Killer Keys – Part 1

An Anatomy of Typewriters Story

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Her phone rang again for the third time in the last half hour. Ignoring her boss who was calling about a deadline was her second favorite thing to do. Her first favorite thing was writing. Though the words seemed to not be flowing as easily as they used to. She knew the reason. It was the time of year. In fact, her boss should also know as well why she was avoiding his calls.

The phone rang a fourth time. Too soon for it to be him so she picked up her cell phone that she had face down beside her laptop to read the caller id: BATTLE-AXE

Nat rolled her eyes and sighed. This was a call she had to answer. If she didn’t then it would be followed by a knock on her door in a day or two. A quick glance around her apartment told her a visit from mom was not ideal at this time.

She tapped the green answer button and forced a smile on her face. Her favorite teacher from high school told her the best way to make anyone believe the lie is to smile. Even over the phone they can feel it.

“Yes, mother?”

“Ouch! Damn it!” Her mother always seemed to call her when she was in the middle of doing something that required two hands. No matter who it was she had to talk to, it waited till she was loading the dishwasher, vacuuming, polishing the silver. She can picture her now, probably clearing out the closet, her cellphone dangling precariously between her left shoulder and her left ear. A box on the brink of falling on top of her as she lowers it onto her foot. “Your great uncle, Lou, passed away last week.” A few muffled sounds and a thunk could be heard on the phone. Nat was used to this and waited before saying anything in response. Her mother just dropped her phone. Muffle. Muffle. “Okay, I’m back.”

“Who the heck is uncle Lou?” Nat asked, staring down at her laptop. The screen dimmed, daring her to swipe along the track pad to bring it back to life. Instead she closed the lid. The last thing she needed was a continuous reminder of a blank page. The cursor blinking at her.

“Grandma Dottie. Your father’s mother. May he rest in piece. She had a brother. You heard us talk about him, surely?” She was starting to get out of breath now, and was breathing heavily into the mic of the phone. 

Nat put her mother on speaker and placed her phone down on the desk in front of her now closed laptop. “Vaguely, mom. Is that the one they put away? Why are you just now telling me a week later?”

“None of us knew till just yesterday. You know how his side of the family is…” Nat tuned her mother out at this point. No matter what reason her mother called the conversation always managed to turn back around towards her father’s side of the family. She claimed they cut her out of any news when he died because they never liked her. If not for Nat and her younger brother they probably would’ve cut her out completely. Blah. Blah. Blah. “…left to you in his will. It should arrive some time today, if not already.”

“Wait, what?” Nat tuned her mother back in when she heard the word ‘will’ but it was too late, her mother was already much too preoccupied to repeat herself.

“Listen, your brother is coming over with my grand baby so I can’t stay on the phone all day with you.”

“You called me, mother. Remember?”

“Talk soon. Kisses.” Her mother blew her two kisses through the phone and hung up. Nat stayed staring at the phone. Whenever she got off the phone with her mother it always felt like less of a conversation and more of a public service announcement: Here Are the Things You Must Be Told. Hang Up. Done.

Her mother never asked her how she was doing. Never showed the slightest interest in her career. In fact, she’d never stepped foot inside of Nat’s apartment. One day Nat won’t answer and it will force her mother to come and see her place. 

Nat leaned back in her chair and turned to look out of her seventh floor window. The curtains were drawn but they were the shear kind. She could see an overcast of clouds were about to step in front of the sun. The perfect time for putting words down on the page. She opened her laptop and hovered her fingers over the keys to type in her password when her intercom buzzer went off.

She pushed the TALK button on the square box next to her front door and said, “Yes?”

“Package for Natalie Winter.”

TALK: “Bring it up.” She pushed the door button and heard a buzz to let her know she had unlocked the door downstairs to let them in.

The present from her uncle already? Her mother had only just called her to expect it. Knowing her mother, who was always late with news, she knew about it days ago but only just today remembered to tell her daughter about it.

She looked through her front door peep hole and waited for the delivery man to reach her floor from the elevator. She heard a whistling and knew it must be him. When he rounded the corner to her apartment she opened her door, a bit taken aback by two things.

The first was the delivery man. He was actually wearing a recently pressed suit and tie. Long hair pulled back tight in a ponytail, black square rimmed glasses, and a goatee. He was no ordinary delivery man. The second was the large box he carried using two hands. It was rather heavy and he had to use one leg to help him leverage it in his arms better.

“Do you have someplace I can put this down before I drop it, ma’am?” His voice was a soft whisper that she barely heard over the sound of the elevator doors closing and descending back to the ground floor.

“Oh, of course. Come in,” Nat said, stepping to one side to let him in. She winced at the sight of her cluttered apartment. She wasn’t expecting a delivery. Let alone a delivery that would require letting a perfect stranger into her apartment to put it down somewhere. She closed the front door and followed close behind him, directing him towards her tiny kitchen table where she pushed aside bills and magazines to make room for the box.

