Coordinates of Life

For most seventy six year olds, routine dulls the terror and excitement of life, and that much could certainly be said for a man named Albert. Every single day was always the same for Albert. Alarm shrieks life into Albert at five A.M. Slowly, he hobbles into the kitchen and makes himself two scrambled eggs and pours a steaming mug of black coffee. While he eats, the morning news blares a serenade of background noise into his quiet and dusty little kitchen. He takes a shower and shaves until his face is smooth as a baby's bottom. And with that, he is ready to leave the house for the day in his cream colored fleece and baseball cap.

While some people like Albert are accustomed to and crave the monotony of life, there was one crucial thing missing from his. Amelia. In June of the previous year, Amelia, his beautiful bride of fifty years, sadly lost her battle with stage four lung cancer. Never smoked a cigarette, just dealt a bad hand of luck. When the news of the diagnosis hit, their hearts shattered into a million pieces, and what had always been a drama-free life together was snatched in the blink of an eye. That night, as Albert tossed and turned in bed attempting to get a second of shut eye, he was suddenly comforted by the arms of his loving bride. As the two laid there in the dark room of silence, Amelia finally whispered “we can make a choice. Will we let this ruin the rest of whatever time I have left? Or will we live life better than we ever have before? I think I like option two better. What about you?”. As a tear slowly rolled down the side of his cheek, Albert gave every ounce of energy he had to nod his head. Amelia ended by saying “This all has just made me realize that I need to start taking more chances and living more free now. Even at my old age”. The room went silent again as the two laid in the same cuddled up position until finally falling asleep. Nothing else needed to be said.

Unfortunately, Amelia was never able to take her own advice. The illness hit even faster than expected and even with the rigorous treatments, very quickly they found there was not much they could do for her. On one rainy Tuesday morning, Albert lost his soulmate. Now the only routine that included Amelia was a visit to her grave every single morning where he would lay up against her tomb and chat about life as if she were still right next to him. Like a mailman, the severity of the weather was irrelevant to this part of his regimen. Albert would visit her in a hurricane. This left him with no family, with the exception of his police officer nephew, Greg. But he had little to no contact with him.

To cap off his routine, Albert would go to work the night time security shift at a local nail salon.

Why this type of place needed a security guard was always a mystery to Albert. The only thing clear to him was that it was run by a shady group of tough looking men who throughout the years had trouble with the law. But that was just about as far as he had cared to look into it. As long as the check still cleared it made no difference to him what kind of business was going on in there. After all he was not employed by any of those men, he was hired by the building owner Lenny who gave him a run for his money in age. Albert had worked as an accountant for most of his career before all of this. It wasn’t until the tail end when he decided to retire from the tedious life of counting up numbers and do part time security work. This enabled him to spend more time with Amelia while also bringing in a little income. Albert never had a lot of money and working security night shifts three days a week certainly didn’t make him richer. But he didn’t need a lot of money. He had Amelia. However, after paying for the best possible medical care they could afford just to extend every bit of life she still had in her, the bills burned a hole in his pockets. For the first time, Albert was concerned about money. Of course he did not care about living glamorously with fancy cars and private chefs. It was the house. It was Albert and Amelia’s house. The house where the two had shared almost every waking memory of their lives together. The house where the two celebrated holidays with each other. The house with the porch swing, that they would relax on during the nights of summer. The house where the two savored every single home cooked meal that was whipped up on the old fashioned metal stove tops. The house where the two crawled up into bed every single night, ending whatever the previous day had brought to them with a kiss and an exchange of “Love you”. This place had become more than just a house. For Albert, it had become a physical symbol of love, memories and a major piece of his wife still with him. And with all this, sadly the clock was ticking to when he would no longer have a choice but to give it up. An incredibly tough but inevitable pill for Albert to swallow. But this the never ending, soul sucking style of a routine was about to come to an end.

On a cool summer night, Albert clocked into work just as he had hundreds of times before. After a couple of hours pacing back and forth patrolling the building, he decided to relax a little in the security booth. As he sat in silence, wheeling back and forth in the office chair with his feet up, he suddenly could see through the security monitor a car pulled into the back parking lot. Albert looked up at the clock with a puzzled expression. Three in the morning. This was no ordinary time for any walks of life to be showing their presence. Albert leaned in closer and noticed a figure exit the car and walk into the back entrance using a key. Rather than go confront this potential intruder head on, he decided to sit back and assess the situation a little more thoroughly. In the midst of his analysis, the individual took a remote out of his pocket and proceeded to turn off all the security footage. This now really made Albert uneasy. After a moment of sitting frozen in his chair, sweat glistening on his forehead, Albert took a deep breath and quietly went to go investigate.

With each step brought more terror and uncertainty of what laid ahead for him. Albert had been doing this job for years and never in all this time was there even a second that called for concern. As he walked carefully through the building, he could finally make out some noise coming from one of the offices. The more he walked the more clear the noise became. Albert took a deep breath and slowly peaked his end around the corner to get a better glimpse of what was taking place. With a little squinting, he could make out one of the shady men who worked in that building. The man was frantically rummaging through his desk. What could he possibly need at this hour, Albert wondered. As Albert gazed over, pondering the motive, the man pulled out from the desk a black book. The second he retrieved the item he dropped to the ground and removed a piece of the floorboard and stashed in underneath. The man gently placed back the wood paneling where it was and rushed out of the building.

