The Letter: Part Two

“Well, what the fuck does that mean?” I announce.

This is not funny. I wonder if someone I know could have left this here, as a practical joke. I am a loner though; I don’t have many friends. I work from home too, so it’s not like anyone from work decided it was April Fool’s Day summer edition. It’s probably nothing anyway, but there’s a kernel of doubt in the back of my mind. Again, I cannot bring myself to throw it away. Shrugging, I put my foot on the pedal of my trashcan, the lid fully opens and I push the letter down as far as I can physically push the envelope.

               Keeping the letter in my hand, I walk out of the kitchen. Incipit nunc finis, keeps playing in my head. I guess I better figure out what this says. I live alone in my small home, with a home office. Walking into the room I flick on the lights and hit the power button on the laptop. It is so quiet you can hear the fan click on and all the hardware start up. Going to trust the good ole’ Google for this.

               I type, Google Translate, into the browser bar, and “viola”, I’m taken magically to the site I need. Technology is wonderful, most of the time. Clicking the text box under detect language, I slowly type the script from the letter making sure to get it all correct. Incipit nunc finis. I slide my pinky to the right to press the enter key. As it presses down the lights dim and quickly come back up. I slipped off the button before the action activated, quickly looking around but nothing else happened. I hit enter again, the lights dim again. Odd, these bulbs are brand new, they were replaced a week ago.  It is an old house, maybe the wiring is going bad. The lights are quickly forgotten when my eyes focus back on the screen.

               The original text was written in Latin. Not Italian, which was my guess. Translated into English it means, “The end begins now.”

               My heart rate spikes, peaking down at my Fitbit  I see my rate jumped to 120 bpm. I take a deep breath, looking back at the screen on my exhale, “Well, this makes zero sense.”

               I slam my computer shut, skip down the stairs, and walk directly to the trash can. My eyes scan the trash for the green envelope I threw away. I flip it over, back and forth at least six times. It doesn’t matter how long I stare, or how many times I flip it over, there’s no return address, no stamp. There’s no mark from the post office that it even came through their system. There’s no one that I can ask where it shipped from. I have nothing to go on to find the sender. I set it down backside up, the image of the crest quickly becoming engraved into my memory.

               This is dumb, it’s probably nothing and I will likely never find out who sent it. Leaving it on the counter, I head to bed assuming it will blow over. If it doesn’t, if I need to do anything, I will deal with it tomorrow. I finally calm down enough to start drifting off to sleep when there’s a subtle screech coming from outside the window.

               I get up, eyes half open, stumbling on a sweatshirt I threw on the floor. Grumbling, I peel the shades apart with my thumb and pointer finger. No surprise, nothing is there. “Good job Raven, you’ve got yourself all spooked and riled up for nothing.”