Margen
Previously: Ruth and Yeray went into the depot warehouse at 4:10 with a borrowed battery. The recorder printed the first line from 2023.
At 4:55 the fluorescents came on across the whole warehouse. At 5:00 the side door opened for the first person arriving: Chelo Marí, in charge of the Calle Reyes office for the past nineteen years. She was carrying her keys hooked over her thumb and a small thermos in the other hand. She stopped in the doorway.
"Shut the bonnet, Ruth."
Ruth Anglada, twenty-two years old and three weeks into her contract, kept her hands where they were, holding the side door of the refrigerated van. Yeray Fabra, maintenance technician, was cradling the battery as if that could rewind the scene.
"Chelo, this only takes fifteen minutes," Ruth said. "Just the keys, the date and the door openings. The tow truck comes at nine."
"Shut the bonnet."
Chelo set the thermos on the counter and stepped slowly up to the van. She stopped a metre away. She looked at the strip of paper spilling out of the recorder, twelve centimetres already printed in double letters: 09/02/2023 22:31 IGNITION KEY 02. 22:44 DOOR OPEN. 23:15 DOOR OPEN.
"Nineteen years, Ruth. I've been here since 2007. Two kids, a flat, five more years and early retirement by seniority. With what's in there," she pointed at the strip without touching it, "I lose those five years and they open a file on me on top. Do you get it or don't you get it?"
"I get it."
"Then shut the bonnet."
Ruth didn't shut it. Yeray, still holding the battery, looked for Ruth with his eyes.
"Aitana Pomares has been coming to pay the 80 euros on the 3rd for three years," Ruth said. "You alert her yourself because you know her from before. And now you're going to leave her with nothing."
"I'm not leaving her with nothing. I'm leaving her without this. Aitana knew what she was doing."
"Aitana was seventeen when her brother was reported. She took out twenty thousand euros under her mother's name. What's inside that grey box is the only proof of who started the van that night."
Chelo shook her head. Not angry: tired.
"Ruth, listen. The tow truck comes in at nine. Cardus signs the batch at quarter past nine. If at quarter past nine there's a paper strip on the counter with KEY 02 and a false intake sheet, I'm not taking the fall alone. Bruno takes it too, and at midday he rings the company and by three we're both on record. Me by name. You, not renewed. And Aitana, with that paper you're talking about, what? What court is she going to with a document taken from a vehicle in custody?"
"She'll take it to her lawyer. She'll know what to do."
"The lawyer can't file it, love."
Ruth went silent. Yeray put the battery down. The recorder kept printing on its own: 23:32 DOOR OPEN. 00:04 IGNITION KEY 01.
Chelo looked at the last line. She moved her head a little, like someone confirming what she already knew. Then she turned around, crossed the warehouse to the counter and opened the low cupboard where the register was kept. She took out two rolls of type-57 thermal paper, still wrapped in the stationery-shop plastic. She placed them on the counter, side by side, neatly.
"I have breakfast at La Espiga, on the corner," she said without turning. "I'm leaving now, twelve minutes there and back, and I drink my coffee sitting down. I'll be back at half past five sharp."
She tucked the thermos under her arm and reached for the warehouse keys.
"Oh, and by half past five," she added, hand already on the door, "there can't be any battery on the floor, no van with a side door open, nothing that wasn't here before. On the checklist on the bonnet you write that the 214 has been inspected and is ready for transport. I sign it when I'm back."
She opened the side door. Dawn was starting.
"If by half past five this is still all open," she said, already outside, "the three of us go in again, and I'll be filming on my phone. And this conversation never happened."
She closed it.
Ruth kept looking at the two rolls of thermal paper. Yeray kept looking at Ruth.