The Wall

I consider myself a good handyman, a Jack of all trades. My ex-wives would argue that saying I never did anything right.... oh well, that’s a whole other story.

I saw it in the wall when I was remodeling. At first, I thought it was a wad of black paper, I paid no attention to it as I had pulled a lot of crap out of walls at construction sites before. I had a lot to do, and besides, I was working on the other side of the room. When I started on the wall where I saw the black wad, I reached in between the old plaster and wood studs to pull it out and it wasn't paper, it was a large boot, an old one…. really old. Whoever owned it had been a big man! It was bigger than my shoe and I wear a size thirteen. It was heavy, real heavy and something was in it. I turned it over and the contents dropped to the floor in a thud. It was two cloth bags, closed with thin rope and knotted. I picked up one of them, it was heavy.

At that point, I got myself a beer and took a break. Sitting on the floor drinking my beer, I thought of my old man. He was a real asshole, a drinker, and an abuser. When I was a kid, he would slap my Mother for no reason, I got the fist. It took me years to figure out that I wasn’t like him, but every time I grab a beer, I think of him. Don’t ask me why can’t explain it, I just do. I can say I was surprised when I learned he had died and left me everything. I hadn’t seen him in years, didn’t want to. Mom had died years before and I had no siblings, that I knew of. Mom always said she was sorry for bringing me into this hell, she certainly would not bring another. So, I grew up alone.

I untied the knot and dumped the contents out. Whatever it was, had been wrapped in newspaper and tied with string. I opened the other bag; it was flat and folded over and not even close to being as heavy as the other one. There was one string holding it together. I opened that one first, and in it was a small black notebook that was old and worn. I opened it up and there was something written on it. The first entry written was the name Jeremy 1890-1892, the second entry was James 1893-1895, and the last entry was Olivia 1898-1900. It looked like birth and death dates to me. Had they lived in this house? Were they the original owner’s children? There were no last names, only first ones, damn… I skimmed through the rest of the book and it was empty. I cut the string on the other wrapped package and inside were ten gold coins. There on the floor before me, I had ten double eagle gold coins worth in today's value about twenty thousand dollars. I had bought the house to flip, it had cost me everything I had. The house was in bad shape, been sitting for years out in the country. Full of mold and rot, built in the year 1880, but it had good bones so I thought I could flip it. So now, do I keep the money? Do I try to figure out who Jeremy, James and, Olivia are? What would you do? Me, I'm gonna keep it. I mean, I bought the house, paid cash, more than twenty grand that's for sure. Crazy, who would have thought, shit, maybe I'll rip out a few more walls, who the hell knows what I will find. Yeah, I'm keeping it...