Well, it actually wasn't a box, but rather a door to a bedroom. And it wasn't Pandora's door, it was our tenant Lisa's door. And it wasn't a curse inside but rather items that lead to an unexpected series of very pleasant events. No, Lisa's bedroom wasn't the scene of group sex, lesbian explorations, or an affair. At least not involving myself and my wife Janet. Let me start at the beginning.
I'm a rather typical 35 year old suburban middleclass, college educated working professional living in the suburbs, working about 40-50 hour work weeks and happily married to my wife, Janet, a 34 year old similarly college educated middleclass working mom of two delightful daughters, Amiee, our precocious 8 year old and her little sister Anisha, 6. Like most of the rest of the world, we were a little busier than we wished and not quite as well off, but couldn't really complain. Tennis kept me in rather decent shape about 9 months a year and Janet kept her very nice figure in very nice shape particularly in the summer when she was off from her teaching position and busy with the kids.
Three years ago, a group of neighbors banded together to confront the owner of an 8-unit apartment building across the street from our single-family neighborhood. The place was in disrepair with more noise, cars, commotion and non-resident people than the neighbors thought appropriate. I was appointed as the spokesperson, and we confronted the owner. The elderly owner pled guilty to not doing a good job of managing the place and was apologetic. When asked what he was going to do about it he looked at me and said, I just retired, and I am going to move to Florida, and you are going to manage the building. Before I could respond he laid out the terms. He would set up an account of $30,000 for immediate repairs and I could keep ten percent of the rents for a commission and ten percent for reinvestment. In a couple of years if the market was better, he would sell it. He said he would have all the paperwork together in a few days and I could start by the weekend. Stunned but intrigued, within a week Janet and I were apartment building managers.
That was three very busy years ago. The extra income had allowed Janet to take summers off to be with the girls and help out with the building. The building had been brought up to great condition after three years of hard work. The tenants had mostly turned over to a carefully selected group of well-behaved folks and we had been able to increase rents, keeping the owner delighted with the arrangement.
Three months ago, we got a call from a gentleman that was the father of one of the tenants. He was very business like and asked to set up a meeting the following Sunday. Him and his wife arrived about 4:00pm in a chauffeured black sedan and we invited them in. He thanked us for being willing to meet. They both looked stressed but were impeccably groomed. He got right to the point. He informed us his daughter, Lisa, our tenant, had been killed in an auto accident three days earlier and they were in town to make arrangements to have her body returned home and her affairs and possessions handled.
He asked about lease termination and told us he would pay the remaining three months on the lease less the security deposit and would give us $1000,00 to arrange disposal of her belongings. As I was telling him three months was more than was necessary as we could turn the property quickly, he was ignoring me as he was busy writing out a check for the full amount. They asked to see the unit and we walked the three doors down and across the street and took them to the unit. We told them we would give them some time, but they insisted it would only take a few minutes. The unit was nicely furnished and equipped.
They took her laptop computer, several photos, some papers from a file and some family jewelry items from her jewelry box and mementos and packed into one of the suitcases in the unit. The second bedroom in the unit had a lock on the door, something the tenant had evidently installed. With no key, they dismissed it and thanked us for our time as they took a last look around with tears in their eyes. The wife said to us, "Use, sell or give away the contents as you see fit." She smiled at Janet and said, "You look like you are the exact same size as our daughter, Lisa, she has a nice wardrobe that you might enjoy."
In less than 30 minutes they were gone having left a check and contact information. As we headed across the street to our home, I was thinking about whether or not I could get that high end large screen television retrieved and mounted in place of our older smaller model in our family room before Sunday night football started and Janet was mumbling about an end table and side chair, she had her eye on.
By 9:00pm my buddy Jake and I had the 55-inch OLED flatscreen mounted on my family room wall and we had only missed the first half of the game. The kids were tucked in bed and Janet was enjoying a nice bottle of wine she had retrieved from Lisa's fridge. Monday evening Janet briefed me on her day of forwarding the mail, switching out the utilities, cleaning out the fridge and sorting through some of the items in the apartment. Lisa's family evidently had money as all the items from the food in the fridge to the clothes in the closet to the furnishings were high quality. Janet had traded up our toaster, juice maker, toaster oven and assorted kitchenware with several boxes of our old stuff destined for charity. Something of a Christmas in July.
My Monday night assignment was to remove the lock from the second bedroom door. My trusty cordless drill made short order of the lock cylinder. I knew I would have to replace the hardware but at least Janet could get into the room. It was a long day with a full calendar for Tuesday, so my normal curiosity lost out to my busy schedule, and I did not look in the room.
Tuesday at noon I got a text from Janet, "You won't believe what's in the second bedroom."
