale milky skin. Soraya…

David remembered that magical night as if it had happened only yesterday. And the 35 karat, princess-cut, diamond ring he had proposed with…

What is God... He almost thought he was dreaming as he felt a white light and peacefulness closing in around him…

“David! David!” a voice shouted through the water, though he could barely hear…

He felt a warm hand grabbing his left shoulder. He flew up gasping for air, thrashing about in the water. He breathed heavily, gripping the edge of the pool as fresh city air filled his lungs.

“Mr. Benningfield! You gave me such a fright! I am just glad that you are alive!” said Mrs. Middleton. She was a portly English woman who had been his housekeeper since he bought the estate.

“Sir, I am worried about you! I thought you were dead!”

“LEAVE ME ALONE!” David shouted, drunk and angrily... He ran his fingers through his overgrown dark brown hair in angst. The vintage Dalamore stung his forehead as a pulsing migraine arose in his temples.

“No, I am not leaving!” she said with a hearty English accent. “Sir! With all due respect, Mr. Benningfield, you cannot live your life like this! It’s been months since… Well I just can’t stomach seeing you lie out here like this!”

“What is the point of life anyway, Eleanor, huh?” he laughed maniacally, showing his perfect white teeth. He scratched his thick beard that he hadn’t cared to shave in months. He had cancelled all of his business meetings anyway.

“I may be talking out of turn, sir, you’re a mess! You are letting the darkness consume you, again! You are losing weight, you need to eat something besides alcohol! I have prepared brunch served in the main dining parlor. Now I expect you to get yourself cleaned up.” she turned to leave him hurriedly.

____________________________

(2.5 months earlier)

David’s crocodile Ferragamo’s clicked against the glossy white marbled floors as he walked into the palatial foyer. He had just flown back in from Tokyo. His meetings wrapped a couple days early, so he came back to surprise his love, his Soraya. It was a beautiful, sunny day and he could not wait to once again set his gaze upon her magnificent smile.

It was odd that no one greeted him at the entrance. But he figured that she had given staff the day off. He took off his shoes and made his way, casually with excitement, up the winding staircase holding the gold encrusted banister.

Standing in the French doorway, his heart dropped into his stomach. Instead of gazing upon her smile, his eyes met with Soraya in doggy style position. Behind her, working up a profound sweat, was his longtime business partner, best friend Richard Black. In his bed...

They don't even realize I’m standing right here.... What. The. Fuck…

David must have sat down in the doorway for 10 minutes before the two of them realized he was there.

Soraya exclaimed in shock, “Oh fuck! David! I thought you were coming back on Thursday!”

David’s mind went black. He saw red in his eyes. In a sudden upsurge of rage, he charged towards Richard.

“You PIECE OF SHIT!” David hollered. His piercing green eyes emblazoned with golden fury.

He gripped Richard by his shoulders and threw him on the floor. David then slammed Richard’s naked body against the balcony, threatening to throw him over.

“GIVE ME ONE REASON WHY I SHOULDN’T DO IT???!!!” Richard closed his eyes, fearing what David would do next. He had been fucking his fiancé for years, so he decided to take whatever fate he would get at this point...

Taking all of his 6’ 3” & 195 pounds, David slammed Richard’s head into the sliding glass door, instantly shattering it.

“David I’m so sorry! Please, can we talk about this? I still want to be Mrs. Benningfield! I love you, I’m so sorry…” Tears seeped out of Soraya’s eyes like a river.

“YOU LOVE ME!!!?? I lost my entire family! DEAD! And I thought you were the ONE good thing that I had left in my life! AND YOU DO THIS TO ME??!!” David’s voice boomed with wrath.

All those years he spent being a player, womanizing women. Seducing and reducing. Telling them he loved them and never intending on calling back.

How fucking ironic is life that when I finally thought I was truly happy and about to settle down, THIS happens...

The player has been truly and utterly played.

“GET THE FUCK OOUUUTTTT!!!” He screamed at them intensely, with vigor, veins popping out of his neck. His face flushed cherry red with Hellfire. He took their clothes and shoes and jettisoned them over the bedroom balcony.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!”

Regret in her tears, Soraya heard David scream at the top of his lungs as she left his mansion for the last time.

______________________________

“No I just got finished telling you that I'm selling everything! I don't care what you do with it! Get rid of it!” David yelled into the phone at his manager of accounts. “Listen when I speak the first time so I don't have to repeat myself!”

