“I thought I could make it. I really thought I could make it.”
With so many hours left in the day, you’d assume one could accomplish a few easy chores. This would be an incorrect assumption, as four out of five of these chores require abilities that Carey does not currently possess. Yet here she is, rolling up her sleeves and marching into the decrepit living room, with a half-baked plan and perseverance that is slipping by the minute.
From the adjacent doorway, a person she would like to call a friend (though the more appropriate title would most likely be colleague) watches with dismay as she once again throws herself at a task that she is not equipped to handle.
“This is painful to watch. Why don’t you just move on? Find something else to run at headfirst that isn’t a brick wall.”
This suggestion proves less than helpful.
“This whole house is brick walls! Nothing in here is easy, nothing in here is familiar. If I give up on this I might as well pack up and leave,” she gave him a pointed look, “and I am not going anywhere.”
Frank holds up his hands in a placating manner, “Alright, fine. But you know what they say about insanity. If you keep trying the same thing over and over, you’re just gonna end up right back where you started with a few more screws knocked loose than before.”
Carey decides there is no use in continuing this conversation and starts trying to move the stack of old books next to the fireplace, both of which are blanketed with a healthy coating of dust.
The books do not appreciate this.
In a swift movement, Carey is knocked to the ground, which swallows her whole.
Carey lands, for the 12th time today, in the basement. By now you would have thought she would have the foresight to perhaps wear a little padding, or place a crash mat of some kind in said basement. She has done neither, and her landing hurts just as much as it did the first time, which was nearly a week ago.
Frank sighs and makes his way back downstairs with an “I told you so” at the tip of his tongue. He doesn’t make it halfway to the basement door before he hears a series of rampant footsteps, followed by an extremely irate Carey bursting through the door and running back into the living room.
With a running jump she throws herself onto the tall stack of books, and holds on like a buccaneer on a bull. The books thrash and shake desperately, but she holds on. Her fingernails are making marks on her arms, and her face is getting bruised with each twist and flail of the stubborn stack, but she holds on.
Frank wishes this was a new strategy. She tried this two days ago.
Strained, Carey yells, “I have tried to be polite, I have tried to be understanding, I have tried every conceivable tactic under the sun short of burning this place to the ground, what do you want from me?!”
A deep creaking came, as the floor beneath her morphed into a twisted caricature of a mouth. The grotesque form of cobweb saliva stretching across blunt floorboard teeth no longer sent a jolt up her spine. At that point, it was nothing more than an annoyance. The pile of books arched down, trying to shake her off into the maw like one would shake a spider off their hand.
Carey refused to budge. If she was going down again, she was bringing the dastardly books with her.
As much fun as this was to watch, Frank decided his time would be better spent tackling (metaphorically) the garden, which had proven to be significantly less stubborn than the inside of the house.
The petunias bite and the almond trees are a little verbally aggressive if you don’t prune them “correctly”, but some gloves and headphones proved to be a fairly manageable solution. As Frank made his way down the cobblestone pathway just outside the back door towards the vegetable patch, he got a call. He briefly stopped in front of the oregano that had begun thrashing wildly upon his arrival to answer it.
“Hello?”
“Hi, yes, hello, how’s it going? Did you find the box?”
Ah, the box. The whole reason they were here. Frank had briefly forgotten that he had a goal aside from dusting violent shelves and pulling out strangle-happy crabgrass.
“Uh, no, not yet. We’re just uh-,” a muffled crash could be heard from the house, followed by a yell of frustration that seemed to sink below the ground until stopping with a thud, “-trying to power through all the stuff in the way.”
“Oh yeah, sure, sure. Well, let me know when you find it. Good luck to you both!”
And with a click, their frantic employer left Frank to continue his trek towards the “vegetables”, where the bell peppers were trying to twist themselves free of their stocks. Who knows what would happen if they succeeded (Frank knows. They seem to have an affinity for break dancing and breaking the slats on the rickety fence).
Although high maintenance and slightly painful, Frank quite enjoys his job. It requires him to think creatively and solve absurd problems. It keeps him on his toes and entertained, and that’s really all he wants at this point. Beats sitting at a desk or standing at a cash register. Plus, he makes a reasonable living.
