Page 14 of Buried Treasure
"Sure," Sydney replied glumly. "What's in the box?"
Lucy just stared ahead, keys still in hand. "I don't know," she said quietly. "But I guess we're about to find out."
The key slipped easily through the bright yellow tape that encased the box along with an evidence label from the S.E.C. Lucy took another drink of wine and slowly pulled the top off, taking a quick assessment of the content inside.
"Well, that's not so bad."
"What is it?"
She watched as Lucy pulled out a heavy textbook. "Looks like your college library." She held on to the covers of the book and shook it, watching the pages flutter around. "The good news is they didn't stuff any random papers in it after they flipped through everything."
Sydney's brow furrowed and she stood up to get a better view of the contents inside.
"It's just full of books?" she stammered. "I poured wine and freaked out for some books?"
"Maybe," Lucy replied apprehensively. "Does it look like any are missing? Or did they mark any up?"
Sydney started to rummage in the box, pulling out book after book. She remembered her stock market book and her personal finance book and her business dictionary. For some reason, that had another label on it, sealing it shut. Lucy quietly grabbed it out of her hand and slipped her keys in to break the seal. Then she shook it like she had the previous book. Nothing.
In fact, other than the books, there was nothing in there. Nothing. No files, no paperwork, no proof of what her boss had allegedly done, no explanation about why he did it, and no apology from the S.E.C. for going through her personal stuff.
Nothing.
Sydney dropped back onto her sofa like a lifeless rag doll, hunched over in the corner of it staring at this stupid box in front of her.
"Is this normal?"
"A box with innocent books?" Lucy asked. "Yeah. It'll take some time for them to go through everything since they're trying to build a case against John."
Sydney sighed. "But I mean, this feeling."
"What feeling?"
"I feel so…" She took a deep breath, trying to come up with one word to describe herself. "Lifeless? Lost? What's a word for someone who is completely drained of any emotion to even have an emotion anymore?"
Lucy gave her a concerned look. "Are you OK?"
For the second time today, someone had asked her that question. And for the second time, she couldn't really come up with an articulate answer.
"I just feel numb."
Lucy put her arm around Sydney's shoulder and pulled her close.
"You feel the same way anyone feels after they've been betrayed by someone they trusted. I mean, don't take offense, but you have the same look on your face as the women who come into our office to file for divorce after their husbands cheat on them."
"Is it weird that I actually feel that way?" she said. "I mean, I just didn't have any warning with this."
"Before you say anything else," Lucy said, her voice becoming more serious. "As your lawyer I have to ask you if there is anything you can think of that made you believe something was going on?"
Sydney took a deep breath. "I can't sleep," she admitted. "It takes me hours to fall asleep because I keep thinking about little things that were going on that made no sense then but do now."
"Would you be up for coming down to the office this week and getting them on record?"
She could only nod in approval, too afraid of the words that would come out of her mouth. She had never felt uneasy at work, never felt like her boss wasn't trustworthy. But now that all of this had happened, there were these blurry moments that she had thought nothing of at the time that had begun to come into focus. But when they came into focus, there was only one explanation: Her boss was a crook.
Blinking back tears, Sydney quickly rubbed her cheeks with her hands and inhaled sharply to try and clear her vision. She let out a quiet laugh, hoping it would break the sadness that she had pulled further into her apartment.
"Sorry, just got a little something in my eyes," she said flippantly.
