Refuse

11

The tiny print on the handmade sheets of paper bent around the Bukovsky quote, and then continued around in a circle on to the top of the page. The words were miniscule—she could barely read them without a magnifying glass—and the author had written the lines in a single swirl, like a pinwheel or a spiral, starting on the very edge of the top of the page and then continuing clockwise until the words reached the middle of the page. In this way, an entire manuscript had been squeezed onto the front and backs of four sheets of paper. She tried to imagine doing this. She wondered how many words the author could write before he’d have to sharpen his charcoal and rest his hand.

Leah wanted to read the manuscript, but she felt an urgency that compelled her to set the pages aside for the moment. She needed to work on the mystery of the key. She looked at it again, rubbed its face, flipped it over in her hands and examined it again. She could not identify a single element of the key that indicated its use. It was different than the apartment keys she was used to, and it had no name or number stamped into it that might give her an indication of where to start looking for an answer.

As she looked closer, she noted that the tooth pattern on the key did remind her of an apartment key—at least it was the nearest thing she could think of to the one she had in her hand. She fished her own key out of her pocket and compared it to the key in her hand. Similar. Not identical, but similar. Maybe it goes to a safe house? Arghh! Where could it be?

She closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind. She took a deep breath and relaxed her shoulders and arms. She began breathing diaphragmatically and attempted to will her heart rate to decrease.

That’s when she realized that she needed to make this more personal. Ivan had given her a note telling her where to find the key. He expected her to know what the key went to, and he showed no doubt that she would figure it out because he didn’t mention it again in the note she’d just read. He expected her to just know! So it was personal. Where could it be?

Alexander.

“Could it be the key to Alexander’s old apartment?” She actually asked this question aloud to herself. Alexander had been dead for two years. Surely they’d assigned the living space to someone else by now. How could she find out? Alexander had lived on 60, three levels down, though he’d worked as a picker in the recycling unit for his whole life. She’d have to go down there to try the key in order to find out.

It took her only a few minutes to make it back to her apartment. She slipped the brass key into her pocket and then pulled on a woolen sweatshirt. She carefully rolled up the four page manuscript and put the roll up her left sleeve. She didn’t want to be carrying any bags or packages because doing that might catch the attention of a porter. She pulled on a cap and left her apartment, locking the door behind her. As she did, she wondered if she’d ever see her home again.