In the Absence of a Good Life

(22) Stealing a Pound of Flesh

One Half of the Comedy Duo (A.K.A - The Sarcastic One - Shelly)

I'd managed to remove most of the feathers from my room while I'd thought over the steps and problems of the plan that I'd come up with.

It was entirely plausible, it might actually work!

Gus never put the money that he'd made off of his 'victims' into the bank for several reasons. One of them was that he didn't trust the corrupt money prisons. Another reason that was probably the most important, was that receiving large amounts of money when he had no discernible job would look a bit suspicious. He didn't want to be investigated by the police. He wanted to stay low, under the radar.

I knew that he kept his money in the house, he'd never truly moved out, he just lived between several places. He'd never taken any of his things with him when he left, so we never got the impression that he'd gone for sure.

Gus always came back home for special occasions, like birthdays, family reunions and Christmas. There were, however, those times when he'd come back home for seemingly inexplicable reasons. He usually said that it was because he missed seeing us, but now, I knew the truth.

He only came home in those times so that he could deposit his filthy money in the house somewhere. Of course, I didn't know this for sure, but I was pretty certain. His visits always seemed to coincide with his coming into a large period of financial gain. He used to boast about his successes to our Dad whenever he was here. So from this, I knew, somewhere or other, the money was here and I would find it.

I just had to wait for the opportune moment to search his room. It was the most likely place where he hid his money. He always got really tetchy whenever anyone attempted to go in it. He even got angry at our grandmother whenever she tried to go in his room to clean it. They used to get into the most horrendous arguments over it.

Another thing that proved my hypothesis, was that anytime that he was absent from the house, for however long, he would always lock the door to his room.

My choices on how to complete the first step in my carefully formulated plan, were numerous. The most obvious and possibly the easiest were that I could either steal the key, or pick the lock myself.

I decided to try and pick the lock first, and then attempt to steal the key if I failed. Gus was always very protective over his possessions, so I knew that he'd protect the key with everything he had. He was also very aware of attempts of pickpocketing, since the people that owed money to him were usually desperate and didn't live in 'good' areas of town. He had to have his wits about him whenever he personally entered those 'dodgy' areas, and as a result, he knew when someone was trying to mug him.

Also, if Gus twigged that I was trying to enter his room, my whole plan would be ruined. He'd take extra precautions in securing his room and probably wouldn't leave it unless it was absolutely necessary.

If I failed, then it would all rest on Jimmy and Terrance to solve their problem. I couldn't see any way of making big money by the end of the week, so I assumed that if I failed, Jimmy would die, and Terrance would hate me forever. I'd have the weight of Jimmy's death on my shoulders and I'd have to bear it for the rest of my life. I knew I wouldn't be able to live with it. So failure wasn't an option.

I searched on-line for how to pick a lock. I knew that the locks in the house were simple ones, something that the Internet called 'simple pin-and-tumbler locks'. I read various articles, and they all suggested the use of good quality 'picks' and  'tension wrenches'.

I'd never heard of them before, but a quick search on eBay told me that they were well within my budget, relatively easy to acquire and available for delivery before the end of the week. Perfect. I ordered a set and started to practise my newly found skills on my en-suite bathroom lock.