The Cleaner

The Package

Oakley had had a stressful day.

The Drop was coming, he knew he needed to get back home in good time, but there was still so much he had to do, still so much he had to arrange. He had known The Drop was coming for months and still he didn't feel prepared, and he didn't much like this at all. Preparation to him was a personality trait.

"I need a Scotch" he muttered under his breath, loosening his tie, and waving thanks to his driver.

The black Mercedes pulled off the driveway as Oakley entered the code to his house. The large mahogany doors whirred as he stepped inside the cabin-like entrance hall. The house was cold, he had not been home in a few days which was quite normal for him. The sharpness of the winter in the Northern Hemisphere was beginning to settle in. Oakley stared at his breath leaving his mouth. He threw his fob into the bowl by the coatrack and the tinny din echoed through the house. He hung up his blazer on the shelf and wandered towards the stand that backed onto the sofa in the main lounge. As he pressed the button on his answering machine, his eyes caught site of a package.

The messages rang through as he poured himself a second Scotch after downing the first one in a single gulp, his eyes maintaining contact with the package the whole time. The package was a hefty box, made of leather and metal, it resembled a briefcase. Sat atop of it was a white envelope which read confidential across the front of it. He flipped the envelope inspecting every inch before setting his glass down to return to the whiskey bottle in the corner of the room. He scoffed almost as if he didn't have the patience to deal with this right now but checked his watch and sucked his teeth. He had to open it soon. Time was running out.

The man in the orange jumpsuit limped along against the blizzard which was certainly kinder at this level of altitude. It even seemed to let up the nearer to civilization he got, he must have been walking for only forty minutes or so. The bitter cold air and the aches in his body made it seem far longer but he revelled in the fortune he had found himself in.

In the distance and getting larger with every step he could make out the first house. As he arrived at the back garden, he was somewhat confused at what he had found. The house ahead of him was huge and cabin-like with almost floor to ceiling windows, he was surprised at how little security surrounded its perimeter though acknowledged it was nicely settled amid the woods. He crouched at the edge of the three-foot high, chain-link fence which seemed to be the only boundary to the building. From where he was crouched, he could peer into the lounge, though the house looked barely lived in, there was a well-dressed man stood in the centre of the room. The man in orange jump-suit thought he looked stressed, weathered almost, he noted how he was not much smaller than him in both height and stature and had to make another decision, for he could not wait out in the snow and bitter cold much longer.

Oakley thought he heard a strange noise come out from somewhere in the back garden and walked up to the back door. Flicking the flood light on, the back garden illuminated, but after seeing nothing but the falling snow through the window he backed away again and plunged the outdoors into darkness. He put his unease down to tension, today had been a very tense day. A draft tickled the back of his neck, and his senses peaked at where it could have possibly come from. He passed his back door again taking a quick glance through the window that was set within the mahogany door frame and walked on through the kitchen into the utility room. He heard a familiar banging. Oakley had been meaning to get that window sorted for a while, it sat just above his chest freezer and had broken sometime in the early autumn. It did not concern him too much; the area was known for its peace and isolation. He tutted under his breath hammering the window into its frame to stop the relentless sound. Oakley lifted the Scotch back up to his mouth again and walked back toward the lounge. He had only the package and its contents on his mind.