He stepped back and reached into the inside pocket of his suit. “If you could just sign here and initial here,” he said, pointing to two places on a piece of paper he unfolded and placed on the box. He also pulled out a pen that he clicked and handed to her.

“You’re not my usual mail man,” Nat said, signing where he directed. She closed her eyes briefly, realizing how stupid she must sound having said that.

“I work for the law firm that handled Mr. Nathanial I. Winter’s estate upon his passing.”

“Really? I’m afraid I hardly knew my great uncle,” she said, handing him back his pen which he promptly clicked and replaced in his pocket along with the paper she signed. “What’s in the box? I can’t imagine he knew I existed let alone would’ve left me something. I thought he wasn’t allowed to have any personal things at the sanitarium.”

The man’s face hardened and she could tell he was not amused by her words. “Happydale was not a sanitarium, ma’am. And your great uncle lived a most interesting life right up until the end.” He took a step towards Nat who was frozen in place. She looked around for a weapon, should she need one at this moment, but her knives were all dirty and at the bottom of her sink. “He was always most fond of you. In fact, during our last visit with him he insisted you were to receive his most prized possession. He said you were the only one in his family who would know exactly how to use it.” He then turned and headed towards her front door. She watched him leave without saying a word. She didn’t know what to say. How could her great uncle think so highly of her? They’ve never met. Whenever she heard about him, he was already a resident of Happydale and from the way her family spoke about it, his stay there was for his safety as well as theirs.

She retrieved a blade from her junk drawer in the kitchen and opened it to open the box. On top of it was the business card of Randell Sayers, Junior Associates at Crocker, Pfeiffer and Associates.

Slicing through the tape around the box the flaps opened slightly and she pulled all four back to reveal crumpled newspaper. She tossed them aside, excited for what she might find inside. She saw the black case that was almost as square as the box it came in. She reached inside and used all the strength she could muster to lift the case out of the box. It was rather large and much heavier than she anticipated it to be.

The word ROYAL was embossed in silver letters on the case and Nat knew exactly what it was. She managed to get it onto her desk and tossed her laptop on the nearby couch to set up the case perfectly center. She then went to work finding the four clasps that were on all four sides of the case. Once she found them she took a deep breath and lifted the lid that was not as heavy as the full case. She set it beside her desk and sat down in front of a vintage typewriter. It was just like one she’d always wanted growing up but her parent’s would never buy her.

The blood red Royal typewriter looked as old as it was with scuff marks along the side and some letters on keys were worn more than others. Nat had no idea her great uncle was a writer just like her. She pushed her chair back from the desk and bent down to look under it where she kept her printer. With no other clear surfaces in her apartment it was the best place for it. Unfortunately, there was no paper there. She forgot to buy a new ream when she ran out a week ago.

She went back to the box and looked inside to find more crumpled newspapers at the bottom that she pulled out. Under them were two folders. The first was the same color red like the typewriter and had about one hundred sheets of blank paper, maybe more. Just what she was looking for. She set it aside and looked in the other folder. It had a handwritten letter from her great uncle to her that read:

Nat put down the letter and looked at the typewriter with a sense of fear she couldn’t quite place. She reached out one finger and quickly tapped the N key. The clicky sound it made felt amazing to her. She clicked it once more, slowly. Watching the letter rise from its resting place and strike the drum. She laughed to herself for letting her great uncles letter scare her. 

But what did he mean that he was murdered? Her mother didn’t tell her that. She didn’t say much about how he died now that she recalled their conversation in her head. She needed answers but knew calling her mother back wasn’t going to yield much results. This called for a Google search but not before she poured herself a drink.

Putting the typewriter to one side she fired up her laptop and got to work trying to Google her dead relative. As she might have guessed, he had no social media footprint at all. Why would he? He spent most of his childhood and adult life in an institution where any interaction he had with the digital or outside world would’ve been monitored. She figured that’s why he had, and cherished, his typewriter so much. 

Then she decided to search the name of the place where he lived his entire life but she didn’t know the name. Why would she. It wasn’t like she was writing him any letters and she doesn’t remember her mother ever mentioning visiting Uncle Nat. Her drink was starting to affect her. Made her feel dizzy as she shut her laptop and moved it aside for the typewriter that she plonked down in front of her. 

She started typing and chuckled when she realized there was no paper in the typewriter. She poured herself another glass and went to the table to retrieve a few sheets of the blank paper that accompanied it. As she sat down she noticed something strange about the feel of the paper in her hands. It wasn’t like printer white paper. She turned on the reading lamp on her desk and held it under to examine it closely. It was slightly thicker and felt rough to the touch, like it was as old as the typewriter it accompanied.

She fed one page into the typewriter and proceeded to type her name “NAT” in all caps and yawned before downing the rest of her drink. She was suddenly too exhausted to do anymore work. Her bed was calling her and she wasn’t going to let the sound of tapping keep her from the rest her mind and body were longing for.