Saturday morning rolled around and as per our plans, I met Emily for an early lunch at a little cafe in the heart of downtown. We kept conversation light as we enjoyed the pleasant autumn air that hadn't yet reached the uncomfortable chill of an impending winter. Once we cleared our food away, we both ordered a couple hot drinks to finish off our meal and to warm us up for the task at hand.
"Well," said Emily after taking a deep swig of her pumpkin spice latte, "I don't know about you, but Carmen down in Accounting came through for me. Though, I'm supposed to tell you we owe her lunch for it."
"It would be nice to see her again," I said as I blew the steam away from my tea. "I haven't really kept up with her since our initial orientation back when we all started at Quinto. You could have invited her to join us today."
"Oh no, she's talking some place that at least serves wine. She plans to get her full use out of our IOU."
"Okay, well, I guess we'll have to arrange that at some point."
"To be fair," said Emi, her tone dropping with the weight of worry that also furrowed her brow, "she didn't ask this out of desire to drain our purses. It was more like she needed a good drink."
"Why?" I asked, placing my cup down and bracing my elbows against the table as I leaned in.
"She first accepted my request without hesitation, thinking she would be able to get back to me before lunch yesterday. But, I didn't hear from her again until this morning. I thought I was going to have to come to you with nothing."
"How long did she spend on it? Did she just get busy at work?"
"That's the thing," said Emily, leaning in as if we were sharing some sort of conspiratorial secret, "she said she hit a wall right away. No one knew anything and she couldn't find any hint of financial support from Quinto for the charity. She thought she was just missing something and so she kept at it. By lunch time she said she found it to be an affront to her skills that she hadn't tracked anything down yet. To make matters worse, she found one of her coworkers was starting to get a little nosy, asking about what she was doing and, after that, she suddenly felt like she shouldn't be poking around so much."
"Clearly that didn't stop her if you have information now."
"No, if anything it just made her dig harder." Emily flashed a proud smile in honor of her friend.
"That was brave. I hope she didn't get into trouble over this."
"She did eventually find a record of the company's financial support of the charity tucked away. It was poorly named so she thinks that had something to do with her trouble. Anyway, she found that we're footing the first few months rent for the charity. She was able to get the address of the charity's base of operations. That's unfortunately all she could dig up."
"Well considering how much work she put into it, I'm grateful for every bit of it. Plus it is way more than what I found."
"Did you get a chance to talk to Mr. Radcliffe about it?"
"I mentioned Mariska's questions to him on Thursday, but he didn't have much to offer, though admittedly, we got a bit side tracked and I didn't get to really question him on it."
I had planned to be more direct about addressing the charity with Alec the next day by having him look over some questions I expected Mariska to ask, particularly ones specifically about the charity. However, after I brought up Tamara, Alec became distant. I wasn't able to secure his undivided attention at all on Friday and the few times I was with him in the company of my team, I couldn't even manage solid eye contact. It's not like I picked up any sort of animosity or hostility in his distance, but there was a cold tension there that I simply couldn't decipher.
"I don't know," I said with a frustrated sigh. "I wanted to talk to him some more on Friday, but something about my whole encounter with that awful woman Tamara got him upset. Plus we've been busy..." I stopped when I caught Emily's mischievous grin that was threatening to tear her face in half. "What? What is it?"
"You're legitimately disappointed that you couldn't talk to him."
"You're smiling too much..."
"You are upset that he isn't showing you attention. You're worried you did something wrong. You like Mr. Radcliffe!"
"It would sound less creepy if you would just call him by his first name."
"But he's our boss," she said with snarky glee. "It wouldn't be appropriate to call him Alec. That would be so scandalous..."
"I'm going to revoke your friendship license."
"So you won't deny it?" Her smile was ever widening, her eyes wild with glee.
"I won't confirm or deny anything."
"Come on," she said, her eager eyes pleading. "I trusted you with that whole thing with Theo, I think I deserve the same."
"Fine."
I sighed as Emily scooted to the edge of her seat, her hands clasped tight in her lap to quell the anticipation buzzing through her. With some hesitation I began to tell her about my night on the patio. As my tale wore on, she started to lean forward until she braced her elbows against our table and rested her gaping mouth in her palm. Finally I ended with our evening sharing tea in the Pit.
"Wow, way to go Lex."
"Way to go nothing. I wasn't trying to accomplish anything, it just sort of happened."
"Maybe you weren't trying before, but you sure are trying now."
I can't say whether I agreed with that or not, but I did know that the conversation had long ago gone off course and it was well past time to get to work.
"I think that's up for debate. For now, can we table it and get back to researching the charity."
"Right, because that would totally prove that you aren't trying to impress Alec."
I put on my best pout for Emily, who simply giggled as she rose up from her chair. I followed her example and we both continued to poke fun at each other's silly love life as we mapped a route to the address Emily got from Carmen. That ended up being a good hour's walk thanks to all the circles we made. The GPS on my phone had a severely difficult time trying to pinpoint the building and we spent the majority of our walk retracing our steps. It probably had something to do with the fact that the office building was hidden in the dark recesses of some shady alleyways. Still, we made our way inside and eventually found ourselves outside a door named by the address from Accounting. We could only assume the address was right since there was a paper sign taped to the door proclaiming it "Coding a Future." However, had that not been there, I would have had my doubts. Most of the rooms in the building were vacant and the lights in the hall flickered at a nauseating rate.
"I suppose this is it," said Emily with a shiver present in her voice.
"It certainly says it is. It also says that it is still under construction."
Just below the first paper sign was another that read, "Do Not Enter. Renovation in Progress."
