I took out my phone, smoothed back his hair once more, and took a photo of the tattoo.
The knock at the door came softly, then the doorknob clicked.
I tucked my phone away and fixed Thomas’s hair.
“Are you ready, ma’am?” The funeral director asked.
“Yes,” I replied, staring down at Thomas.
I sat at the front with my sons and their families for the entirety of the funeral service.
I don’t remember what was said, and I don’t remember crying.
All I could think about was that tattoo.
“Mom, are you okay?” Daniel whispered once it was over.
I looked up at him. For a split second, I thought about telling him what I’d seen.
Then his wife, Sally, moved to my side.
“Of course, she’s not okay, Dan,” Sally said.
“Come, Margaret, let’s go outside and get some fresh air.”
That night, I sat in my too-quiet home, staring at the casseroles on the counter.
I opened the photo on my phone, then slowly typed the numbers into my GPS app.
The map blinked, then loaded.
A red pin dropped at a location 23 minutes away.
I zoomed in and stared at the screen.
It was a storage facility.
I shook my head.
This couldn’t be happening. Thomas didn’t keep secrets! He was the type of person who kept receipts in labeled folders and had a system for his sock drawer.
He told me when he bought new underwear, for Pete’s sake!
That was one of the things I had loved about him — you always knew where you stood with Thomas.
I stared down at the red pin on the map.
Except, apparently, you didn’t.
I didn’t sleep that night.
Instead, I searched for the key to that storage unit.
I opened his dresser and rifled through his clothes.
The smell of him was still caught in the fabric, but there was no key.
Then I went through his coat pockets. I found receipts, a gum wrapper, and a pen from the bank.
I opened his briefcase next and gasped.
A key lay right on top of his laptop!
I lifted it out, and my heart sank.
It was just the key to Thomas’s desk in the garage.
At 1:15, I climbed into the attic in my nightgown and bare feet, pulling the cord for the light. I hadn’t been up there in years.
“Margaret, you’ll break your neck up there,” he used to warn me.
Then he’d head up and do whatever needed doing.
I stood in the middle of all those boxes we’d accumulated together over four decades. There weren’t nearly as many boxes as I thought there would be.
I opened Christmas bins, old tax boxes, and everything else in between.
I found nothing.
There was just one place left to look.
Around 2 a.m., I went into the garage.
He’d always insisted it was his space.
“Don’t reorganize it,” he would say. “I know where everything is.”
His tools hung on a pegboard exactly where he had left them.
His workbench was clean. His desk sat against the far wall.
I pulled at the top drawer; it was locked.
It had never been locked before… had it?
I’d hidden candy in that drawer several times as a surprise for Thomas.
I’d left grocery lists on top of the desk.
I had walked past it ten thousand times without a second thought.
There was only one way to find out. I returned to his briefcase and fetched the key I’d found earlier.
Minutes later, I slid the key into the lock and opened the drawer.
An envelope slid forward.
I lifted it, but it was empty. There were no letters, either.
Not that I was surprised.
Thomas always said paper could be destroyed, and digital files erased. No wonder he tattooed those coordinates onto his skin; what could be less infallible than that?
I reached around inside, feeling for that storage unit key.
That’s how I found the secret compartment.
I noticed the wood panel right at the back didn’t sit flush with the frame. My fingers found the edge.
It shifted, revealing a small hidden compartment, maybe four inches deep.
I stared at it for a long time before I reached in.
My fingers closed around something small, hard, and cold.
I pulled it out.
I held up the key. The number stamped on it said 317.
***
The next morning, I drove to the storage facility alone.
My hands were steady when I stepped out of the car, but they were trembling by the time I slid the key into the lock.
