The street lights hit the fifty dollar bills in a way I can't quite describe. If you've ever seen a briefcase full of cash, you'll know money looks different when they're all banded into sets. They feel different in your hands too. Heavy and important. I've never seen this much money all together in one place. I'm mesmerized a while.

Ben's mouth is a little open. He keeps staring at the box and even Omar's quiet for a moment. None of us expected this. At least, I don't think we did.

"What do we do with it?" Omar picks up a stack, flicks through the notes and then puts it back.

"Well," Ben replies. "I think it's obvious, we keep it."

"I don't disagree," I swallow. "There's no point in returning it."

Ben nods a little too eagerly. I don't blame him for it though. We got lucky. Really lucky.

"How much do you think there is?" I ask.

"No clue, at least a thousand? Probably more," Omar stands up, the case under his arm.

Somehow Ben looks pale even under the sharp orange lights. Cars drive past, blissfully unaware of this enormous treasure three dying kids have found.

"Careful," Ben says. "Someone might hear us."

"There's nobody else here," Omar deadpans.

"I know, I'm just saying we should go back to the hotel where it's safe."

"I don't think anywhere is safe with that much money," I cross my arms over my chest as the cold begins to crawl up my jaw and nose. The wind picks up, sliding my hoodie off.

"Who stashes so much cash anyway?" Ben mutters, more to himself than to anyone else.

"This has to be Stewart's money but why did he leave it behind?" Omar asks.

"Maybe it's been there for years," Ben guesses. "It doesn't mean he's alive."

"Good thing we still have time then," Omar brushes Ben's pessimism off.

"We could just take the money," Ben looks at me to back him up but I stay silent. We could be done by tomorrow and still catch a flight. Another 24 hours means nothing to me. At least, it's slowly starting to look that way for me.

Omar is quiet as he stares at Ben. I can sense the tension between them. This is maybe the third or fourth time Ben's suggested we go back.

"Nobody's stoppin' you pal," Omar says, gruffly. We start walking towards the hotel and nobody really says anything the rest of the way. Ben excuses himself and takes the stairs instead. It's probably because he's equally pissed and tired. Not too tired to take the stairs though, I guess. Omar and I take the elevator to our respective floors.

I let a casual 'good night' slip over my shoulder just as the silver doors close.

When I wake up, the sun slights through a gap in the drawn curtains. My sheets are disheveled, one leg out and the other, across the spare pillow. The room is hot, my shirt sticks to my back as I sit up in bed. I've overslept somehow.

I quickly check my phone for any missed calls. There aren't any so I take my stuff to the bathroom, have a quick shower and call Omar's cell phone. He answers on the third ring.

"Have you seen Ben?" he asks, hastily.

"No, I just woke up," I tell him. "Why?"

"He's not in our room," Omar continues. "And I can't find the brief case."

"Uh-" I pause, unsure how to reply. "Are you sure?"

"I've checked the room, it's not where I left it last night. Ben isn't picking up either."

"Where are you?" I step out of my room, heading towards the elevators.

"Reception."

"I'm on my way."

I find Omar slouched over on one of the chairs by the entrance. His hands are clasped together and when I sit down next to him, he gives me a tight lipped look of acknowledgement.

"Can you try calling him?" he asks.

I listen to the monotonous ring, one after another until eventually, I reach his voicemail. I leave him a message but my heart still sinks. It's already decided it knows Ben better than any of us.

"Where did you keep the money?" I ask, lowering my phone from my ear after another failed attempt of reaching Ben.

"It was under my bedside table," Omar rubs his palms over his eyes, giving him this sort of dazed look. "I've been trying to reach Ben since 9. It's been two hours."

"Maybe he's gone to deposit it," I offer.

"Yeah, in his bank account," Omar laughs sourly.

"We don't know that yet."

"Don't we? He might have slipped out right after I fell asleep. There's no way of knowing and now, he won't even pick up."

"We should still wait for him," I shake my head.

"I need to visit the guy who wrote that article about Stewart," Omar sighs. "I've wasted enough time already. You ready to check out?"

"Check out? What if Ben comes back here."

"He won't, trust me," he says, solemnly.

"Well shit," I lean back in my seat, looking up at the lights on the ceiling.

"I'll meet you down here in five?"

"Yeah okay," I finally say.

We don't bring up Ben until we're half way there. When Ben doesn't pick up my fifth call, Omar tells me to give it up. Ben is gone. The money is too.

   "I didn't think he could do something like that," I begin.

"Why not?"

I'm a little baffled by his question, "I don't know, just doesn't seem like the type."

"Everyone's capable of doing bad things," Omar says rather philosophically.

"Have you?"

"What?"

"Have you done anything bad before?" I clarify.

"Probably. I don't think I have intentionally but everyone's a villain in someone else's story, right?"

"Huh."

"What?" he arches an eyebrow a little.

"Nothing. Just thinking whose story I might be a villain in."

"I can make a guess," Omar says.

"You're hilarious."

"Well for now, Ben's a fucking villain in my book," he says as he matches my stride.

"I guess he really needed the money," I shrug.

"Doesn't everybody? You just don't screw people, you don't do that," he says a little angrily.

"I'm glad he couldn't grab what we have in our accounts," I mumble, kicking a stone and watching it hop on to the road.

"Yeah," he says, a little distracted.

  "We're here," he announces as we stop in front of a medium sized, dull-yellow painted building. Some of the windows are covered in brown colored parchment paper, some giving partially occluded views into the rooms.

