Brennan and Riz - Pandemic Blues part 3

Greetings everyone!
Back with more from everyone's favourite trio of a man, woman and talking rat. The lockdown continues and things are starting to get weirder...

Brennan and Riz: Pandemic Blues part 3

Day 5

Things were ticking along fine, Riz and Valarie had entered a sort of stalemate situation where they just didn’t speak to each other, which suited me fine really. I could do without the agro they created. This morning though, Valarie stopped me from entering the office room, instead making me wait in the hallway, as she spied through the halfway open door. I could see in her eyes that she had mischief on the mind.

“Bren, by any chance, have you seen what the inside of Riz’s drawer looks like?” She asked.
“The inside? No, but I’m not sure I’d want to, I mean it’s a rat nest, it’s probably just a giant mess that even hardened cleaners would balk at.” I’d never peeked into his drawer for that reason, frightened at what new life might be growing in there. He was constantly taking food in, and once something went in, it only rarely came back out again. On saying that, there was an exception. Books. Books, once he’d finished with them, would be exchanged. Though depending on who the books belonged to, their condition differed.

“So you’re never curious on how big that drawer is? Yesterday, I saw him haul ten volumes of Grevel’s Testament, the Heraz Codexies, and that badly translated copy of the Necronomicon you have.” Valarie said, rolling her eyes.

“That copy is still valuable! So what if every other word is misspelled....” I said in my defence. “Still, yeah, I get that his drawer wouldn’t have enough space for those books, and just those books...But he doesn’t have it open long enough to have a look!”
“Can’t you just open it when he’s not here? Or asleep? He’s not a light sleeper you know. I could go in there and play the tuba full blast, and he wouldn’t even shudder. So I doubt he’d notice if you just went in and opened his drawer.”

“If you’re so sure about that, why are we stood out here?” I pointed out, and Valarie looked at me, then sighed.
“Because it’s early and I haven’t had coffee in twenty hours.” She said, raising another question.

“Why twenty hours? I got enough of that stuff in, you’re the only one who drinks that kind. Riz goes for that stronger stuff that Alice likes.” This may seem like we were going off on a tangent, and that’s because we were.

“I haven’t touched it since I saw Riz doing...You know what, that doesn’t matter, just know that I’ve swapped his coffee supply for the stuff I would have been drinking. I may have picked up a lot from Alice, but I certainly haven’t picked up her taste for that particular blend. I did try it once and I think I didn’t sleep for two weeks. After that long you think you can see through phases of reality.”

“So not fit for human consumption?”
“Did she ever give you anything that was?”
“Touché” Valarie then remembered what we were talking about in the first place.
“...Anyway, point is, why haven’t you gone and looked in Riz’s drawer?”
“Because he uses a magic lock on it, to keep people out.”
“Even on your desk?”
“Yup, he was quite explicit on having his own personal space where he could go.”
“Never took him for one to have his own safe space.” Valarie eyed back into the office, and my desk. Her mind was now probably unravelling the mysteries of Riz’s drawer, slowly tying me up into it all, which would only end up badly for me. “Well, can’t say I’ve ever came across a lock that I couldn’t break into.” She said smiling at the challenge.

“Problem is waiting till he’s not around. That tends to be when he goes off drinking with the old gods. I think even they are in lockdown, or at least the places they’d end up are closed because of it.”

“That is a problem...Must be something we can do, a way to get him to leave that drawer unoccupied.” The way she was going on, it almost seemed like there was an ulterior motive going on behind the scenes, driving her to want to uncover Riz’s secret space. Then I saw a twisted smile cross her face, no doubt an idea had entered her mind. She then went into my room, and looked at the calendar. “Perfect...” She muttered to herself. Then she turned back to me, her smile, her normal joyous one again. “I’ll take care of everything. Tomorrow, we’ll expose the secrets of that drawer, and whatever the rat is hiding in there.”

“Oh boy.” I absent mindedly muttered.
“What?”
“Just that every time you talk like that, it normally ends up bad time for me. Like that time with the Gnomes, or that time where you got us to take on that Demon. Not to mention all those other jobs where you’ve basically used us as bait.” I can still hear the calls of the Gnomes on those still days near a forest, where there’s a low wind, low enough to carry the voices of the little people.

“Did I or did I not pay you well for those jobs? Plus on some of those jobs, it was Riz who was the bait, you just stupidly put yourself between him and the danger. Can’t be blamed for that.” She shrugged.
“Well, yeah you paid very well, but my point is that, well, the smile of yours leads to trouble. Specially for me.”

“Come on Bren, I wouldn’t put you in any trouble I didn’t know if you could get yourself out of.” She said seductively, and I felt my temperature starting to rise, as she leaned forward. Let’s face it, we all know what happened here. Didn’t do anything to ease the bad feeling I was having about the impending drawer job...