Taking out a pepper packet from this afternoon’s lunch, Frank tears off a corner and begins throwing the granules beneath the writhing fruits. The bell peppers gradually slowed down to a gentle sway. When the plants and floorboards and everything in between wasn’t trying to fight him, this was actually quite a lovely place to be. The house, though questionably sound, was quite a marvel. There were many additions added to the charming, old-fashioned three story house, making the already large building feel monumental. It was fascinating to explore when they had first arrived a few weeks ago, and the rooms which the furniture had vacated were nice to take a nap in here and there when needed.
“FRAAAANK!!!”
With a sigh, Frank stood up, put the now empty pepper packet in his pocket, and set off back into the house.
It turns out, while Frank had been meandering in the garden, Carey had taken it upon herself to aggravatedly pace around the one room downstairs where she wouldn’t have to encounter any furniture: what used to be the library. Though, upon finding Carey, she was no longer pacing, she was now laying stomach down on the floor with the top half of her torso in a hole in the floorboards.
“Great, you’re here. Take this.”
Carey flung her arm back in Frank’s direction, nearly propelling herself further into the hole. In her hand she held a box. Nothing truly extraordinary, just a small wooden box with a small wooden lid. No carvings, no labels, just a box.
“Is this what Aaron wanted us to find?”
“I don’t know, but I’m hoping it is, I need to move on to a new job. Something less likely to give me a fractured rib.” As she said this, the hole in the floorboards began to widen, the floor collapsing in on itself around Carey, making her scream and scramble out of the way, narrowly avoiding being swallowed back into the basement, and landing her at Frank’s feet, her back to him. She stared at the floor with disdain.
“I hate this place. I hate it so much.”
“Noted. Did Aaron say what was in the box?”
Laying down, exhausted, Carey responded, “Nope.”
“Did he say whether or not we can open the box?”
“I don’t think he did, no.”
There was a brief pause, followed by Carey reasoning, “I mean, you could call him up. I feel like a box hidden beneath the floorboards would be the thing we’re looking for, but it doesn’t hurt to double check.”
But upon calling Aaron, there was no response. This was pretty par for the course, but extremely inconvenient.
“Well, let’s just go outside and wait for him to call back. I’d like to get out of this death trap as soon as I can.” Carey made her way out of the front door, Frank close behind.
Frank took one step over the threshold, and the house began to shake. He stopped, assessed the situation, and cautiously continued walking out of the house. His other foot wasn’t even fully over the threshold when the roof started crumbling.
Carey was shouting at him to move, but he was hesitant. It seemed like the house was responding to his movements. No, not his movements, the placement of the box.
But this realization came too late, the house was crumbling and he did not have time to put it back. Carey sprinted over and pulled him out of the doorway. They both landed on the ground in front of the house, and the building fell apart where it stood.
What was once a fireplace was reduced to rubble. What were once books and furniture were now buried under bricks and wood. Where a house once towered, there was now nothing but debris.
Right on time, Frank’s phone began to ring. He was so shocked he could hardly manage to take the phone out of his pocket and hold it to his ear.
“…Hello?”
“Hi! Yes, I saw you called. Did you find the box?”
Looking down at the small box in his left hand, Frank saw that it was no longer plain. On the lid, in intricate detail, was a carving of the house, with the words “Key Stone” carved in cursive beneath it. A hardly legible font for such an important distinction.
“…Uh. Yes.”
“Wonderful! Thank you so much! Now, I want you to move the box outside. When you take it out of the house, be very quick about it, because once it is removed, the whole thing will come down. Don’t want you getting crushed!” He chuckled briefly.
“…Wouldn’t the house coming down be something we want to avoid?”
“Hm? Oh no. I just want to get rid of the old thing. I need that land for something else, and you two were a cheaper hire than a professional demolition company. It’s easier just to have you pull out one piece and watch the whole tower fall down than to have a whole team of people meticulously pulling out each piece one by one. Plus, the less people who know about me or my property, the better.”
“Okay. So then, uh, what should we do with the box?”
“Just leave it in the front lawn. Thanks again, I’ll send you your final paycheck by the end of the week!”
Aaron hung up. Frank turned to Carey, “Guess we better find a new job, then.”
“Gimme a few weeks to recover from this one, we have enough money to tide us over. Then we can start the job hunt again.”