"Well, that was useful," I said with a groan and a roll of my eyes.
Emily sighed and glanced around the floor. I too took another good look at our surroundings. The walls looked yellow with age and, based on the lingering scent, decades old tobacco smoke. The carpet had little burn holes in it and I couldn't fathom it's original color since it fluctuated between tar black and puke brown. The lights buzzed and popped above us, while the sound of the autumn breeze bellowed through the old vents.
"What is that smell?" I asked, looking around me. "It's everywhere. I think there may be a hoard of opened tuna cans in one of these rooms..."
"Maybe it is one of those big district upheaval projects," said Emi, ignoring my revulsion and giving her chin a thoughtful tap of her finger. "Most of the buildings around here are vacant and broken down. Means they're cheap and primed for some wealthy investor to come in and refurbish it into the classiest neighborhood in the city."
She was potentially correct and I gave her a nod of understanding, but a sigh of disappointment still took hold of me.
"That may be true, but the public won't see it that way. Mariska would tear me to pieces if she saw this."
"That's what spin is for."
"It would be easier to spin if we had more information. Maybe we could just open the door and look in. We don't have to enter."
Emily shrugged and then reached for the knob, but when she gave it a turn, the door refused to budge.
"Not really a surprise," she said, looking back to me.
"Maybe we should try again later," I said with a frustrated growl. As much as I enjoyed my time with Emily, it certainly seemed like the majority of my Saturday had been a waste. "I'll see what I can get from Alec and then maybe..."
"Or," said Emily, raising her finger to halt my train of thought, "we could continue to pursue this lead." She had a wicked grin on her face, her eyes casting a sideways glance towards the door handle.
"What's your alternative?"
"I have two older brothers," she said as if that right there answered everything, "and I found myself locked out of the house more than a few times. I got good at picking the lock."
"Didn't you have a spare key somewhere?"
"They were gremlins. They had a gift for stealing things just as they were necessary, but it backfired on them eventually."
"Oh?"
"I unlocked their secret trunk that they hid under their bunk bed," she said with a devious smile. "I made sure their little treasure trove was spread across their beds for mom to see when she came in to collect laundry."
I made a mental note, right then and there, not to cross Emily.
Without further notice, Emily took it upon herself to pull out a little multi-tool that she kept in her purse and started her work on the locks. I stood behind her, giving a frantic scan of the hall, expecting someone to turn the corner at any moment. I, however, gave up fairly quickly. It didn't take long to realize that there quite simply was not a single other living soul in that building except for maybe a nest of rats.
"There," she said, popping up from her crouching position. "Mission Accomplished!"
After placing her tool back in her purse, she looked at me from over her shoulder as if waiting for me to give some sort of signal. I took a deep breath and gave her a nod. With that, she turned the handle and opened the door. Somehow, the room we found was in worse shape than the hallway.
Molding cardboard boxes, stuffed with a yard sale worth of junk, towered in the stripped bare space. Dismembered chairs cluttered the floor and cobwebs stretched from one side of the room to the other. Up in the exposed ceiling was a labyrinth of ventilation. One of its joints was broken and the end of the large metal tube dangled upon a less than satisfactory chain of rusted metal. Insulation had turned grey with dirt and grime, its long fibers drifted in the breeze whipping through the old ventilation system.
"Please tell me that's a mannequin in the back corner."
I looked to Emi, who cowered and took a few tentative steps back as a shaking hand pointed to the mysterious figure in the room. I then agreed that the one-armed, drooping figure was in fact an abandoned mannequin. Though acknowledging that didn't stop me from shivering whenever I happened to glance in its direction.
Despite our original resolve to simply look in from the hallway, the dark, ominous atmosphere of the office lured us in, wide-eyed and mouths agape. I couldn't say what exactly pulled us forward other than morbid curiosity, but we couldn't keep our feet from guiding us straight to the nearest box of clutter with the sick intention to peer into its frightening innards. I gulped back some musty air when something may or may not have moved inside the box. I stumbled back and bumped into Emily, who gave a worried look.
"They'll be working on this place for months," said Emi with a little whine in her voice. "You'd think they'd want to have something done by the gala."
"You'd also think they'd want to spend a bit more money on the rent." I looked back at the box, but determined it was best to assume my mind was simply toying with me.
"Carmen did say she was floored by just how cheap the rent for this place is."
"I mean, I realize they may have picked a space that had low rent to maximize the donations and see that the majority of the money would go directly to the charity's good work...but it just seems like the amount of money they would need for these renovations would far outweigh the slightly higher cost of picking a place in better shape."
Something creaked from overhead and we both instinctively spread our legs and threw out our hands, ready to dash for the door. However, when we turned our eyes to the ceiling, we found the ventilation still bolted to the roof, though it did have a lazy swing to it.
"I also thought," I continued with a gulp, "they were supposed to be providing a safe work space for those they're looking to help."
"I think," said Emily with a shivering sigh as her muscles relaxed, "we're just letting the place get to us. It's amazing how different a space can look after a proper renovation. And yes, the rent may be pocket change to Quinto Technologies, but I think the location is right. Only a few blocks from here are the neighborhoods that are most in need of assisting the homeless with finding jobs and giving those with homes a better opportunity to afford their mortgage. We just need to look at the potential."
"They'll need a small army to rehabilitate this place, but I suppose it is possible."
"So," said Emily with an excited smirk, "should we start snooping?"
For a moment I wished I had thought to bring some rubber gloves or possibly a gallon of antibacterial soap, but at that point, we'd already broken in and this was probably our only chance. So I gave Emily a nod and we took to opposite sides of the room to investigate.
***
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