The Lost Briefcase - A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words Contest

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Source: Freewrite House

This is my entry to the A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words Contest

A brown briefcase in the middle of a dirt road. The briefcase is not just lying around on the dirty ground. No: it was placed there on purpose.

It gives an eerie, creepy vibe: who brought this briefcase to this remote place only to put it there? And why this unknown person did this?

It's a very nice briefcase, after all: it surely wasn't just abandoned there. If someone wanted to threw away the bag, its owner should just put it on the trash, not walk with it to this place.

_divisoria-classica

The Briefcase in the Dirt Road

"Finally," she thought. After 13 hours working in this smoky, underground laboratory, she had finished the batch.

She then took the erlenmeyer flask and weighed it on her precision scale: 850 grams. "Perfect, as we agreed".

Then she took a notebook from under the table and wrote down "850g * 19.4 = 16,490 USD". "That's enough to pay my debts; I'll be free now. Free."

She took the flask, sealed it a plastic lid and put it in her brown briefcase. Now, it was the time to walk to the rendezvous point, 7 kilometers into the dirt road that cut through the fields of that huge, abandoned farm near the city. After the farm declared bankruptcy a few years ago, no one actually walked through that path, so it was a safe place to do the exchange.

After walking for about an hour, she reached the place. "At least today's not raining; I wouldn't want to go back home soaked again like yesterday".

A brown briefcase, exactly as hers, was in the middle of the path. There was nothing else there.

She opened the briefcase and took a pack of money from it; then she counted the money: "one thousand...three...eight...fifteen, sixteen. Sixteen thousand, four hundred and ninety dollars. Everything's correct, as always".

She then took the briefcase from the ground, put the money inside it, and placed her own briefcase in the same place on the path.

"Let's walk away from here, I don't want to see him again. This is as bad as it is", she thought.

But, in her way back home, she felt something weird going on, as if she was being watched. She knew too much, after all. Would him let her walk away from all of this just by paying her debts?

She kept looking over her shoulders, but couldn't find anynone.

Maybe no one was following her after all.

Maybe.

_divisoria-classica

Thanks for reading this post, and until next time!

If you enjoyed the post, feel free to follow me as I'm routinely writing about Gaming, Investment, Fitness and Writing, and other random fun subjects like Travel and Metal Detecting!

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12 comments
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The briefcase is not just lying around on the dirty ground. No: it was placed there on purpose.

Someone put down his/her business. Literally. But why leave exactly as much money in it as the main character?

Then she took a notebook from under the table and wrote down "850g * 19.4 = 16,490 USD". "That's enough to pay my debts; I'll be free now. Free."

I do not know what kind of drug is that, but the exchange is good (?) for her.

And maybe I overthink this story, but could the main character (her) be drugged (especially after working in a laboratory)? Or even suffer from some kind of mental disorder, for example schizophrenia or amnesia, or anything else.

Either way, it was an enjoyable story. It was good to read. It moved my thoughts a little in the dawn on my way to work.

I give you some !PIZZA and some !LUV.
Have a nice day. All the best. Greetings from Hungary.

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The fun part of those short stories is letting things open, so the reader can create his own story in his mind :D

My main take, as the author, was that the protagonist was, because of debts, coerced into making drugs for the antagonist: she would make drugs, he would pay for them, she would pay the debts with the money.

The rest was just details to make the story more interesting :D

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Thanks for your story. Intrigued. Where can you read the beginning? Why does she come to change portfolios?

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Thanks for the support, I'm glad you liked it!

There's (fortunately or unfortunately!) just this story; it was a contest for the Freewriters Community. The 'before' and the 'after' is for the reader to think...and I don't like to share what I've thought as the author, as this usually just makes everyone else think the same thing as me, killing a part of the beauty of the art that's everyone having their own take of the story being told!

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Thank you so much for your reply. Have a beautiful day!

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I have the same question and so good to know the story has an open end. The beauty of this short story is it has enough details to let readers understand the situation and decide to let their imagination run wild or just stop there with a happy end as the woman can finally live her normal life

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Exactly! The magic of short stories is letting enough open parts to each reader create its own story in their minds.

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