Albert waited a few seconds to secure he was finally alone before walking over to that area. He stood over the floor for a moment, reluctant to explore. However, his curiosity got the best of him and he crouched down to take out the wooden piece. There it was. The black book. Albert grabbed the book and started filing through the pages. With each page came a picture of a different man, all of whom he recognized throughout the years coming in and out of the building. Underneath every man’s photo were written out allabys of crimes from drug dealing to murders. The more he read the more clear it would become to him. These men were all gangsters, and one of their own was ready to sing like a canary to the feds. Albert finally reached the last page but what he saw was not a photo. They were coordinates that read “40.7448° N, 73.9937° W”. Maybe he had seen one too many movies, but in Albert’s mind, this could lead him to one of two things. A dead body or a mountain of cash. Instantly Albert’s brain went to the house. His beloved house. Could this be his winning lottery ticket to save it? There was only one way to find out but this adventure could be too risky. He could be getting himself involved with some of the most dangerous men out there. Suddenly, something snapped in him. And he could hear his sweet Amelia’s voice telling him to take a chance. It was at this moment, Albert was finally ready to do so. Albert took the book and left work early that night.

The following day brought Albert a roller coaster of emotions. Back and forth, contemplating the decision he made. As he sat down at breakfast, for the first time in a while the news caught his attention. On the screen was a reporter describing a murder not far from his home. The frame then cut to a picture of the same exact man from the night before. Albert dropped his fork. The coverage began going into detail about the speculation of the gang he had been affiliated with for years but not enough evidence to incriminate. Albert grabbed his telephone and started dialing. The phone picked up and on the other end was his nephew Greg. “Hello.” Greg said.

“Hey, Greg, how you doing, it’s Albert”. There was a second of dead air. “Uncle Al?” asked Greg.

“Yeah, yeah that’s the one. This is a little out of left field but I was wondering if you heard about the murder in our town? Happened some time this morning.” Albert asked. “Ummmm yeah? Yes I did. Pandolfi. Mob guy. We had him ready to make a deal with us in exchange for information on his crew so if you were wondering why someone would do that there is your answer.” said Greg. As Albert began to stammer out his confession, Greg cut him off and said “Hey listen I’m really busy right now but it was great hearing from you. Take care” and hung up the phone. As Albert looked out his window, a black SUV pulled right in front of his house and sitting in the vehicle were two members from the gang. They were coming for him! Albert’s heart began to pound out of his chest, but there was no time for fear. Albert grabbed his fleece, baseball cap and the black book.

While the two men sat in their car waiting for the old man, the garage door slowly opened and out pulled Albert in his little Volkswagen. The men inconspicuously followed right behind as he calmly continued down the road. They kept a two car distance from his so they wouldn’t blow their cover. After fifteen solid minutes of aimlessly driving, the men got stopped at a red light losing the old man. The driver, incredibly frustrated, put his foot on the gas and aggressively began to search for the Volswagen. Another ten minutes passed until they finally spotted the car once again.

Accompanying Albert was an old fashioned map resting on the dashboard and a shovel. He was going for the money. Albert looked a little calmer at this point. He felt he had lost them. Finally he took a detour off the road driving deep into the pine barrens of Long Island. Suddenly, Albert parked his car, grabbed the shovel and headed into the woods. After a couple minutes of walking, he stopped right on his target and began to dig.

In the midst of his digging, Albert heard a voice call out from behind “How’s it goin’ old man?” both the shovel and his heart dropped. Albert remained silent. With a pistol in hand the man laughed and said “Never would’ve expected to be hunting down an old timer like you. I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw your name on the books for the saloon. Figured it was a stretch that a man of your age would be a threat. But thankfully, I ignored my instincts because it looks like you led us right where we wanted. See we tore up that saloon before the sun rose looking for what we needed. Got tipped off that a little black book was the answer to all our problems but we were unable to find it… Where’s the book?” Albert’s breathing got heavier and he stammered “I burned it.” With a sadistic smile the man said “Don’t wanna tell the truth? That’s fine. We’ll track down where you put it eventually. Now, I don’t expect a man of your age digging out in the woods for nothing so, being that you already started the work. I’m sure you won’t mind digging till you get us what belongs to us.” The man handed the shovel back to Albert to continue what he started which he begrudgingly did.

Twenty minutes of digging passed until finally Albert’s shovel hit a black bag. The men told Albert to toss it up which took a lot of strength but he managed to do it. They pulled the zipper down and in the bag was a large amount of cash just as Albert figured. After a moment of celebration, the man pointed the gun at Albert and said “Thank you for your service.” As he cocked the trigger back, a team of police officers came rushing into the woods yelling for the man to drop his weapon. He froze for a second before finally accepting defeat.

The officer leading the pack was Albert’s nephew, Greg. The men were cuffed and taken away. Albert stayed in the grave he dug himself looking up at his nephew. Greg pulled out the black book from his jacket with a big smile on his face. “Wife called me at the office and said a man that looked like my uncle slid this into our mailbox. Would you happen to know anything about that?” Albert finally caught his breath and said “Life can get really boring at my age”.

Later that week, Albert received his reward money for all the criminals he turned over. For the remainder of his life he never told a soul how much it was but certainly enough to keep him in the modest house which he adored. His life was forever saved thanks to a little old woman who urged him to take a chance.