The Donation

I’ve spent many years working for a thrift shop, every year we get donations of random things. I’ve seen everything from tupperware to underwear.

This year, I was working the line for donations, and Christmas was only weeks away. I checked in car after car of people who are donating things to give to our store, we aren’t typically busy with new loads until after the holidays, when people get gifts… you know, out with the old, and in with the new.

6:00 pm was close to the end of my shift, and I checked in the last car. It was just several trash bags full of clothes, shoes, and handbags. Nothing fancy, no brand names. I scanned labels and checked things for holes, and trashed the things that we could not sell.

“Hey, what’s this?” My coworker Liz looked astonished. She picked it up and threw it on my table.

“But, what if that was a bomb? You could have blown the whole place up.” I joked as I shook the box in front of her face.

It was wrapped in brown paper and didn’t have any writing. There was a thin burlap string tied around it in a bow.

Working for a thrift shop I’m accustomed to searching through other peoples junk, so there’s no fear about opening this.

Liz grabbed the box from my grasp. “What if they didn’t mean to donate it, it feels heavy.”

“It sounds like a brick, it’s thick too.”

We spent the next 20 minutes shaking it and throwing it around. We’ve already ruled out that if it was something glass it would have been destroyed by now.

Finally I gave up, I grabbed an exacto knife and cut the twine off of the package, unwrapped the brown paper that was bound over it. I was surprised at what I saw. Taped to the lid was a note that read, “For Donation”. Curiosity had the best of me, because I was wondering what on earth they could be donating in this ridged old box. I opened the lid and inside was cash. Liz and I began to dump it all over the table and started to count.

A couple of hours passed and we had stacks and stacks of money in front of us. We were surprised to have a little over 200,000 dollars in 100 and 50 dollar bills. There was no name left on the card or in the package. Though this large generous amount was suspiciously thrown into a donation bag with clothes, the question that remains is where did the money come from?

With this amount of cash one would assume drugs, or something illegal. Nobody is ever really this generous even if they win the lottery. Believe me, I know I won’t be, and right now I’m torn between doing exactly what the note says or pay off my bills, I work for a thrift shop…. I really don’t make a lot of money.

I watched Liz sit down and count the stacks of cash in front of her again. Almost like she was classifying it.

What to do……

What to do……

“What do we do?” I asked out loud after thinking and mulling it over in my head. “But I do drive a broken car, and I have a roommate that I desperately hate.”

“You know that this can fix it…” I dangled the cash in front of her, almost spilling it all onto the floor.

Liz didn’t respond, she pushed the cash in my direction, stood up and walked away. Almost like she’s more conflicted than I had ever been in that moment.

“How shout we keep some for ourselves?”

“But thst won’t be honest..” Lis sounded astonished that I would ever consider anything more than just donating it.

Tis’ the season, Liz and I finally came to our conclusion we should divy’d up the money and donated the rest. I wont tell you how much was pocketed or how much actually made it into the donation box, but that is for your imagination. Just know, it’s in a better place.