Chapter 11 - Clearing the Foundation
The following weekend, Owen and I decided it was time to reclaim the basement.
For weeks, the heavy metal door to Reid’s secret server room had remained locked under a federal seal while the investigators finished clearing the hardware. Once the marshals finally signed off on the release of the property last Friday, the key was handed over to me with instructions to do whatever I saw fit with the space.
On Saturday afternoon, Owen stood at the bottom of the basement stairs, holding a large cardboard box while I unlocked the heavy metal door.
The door creaked open, revealing the room where the hum of digital servers used to echo. The federal agents had already removed the hard drives and processing units, leaving behind bare metal racks, empty wooden workbenches, and a lingering scent of dust and ozone.
“Are we going to turn it into a game room?” Owen asked, peering inside with wide, curious eyes.
“That was my exact thought,” I said, stepping into the cool room and flipping the wall switch. Bright, warm overhead lights illuminated the entire space for the first time. “Or maybe a workshop for your science projects. What do you think?”
“Can we put a ping-pong table in the middle?” Owen asked excitedly, running his hand along the edge of the large wooden workbench where Reid’s criminal ledgers used to sit. “And maybe a bookshelf for my comic books?”
“We can put whatever you want in here,” I said, walking over to him and resting my hand on his shoulder. “This is your space now, Owen. No locks. No secrets.”
May you like
Over the next two days, we painted the concrete walls a warm, inviting off-white, hauled out the empty server racks, and set up a brand-new ping-pong table right in the center of the room. We spent Sunday afternoon hanging posters of classic science fiction movies and stacking rows of colorful graphic novels along the newly built wooden shelves.
When Reid’s former command center was finally transformed into a bright, chaotic, paint-splattered rec room, it felt as though the dark history of the house had been thoroughly scrubbed away, replaced by the sound of bouncing ping-pong balls and laughter echoing up from the basement stairs.
