The bike roared underneath him. Manuel wasn’t a fan of motorcycles, but he’d ridden enough to be comfortable. Aesthetics sabotaging function was another item on his long list of annoyances. At one point, there were hundreds of people who wanted him dead and a motorcycle would have left him too open to their desires. So, like flip-flops, he’d sworn motorcycles off to situations of absolute necessity.
Manuel turned the bike west and drove towards the sunset. Soon he’d pulled into a driveway on Justice Street. Years before, there had been an irony to stashing dirty money on a street named Justice. Now, it felt poetic and appropriate that this was where he would start to fix what he’d worked so hard to build.
The front door of the house opened as he dismounted the bike. A short woman stood in the doorway, yellow hijab contrasting against her brown skin. Her expression rode the line between welcoming and cautious.
“Hello, Manuel. I really didn’t expect it to be you when I heard the bike and looked out the window.”
“Sorry for coming unannounced, Lami. I hope I’m not disturbing anything.”
“Nothing. We were just going to sit down to eat. Come in and join us.”
He considered rejecting her offer. However, his stomach chose that moment to rumble and remind him that he’d started this all trying to get some food.
“Thank you. That’d be great.” He said, following her inside toward smells that made the rumblings double.
At the small, round table inside sat Lami’s 12-year-old son, Noab. Manuel had only seen the boy in passing over the last few years, but he was already growing a strong frame. He looked at Manuel suspiciously and Manuel rewarded the boy’s caution by submitting to his gaze with a nod. His natural instinct to protect his mother was one that should be reinforced, and there was nothing better at that age than winning a staring contest with an older man.
Lami brought out a couple of baskets of injera and a fragrant meat and vegetable stew. Ironically, it wasn’t until he’d come to South Dakota of all places that Manuel tried Ethiopian food, and now the two were inseparably tied in his mind.
* * *
After an awkward dinner, as Noab cleaned the table and filled the dishwasher, Manuel motioned for Lami to walk toward the living room.
“Is my bag still in the basement?” His voice was more serious than he’d intended, but after Ralph, he was preparing for bad news.
“Of course. You asked me to hold it and I held it. I haven’t even so much as looked toward that closet in 5 years”
Manuel nodded his appreciation then excused himself to go downstairs. The basement was beautifully finished, with a small table in the center of what looked to be a game room. A small door in the corner, half the width of a normal door, had a combination lock dangling from a latch. Mutt dialed in the numbers and pulled it free. Inside was a single black duffle bag sitting on a shelf in the closet. He lifted it and placed it on the table in the center of the room. He could tell it hadn’t been touched, but opened the bag and counted the money to be sure. Two-hundred and fifty thousand, exactly as he’d left it. An inside pocket held 30 one-ounce bars of gold.
He took fifty thousand in cash and five of the gold bars out, stuffing them into the inside pockets of his jacket. He would have liked to take a bit more, but he preferred to travel light. He also knew he’d have other opportunities to get money in the coming days, so he didn’t feel worried about leaving the majority of this store behind.
Manuel zipped up the duffle bag with the leftovers inside. Climbing the stairs, he reemerged into the living room to find Lami sitting on the couch sipping water. Noab stood just behind the kitchen doorway. The smallest edge of his t-shirt gave away his position. Manuel sat beside Lami and placed the duffle bag at her feet. She looked at it with confusion.
“This is for you, Lami.”
“I don’t need anything else, Manuel.” She said, raising her hands in protest.
“I’m sure. But I want you to have it. You’ve built a beautiful home here, you’ve raised a great boy, and you deserve to be rewarded for your years of work.”
She began to unzip it, stopping when there was enough of a gap for her to glance inside. She folded the bag over with a gasp.
“No, Manuel, absolu-”
He cut her off with a hand laid lightly on the back of hers.
“Please. I don’t think I’ll be coming back here. Allow me to give this to you as a parting gift. An appreciation for many years of friendship, that I will value for the rest of my life.”
She looked at Manuel silently for a moment, then nodded her head and placed her free hand on top of his.
“Thank you. Inshallah this is not the last time we see each other.”
Standing, he smiled and shrugged.
“We’ll have to see what the universe has in store for me yet.”