New Tenant

            “So you’re just going to put your stuff in the hallway,” asked 2015.
            “Yeah, my moving guys are supposed to pick it all up in the morning,” said 2014.
            “Cool. Cool. So, there’s not much stuff there,” said 2015
            “Well, I really didn’t do too much, so there just wasn’t much to put together,” said 2014 as he shrugged.

            2015 stepped around 2014’s tattered brown cardboard boxes. The boxes had strange stains on them in various places. The majority of the stains looked like blood marks to 2015.

            “What’s all that,” asked 2015, pointing to a particularly heavily blood stained box.

            2014 barely looked up from the box he was taping closed marked LOVE LETTERS and sort of smirked.

            “That was mostly summer in Chicago and well, other places around the U.S.,” said 2014.

            “Sheesh, do you think I’ll have any boxes like that after my lease is up,” asked 2015.

            2014 shrugged again and pushed the LOVE LETTERS box out into the hallway. He moved the box marked SEX SCANDALS further down the hall toward the elevators. That was the one he was worried the movers were going to forget. It seemed like everybody forgot those after a while.

            “I saw you had some new mail in the mailbox downstairs,” said 2015.

            “Yeah, it’s probably for all the folks that die before my lease ends. Don’t worry about those, we’ll share them a little,” said 2014.
            “Were you this nervous when you moved in,” asked 2015.
            “Actually, I wasn’t. I was already pretty pessimistic when I took the job so I really didn’t have any anxiety about it. But I am nervous for you. This is going to be a weird one,” said 2014.
            “You think so,” asked 2015.
            “Oh yeah, totally weird. But don't dwell on it.”

            2015 looked around the small apartment. It was dusty and a little dingy. There wasn’t very much light coming in through the large windows that faced the street below. The air was just heavy.

            “You didn’t dust,” asked 2015.

            “Oh, I did. But you’ll discover that that fine layer of dust never goes away. No matter how often you try and wipe it away, it just shows up again. Just try not to let it build up too much or it’ll get into other things and really muck up the works. In fact, that’s my only advice as you take this apartment over, try not to let things get too cluttered. Clutter leads to chaos,” said 2014.
            “Well, I’ll try,” said 2015.

            2014 looked around the room without much concern, patted his pants pockets, found the keys and handed them over to 2015.

            “Okay pal, I’m just about out of here. I’m going to go down to the bar for a few drinks before the lease officially ends. Do you want to join me for a few?”

            2015 took the keys and shrugged.

            “Sure. Why not? I could probably use a few drinks before this gets going,” said 2015.

            “Atta boy,” said 2014.

            2015 turned a light on in the apartment and followed 2014 down the stairs and outside to the bar around the corner.