D – Decisions to be made

D – Decisions to be made

This continues the story from B – What’s in the Bag? You may want to read that first if you haven’t already. 

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This was a big decision to make and I didn’t want to make it alone. I decided to call my friend Ronald up for advice. Ronald had been my friend since elementary school in the Bronx. He was always coming up with ideas of things to do and I trusted his judgment despite the opinions of others, mostly my family. Suffice it to say, Ronald and I had made a few decisions that hadn’t turned out the way I expected they would.

Regardless of public opinion, I called Ronald and explained what had happened at the laundromat. His response was quick.

“Definitely keep the money. Think of all the things we could buy and places we could go.” Ronald was quite enthusiastic and used the word “we” a lot. 

“But what if this is tainted money and we get caught?” I asked. 

Ronald answered, “Why would we get caught? Who’s going to admit that they left $500,000 in a laundry bag at a laundromat, especially if it is ill-gotten gain.”

This didn’t help my decision. I had some fear that if it was illegal money that I could get in real trouble and possibly put in jail.

Ronald suggested that we keep the money hidden at home and periodically go to the laundromat and see if there were any signs posted for lost cash or any suspicious characters hanging around that might be connected with stolen or counterfeit money. And that’s exactly what we did. One or both of us would pass by every day and look for clues as to the money’s origin. And since I occasionally had to do laundry there, I could get a closer look at the inside of the laundromat. Of course, I was smart enough not to bring my dirty laundry there in my tie-dyed bag, so it wouldn’t be recognized and I stayed there for the entire time my washing and drying took to be done. 

We continued this for three weeks and felt sure that whoever had left the money there, was not coming back. As Ronald said, “Finders keepers, losers weepers.”

The next decision we had to make was where to keep the money. I was afraid that if I put it in a bank there would be too many questions asked. But I also wasn’t comfortable with leaving it home, in case someone broke into my house and found it. Ronald suggested that we could keep it at his house, where he had a lockbox that would keep it secure. So without thinking, I threw all of the money into my laundry bag (the tie-dyed one), slung it over my shoulder, walked over to Ronald’s house, and gave him the money. 

In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have used the same bag that originally held the money. Little did I know, I was being followed. Something I found out the next day when I received a rather alarming phone call from Ronald. The money was gone.

…to be continued in “G – Gone!”