"It looks empty," I comment.

"Nah, they have cars parked out," he replies. "It's definitely not empty."

"What is this place?"

"Local newspaper print press," he tells me. "A run down one at that."

"Sad."

"You ready?" he asks.

I hook my thumbs under my backpack straps and nod, following Omar into the building. We walk right in and there's no security, nobody to ask us who we are and why we're here. I can only assume Omar knows where he's going so I take my time to look around, into the number of rooms we walk past. The sun slices into the corridor through a narrow dip in the architecture, settling on the thick fabric of Omar's overshirt. We carry on through to the staircase where there's a brown panel on the wall. He pauses, reading the list of various names on the board before continuing upstairs.

"Is this the one?" I ask as he stops outside one of the offices.

"Yeah," he mumbles, pulling out his phone to check.

He drums his knuckle on the door twice and a voice from inside tells us to come in. The door opens, revealing a man with dark curly hair looking up at us through silver glasses. His chin is in his hands, sleeves rolled up and elbows on the table like we've just interrupted a thinking session.

"Who are you?" he asks, abrasively.

I think this is the first time I've seen Omar freeze up, like get really nervous. He stutters at first.

"Omar, we've talked on the phone a couple of times."

Something flashes across the guy's eyes. He slides his arms off the table and folds them across his chest.

"I remember you," he tells him. "Not many Omars call me."

"Yeah well-"

"I told you I can't help you," he cuts him off. "I'm not sure who let you in here."

"You don't have any security," I answer him. He looks at me like he didn't know there was anyone else here. His eyebrows are knitted in confusion and it's starting to feel an awful lot like we've cornered him or something.

"I read what you wrote," Omar lays it out straight. "All I want to know is why the article was taken down.

"What article?"

"Charles Stewart Jr." Omar says with no emotion. "The guy who outlived his stag letter."

"Alright," the guy gets up, rubbing his hands together. "I think I've entertained this long enough."

"I went to his house," Omar says suddenly. "And I found something."

"Kid, you need to quit," he maneuvers around the table.

"Charles Stewart never had a funeral. At least not one anyone attended or can prove. He hid a whole lot of cash in his garden and your newspaper published an article about seeing him alive. Your article. There were witness reports but what I don't understand is why the story of the century was removed from the public like that?"

The guy stares blankly at Omar with no identifiable expressions. For a second, I think he's battling between his own thoughts and my muscles grow rigid with anxiety.

"That article was a mistake."

"So I guess all the witnesses made a mistake too?"

"Why are you so obsessed with this, kid?"

"What are you hiding?"

"I'm sorry you had to make the journey for nothing. Take my advice and spend this time with your family," Joseph starts preaching.

"Fuck you, I don't need to be doing anything except exposing whoever is doing this to us," Omar fumes.

Joseph blinks, not reacting to Omar's curses. "You came here all the way from Georgia for nothing kid. Go home."

"You have people's blood on your hands by hiding this," Omar continues. 

"You seem awfully confident, Omar. But life is not one of your Facebook conspiracies."

"That's why you started one with your article in the first place, am I right?" he responds. 

Omar comes off too confrontational so I'm not surprised when the guy threatens to have us escorted off the premises unless we willingly leave. Of course, Omar gets a few threatening words in himself but he never pleads, not once.

"You're letting hundreds of people die by keeping their secret," Omar's voice echoes in the corridor as Joseph begins to shrink in the doorway. 

"Get out of here," his voice shrinks too. 

"Why won't you just tell us?" Omar tries for the last time. "Are you scared of someone? The government? Is it the fucking government?"

"I'm sorry this is happening to you but there is no escaping your stag mail, kids. Now get out of here before I seriously call the cops."

We walk downstairs and exit the building. Omar charges out ahead of me and I'm half expecting he'll start producing smoke through his ears with how pissed off he is. Kid. I feel the word hot branded into my rear with the amount of times he's used it. 

It doesn't dawn on me how fucked we are until we get to a gas station and Omar leaves me alone by the pumps to use the bathroom. I watch cars park and their owners get out to fill their tanks just to listen to the dull whirring of their engines when they drive away.

Omar walks out of the station and holds his hand up, signaling me to wait. I watch him circle the station and disappear in the back. A minute passes and the sun feels hotter than it was before so I follow him, in search of some shade.

Behind the station, in the middle of some patchy yellow grass, Omar has his forehead on the ground. Seeing this, I'm a little perplexed as he gets up, hands overlapped over his stomach. When he finally sweeps his head to the side, his eyes meet mine and I realize he must have been praying.

He gets up and dusts his dark blue jeans with the back of his hands. Walking towards me, his eyes are slightly squinted from the sun falling harshly on us.

"What was that about?" my shoulder nudges across his as we walk down the road.

"Just needed a moment to myself."

"I didn't know you were religious."

He shrugs, "And you're not? Even when you're dying?"

I've been pretty realistic about this stag mail ordeal but it's something else hearing Omar talk about it so pessimistically. Has he lost hope then? Has he given up his theory of the government killing innocent civilians?

"I haven't thought about it," I say earnestly. "Maybe I should."

"Maybe," he cracks a sad looking smile and for a while I forget that Joseph is a selfish and pathetic man and that Ben stole all our fucking money. And I forget that my mom doesn't know I'll be gone soon and that my future is looking bleaker every passing day.