Scavenger hunt

Dust clung to the swirls, suspending themselves in the light. Golden sliver of a perfect afternoon piercing through the heavy, royal purple, velvet curtains that hung, like a tattered wall in front of the large picture window.

Her eyes locked onto the smoke. Twisting and coiling upon itself, rising within the blade of light, stabbing the ashtray. Now centered where the kettle used to be, on the hastily abandoned tea tray clinging to the front edge of the oversized office chair. Tea still dripping off of the overturned kettle on the floor and from where it had fallen, down the front of the chair, like a miniature cascading waterfall. It formed a tiny, perfect little tea pond on the vintage hard wood floors.

Her nose was welcomed by familiar smell of yesterdays gone, and suddenly all the years away disappeared. She was there.

Home. It had been a long time.

The dirty beige, overstuffed leather chair, full of tea tray, tea, and other assortments of tea time accessories; was framed by the oversized picture window, reminded her of something out of an old Hitchcock movie. The light and heavy shadows, perfect angles, a sharp contrast. Ridged, heavy wooden tray offset by the placement of tasseled pillows and vintage newspaper.

Flopped over one arm rest, was the deep, red sweater she’d been told to expect to see it. She was surprised that it appeared bright and clean, no dust.

Over the other arm, was Artie’s infamous little black notebook, face down, open. Thick dust, like waves of a sand dune, running the length of the well-used book. Somehow, it was still perched upon the arm of the chair, as though it had just been placed there only moment ago and briefly been forgotten, and the chair still expected them to return.

The heavy dust upon its spine argued otherwise.

Then again...

Clearly, someone had been here only moments before. Cigar smoke weighed sweet and heavy in the air. Mmm. Mixed with warm leather and sandalwood. She glanced around the long, narrow room, taking it all in. There was nothing to indicate who had been here or where they had gone in such a hurry. Or why.

Her eyes spanned the rest of the large, posh looking, office rectangle. There were several yellowing stacks of aged and wrinkled towers of withering importance sprawling the length conference table. Tucked into the dusty corners beyond this table, like tiny eruptions of bright island forestry, tall, silken flowers mixed with greenery were reaching out to the room, as if begging for help, under a blanket of cobwebs and dust.

Somewhere in the distance, on the far side of the room on the floor, she could hear a the heavy chatter of a telephone starting to ring. The sound muffled and obscured by years worth of contracts and bylines.

In an instant she was yanked violently back to this moment, shaking her head then darting from the darkened doorway, to the other side of the room where she heard the noise.

Still ringing.

“Oops. “

“Excuse me.”

“I’m sorry” she murmured beneath her breathe to the office furniture as she fumbled and grunted past, becaming aware of the full scope of her clumsiness as it unraveled.

Behind her, a perfect cascading parade of chaos, like dominoes lined up on there end, everything she touched came toppling down one after another. Filling the the spaces she traveled through.

First, the round file by the door tipped over, rolling to the side. Slowly and (seemingly) deliberately vomiting its contents like trash rainbow onto the floor. With the clamor of the garbage can, came toppling over a long sexy floor lamp. It crashed through the dinosaur of a computer monitor buried under a thick, gray snowdrift of dust. Bringing the whole thing crashing. The old monitor dragging with the old printer behind it, as well as the old and yellowed roll of perforated paper that fed into it.

All of that somehow caught the delicate chord of the tiny desk lamp, shaped like a cartoon mouse, launching it end over end into the empty space above her like a wild trapeze artist, in a perfect arch and through the giant picture window. For a single breath of time she froze and so did the window, her gaze locked to the lamp shaped hole it left. Watching the glass spider web and crack slowly clear to the top. The tension in the air released as she pulled air into her lungs and it cascaded to the floor in a sparkling heap. Causing her to miss her step.

Airborne.

The phone was still ringing.

She grunted and strained to release herself from the center of the bookcase where she suddenly found herself. Rump first, her knees in her armpits. Feet wriggling in the air.

She pulled herself out of the small legal library, of which she had landed, and dusted off her jeans, reaching for the phone on the floor. Which was now conveniently buried under half a mile of old conference room paperwork.

Finally, she grasped the receiver in her hand.

“Hello...” she said, with some trepidation, still trying to catch her breath.

There was a agonizingly long pause before she heard a gruff, but familiar voice respond with only one word....

“Winner.”

The line went silent again with a click.

Staring blankly at nothing, it was a long time before the phone fell to the floor from her ear, with a loud crash against the tile floor.

What did this all mean?! Was it all just a big waste of time?

She was stunned. It was finally over, she won.

Her mind went racing a million different directions. It seemed too easy.

Slowly, she pulled herself from the mess on the floor before her. Wow. Her eyes spanned the room, once more. She could no longer see the red sweater or the notebook.

Bummer.

That would have been a nice bonus to take with her. Gathering her wits about her, she moved toward the still open door. She was just glad to be getting out of this place once and for all.

So glad, indeed, that she almost missed the big yellow envelope taped to the back of the door she had came in, but it caught her eye with a flicker in a last second and she climbed past.

She paused. Scrawled in block print was her name and these few lines.

Maggie May,

saved the day

Wanted to see ya

But couldn’t stay.

-love Artie

Artie. Of course.

The aged tape split upon contact, releasing the overstuffed envelope into her hands. Her fingers trembled as she broke the seal that held the flap, pushed it open and peered inside.

“So that’s what twenty grand in an envelope looks like”

Her heart suddenly wanted to escape her chest.

Trying to contain her excitement, she giggled. She closed the envelope carefully. Tucked it hastily into the worn backpack she carried slung over one shoulder, and clambered over the disarray. She paused for just a moment and looked back upon the room. One last look at the walls that had built her. She would never see these walls again.

All she could do was laugh as she left, wondering if she would ever be able to explain to Kennedy the odd night she had just had. Later he’d laugh and hold her hand as she tried.

Probably not, she thought. Its not as though anyone else would ever even ask. She suspected it was for the best. Nobody would really miss her here anyway. Nor would she miss them.

She was ready for a new life adventure, what was Artie’s deal, anyway?! Where did he disappear to all those years ago?

She smiled.

Maybe she’ll never know.

She disappeared into the dark and just like that, she was gone.

- end