When The Time Comes

chapter 17; Omar

My knuckle meets the grey paint, knocking twice before waiting. The street is empty like we'd hoped. Ben stands guard near the 'for sale' sign. We wait a couple of minutes before I step back and let Lib do her thing. She looks at me as if to say, keep an eye out, before she kneels down in front of the door.

I watch out over the street and the houses nearby. Ben does the same. It's quiet except the faint sounds of cars driving on the main road that this street connects to. I look over her shoulder, watching her stick something sharp into the slot. It makes me wonder how she knows how to do this. Nobody teaches you this kind of shit unless you did it before. So, Liberty, whose house have you broken into before and why?

Math club student and knows how to break in? It sounds a little unbelievable to me.

The gentle sound of a door unlocking pulls my attention.

"Jesus Lib," Ben mutters from behind us.

She pushes her hair behind her ear and pulls my arm, forcing me inside. She pulls Ben in too and closes the door behind us.

"Shh," she mutters, holding a finger up in the air, motioning us to listen. So we do. We wait it out for a while, listening to any sign that someone was inside. Finally, we move forward together into the first room. It looks like a living room. There's a couch draped in a linen cloth and a bunch of carboard boxes with magazines and other miscellaneous things.

"Looks abandoned to me," Ben says, swiping his finger across the dusty mantle.

"Let's split up," I suggest. "I'll take the upstairs. You two cover this floor."

I don't wait for an answer and make my way upstairs, wincing at one of the steps giving out a creak. There are two bedrooms up here with beds still in place. They don't have mattresses and the rest of the rooms are practically empty. In the bigger room which I can only assume belonged to Stewart and his wife, there's a cactus sitting by the window. I focus on it for a moment longer than I intended. Why'd they leave behind the plant?

I turn away and open their wardrobe which is empty except for a few hangers. The drawers are next. I pull them open one by one, searching them for something that stands out. Something out of place or odd lookin'. After wedging it away from the wall to have a look at the back side, I take in a shaky breath. Turns out, the wardrobe was a waste of time.

I leave his room feeling pretty defeated. I can only hope Liberty and Ben have found something promising. I look at the stairs from above when my gut tells me to look into the kid's room again. I don't know why but I got a feeling.

The kid's room is smaller but the window's bigger in here. I can see branches reaching out from the tree in the back yard from here. There are no curtains anymore. I look up at the ringlets that still hang from the curtain rod. I guess they forgot to take those with them when they were leaving.

There are two single beds in opposite corners of the same wall. Their empty metallic structures make the room look more like a holding cell. There's a nail above each of the beds. I wonder what kind of pictures hung from them.

I search under the bed frames and the bathroom cabinet. Then I look through the white clothing drawers. They're empty which shouldn't surprise me but it does anyway. Disappointment feels heavy. Like a weight chained to my midsection. I open the last drawer slowly, as if it'll make something appear magically. It doesn't though. The blank slate of white coated wood stares up at me. 

I stand up, my stomach tight with anxiety. If I were hiding something, where would I hide it? Assuming there was something to hide.

I slide my hand behind the drawers, feeling around for anything. There's nothing there too. Come on you bastard.