“Burner”

“Ya gotta light?”

Keaton nodded and tossed him the bic and watched as he lit up the camel.

There was something undignified about waiting in line. It wrapped around the block. Keaton was glad he got here an hour early.
He winced as he pushed the lighter back into his pocket. A couple days ago he lost his cool at one of those food lines and ended up putting his fist through a plate glass window. At the hospital they managed to patch him up but not before telling him the micro-fractures would take weeks to heal. Effing lines.

“Bullshit Amy!” The girl in front of him huffed irritatingly into her phone. “Hacked? You know damn well you ain’t get hacked girl. You always be gettin off the computer without loggin out. It ain’t nobody else’s fault. Give a fuck if you mad-“ She suddenly paused and looked at her phone. Apparently Amy had hung up. The girl briefly made eye contact with him and he looked away somewhat embarrassed for her.

“Number 3?…number 3?”

“Um. Here-right here!” Keaton waved his ticket stub and sped towards the front desk.

“Purpose for your visit?”

“I’m here to reinstate my benefits.”

“No problem. Please enter your social using the keypad.”

Keaton punched in the numbers and caused something to clatter to the floor. Bending down he noticed it was a phone. He picked it up and looked around for the girl who had come before him. He saw her standing off to one side hunched over. As he got closer he realized she had her phone in her hand texting rapidly and stopped short-confused. Who’s phone was this? The first person in line had long since left and he was the third person in. A feeling of recklessness came over him. He popped open the phone-took out the battery-and stuffed it all into his pants.

His pulse was still thumping like crazy even after his appointment. He was sure someone had seen him pick up the phone and any minute now the rightful owner would confront him about it before he could leave the building. When no one didn’t-outside he hopped on the next bus that happened to stop in front of him.
The bus was empty and the back of it seemed like an ideal spot incase people started coming on. He popped the battery back into the phone and turned it on. Sure enough there had been at least five missed calls from around the time he had found the phone. It suddenly vibrated and Keaton nearly dropped it. He let it buzz and began pouring through the contents of the phone. What he immediately noticed was the number of banking apps installed. He tapped an icon for one and his heart nearly stopped. The balance said 100k!

A shrill sound echoed through the penthouse hallway.

“Baby?” A woman’s voice called.

“Yeah?”

“Its that number again.”

“Let it ring.”

The years had gone by and Keaton’s life had done a 360. After a series of wire transfers he had managed to siphon over four million dollars of which he used to build a better life for himself. The phone’s owner never bothered to deactivate it or even to reset the banking app’s passwords. The name on the accounts read ‘D. Guillermo’. Other than that there was not much else. No way to even return the phone. The phone itself was long gone though. After the bulk of the money was successfully transferred to his own accounts Keaton then sought to cover his tracks. It seemed to work. The only thing that annoyed him was these automated calls from a foreign number. Whenever he picked up it would be a robotic-sounding woman asking him to please hold while she transferred him to some guy called Dawn. Lately the calls became more frequent.

The shrill sound ended abruptly which meant that Kim had hung up. The doorbell rang and from the bathroom Keaton heard the door open. Voices reverberated through the hall as he made his way towards the door. It was likely the delivery he’d been expecting. As his feet touched the warm wet crimson puddle slowly spreading over the surface of the tiles he didn’t bother looking at the visitors to see who they were. He turned sharply in vain-desperately trying to make it to a nearby bedroom. He slipped.

The Don gave them a subtle nod and the men moved forward. In one of their hands a bag. A single drop of a dark substance fell from it and onto the white sand. After peering into it’s depths the Don gave the men a satisfied smile and waved them away.