Let it all fall away…

David decided to let it all go. He gave away his Society Hill Mansion to Mrs. Middleton. She was the one who took care of him after tragically losing his family in the accident... She deserved it most. She was right. He couldn’t sit around in his own filth and depression any longer. He felt that money had brought him nothing, but great despair, so he decided that he no longer needed luxury. Even though all of his shareholders and employees thought he was crazy, he decided to part ways with all of his assets.

He questioned the meaning of his life. David spent hours reading books, researching. He found a Buddhist temple in Peru, in a small town called Cañete. With an immensely generous donation, he decided he would live there to practice finding himself, regaining his true purpose in his life of shambles.

“Money has brought me nothing but a broken heart, loss, despair… what is the point of it all?... Who am I ?”

______________________________

Maya had just finished her 12-hour shift at Chestnut Grill. The tips were sub-par and the server pay rate in Pennsylvania was only $2.83, so she literally lived on her meager tips. Chestnut Grill was more professional, but quite a ways away from 22nd & Berks Street. She exhaled with aching feet and legs as the SEPTA bus roared down the cobblestoned Germantown Avenue. She closed her eyes, exhaled, throwing her head back as her day ran through her mind...

Yeah, I definitely can do better... she sighed to herself. She and one other girl were the only two black servers in the restaurant.

“Hey, Maya, are you and Shalesia sisters? You guys look alike!” she remembered Sarah M. saying during the slow lunch shift.

“Why? Because we’re both Black?” She thought to herself, shaking her head.

Finally, she stepped off the 39 Bus, readying herself for the walk home. Her wide almond eyes looked up at the full mooned sky. She didn't know how it was going to happen, but she knew that she had to have hope to make it out of the heart of North Philadelphia.

Maya zippered her jacket, bracing the brisk mid-April’s night air. Her dark, natural curls blowing in the wind. Noticing her shoelace untied, she stooped down. Adjacent to her was an empty lot where she noticed a stray Calico cat that happened to meow, looking right at her. She noticed that the cat laid on top of a heavy duty white plastic bag. Now there were countless stray cats roaming the streets of North Philadelphia, but for some reason this cat seemed different.

“Meeeeooooow!” The cat uttered again, as if trying to tell her something.

Maya’s Grandma Mary was raised in New Salem Baptist church just down the street, but she always taught Maya about spirituality too. Maya remembered how Grandma Mary always taught her to listen for signs from God. Her grandma’s words echoed in her mind, “He will send you a sign, child, but you gotta listen with your heart, not look with your eyes...”

She noticed the plastic bag the cat laid on top of looked like it had something lumpy inside of it.

“This is crazy, now what the hell do I think I'm doing???…” She thought, as she walked into the empty, trash-ridden lot. In disgust, but yet pulled by an unseen force, she moved towards the cat....

With intrigue, she bent down, and peered inside the bag to get a better look. Opening the bag, she saw stacks of cash just sitting there... In sheer shock, she gasped, taken aback. She quickly looked around, scanning her surroundings to make sure no one was watching. Her first thought was to leave the bag right where she had found it. But she had a warm feeling inside.

She heard her intuition say, “It’s okay. Take it...”

Quickly, she stuffed the white plastic bag inside of her black bookbag.

“Oh My Freaking God…” she thought. She ran home and the cat ran with her.

Finally inside the house, she welcomed the stray Calico, giving him food and water. “I’m going to name you Xae the saviour!” She ran up the creaky carpeted stairs and Xae followed her.

Once inside her room, she dumped the contents of the plastic bag on the floor. Her heart raced in disbelief, beating through her chest. In her 21 years, Maya had never seen so much money in one place before! Her heart-filled with intense emotions as tears of pure joy began to stream down her face. Maya jumped up and down with excitement as her tears turned into giddy laughter. She felt as though her heart had been cradled by the hands of God. She heard her grandmother’s voice echoing in her mind,

“God is good Maya, and He always delivers…”

She knelt down on her knees and prayed in gratitude between tears of joy, disbelief, and happy laughter. She could not believe this incredible blessing.

“I thought this sort of thing only happens in movies!!!” Maya cried.

Among the stacks of cash, Maya noticed a small black notebook.

“Why would they leave this here?” She thought. Picking up the notebook, she opened it to a message that read:

To whoever finds this:

I lost everything I thought was of value in life, I tried to destroy everything I had & I was given a lot, but I realized that was futile. Life is fleeting. So I decided to give it all away instead. Please accept this $20,000 as a random act of kindness or pass it along. Write your story in this book and place it in another random spot for another lucky person to find. Or keep it all. I don't care. Money is useless to me now… I have left thousands of bags, just like this one, all around Philly and other cities... I hope you find what you are looking for...

--David