Trash to trillions

IMPOSSIBLE MIRACLE

The door opened and Caelum flashed a big smile at the ten years old girl who opened the door. Her hair was held up in a pig tail, and she was wearing an old set of pajamas.

“Big brother, you're back.”

He smiled broadly at her, and showed her the bag of supplies he bought.

“Of course, didn't you miss me?”

She threw herself into his arms and burst into tears.

“We thought something had happened to you. They said… the landlord…” She kept hiccuping and crying, unable to complete her words.

Caelum bit his trembling lips hard, trying his best to hold back the emotions surging in his chest.

“I'm back now, aren't I? Look, I bought your favorite pork ribs, and beef tenderloin. Let's make some beef stew, grilled pork and shredded beef pasta, alright?”

He moved them inside and locked the door. The first thing his eyes saw was the broken furniture and clothes strewn all around. His sickly brother walked out at that moment, he smiled the moment he saw Caelum.

“Big brother, you're home. Are you alright?”

“What happened here?”

“The landlord came earlier with thugs and smashed the place. He said we haven't paid the rent for eight months, and you have been arrested for murder. He was going to return tomorrow to throw us out.”

Caelum exhaled a heavy breath.

“Don't worry, nothing will happen. I'm back now. I won't let you all suffer from now on.”

“Big brother you're injured. Everytime you go to that place, you come back sad and brutalized. And now…”

“Daniela, I'm fine. Go sit down with Denise while I clean up this place and make some dinner.”

*****

Caelum smiled as he adjusted the blanket on the twins who were already sleeping. Immediately they finished eating the huge bowl of spaghetti he served them, they fell asleep, and he barely managed to make Denise take his drugs.

“From now on, there will be no more eating of stale buns and cold meals. I will do everything necessary to make money. Being kind and soft hearted never pays. In the end, money and power is the only thing that truly matters, not being a good and honest person.”

He sat on the floor beside their mattress and brought out his laptop which was a gift from the old lady when he maintained a 5.0 CGPA throughout his first year in the university. The landlord had destroyed their wooden bed frame, alongside the tables and chairs, but the laptop was spared.

Due to the nature of their ghetto neighborhood, he had made a hole in the wooden floor board where he hid valuables to prevent robbers from striking in his absence. They wouldn't kill because of the neighborhood watch, so life was safe to an extent. But as for valuables, not so much.

Who would have known that his habit would save him now?

He opened the laptop and logged into the trading account. He had learned trading for years, alongside cyber security, ethical hacking, and coding. Some of it were classes paid for by the old woman, the rest he either learnt himself or paid for through his multiple part time jobs. His head was a literal treasure trove of knowledge, with an unnaturally high IQ of 162, he never got anything below an A+ since his first grade.

The trading began. With his vast knowledge, he began the buying and selling, watching the charts till 3 a.m when he dozed off.

Meanwhile, while he was sleeping, his computer was blowing up with notifications. But after all he went through during the past two days, his body system was too tired to register the sound.

The next morning, it was the sound of his siblings moving around in the kitchen, trying to heat up the previous night's leftovers that woke him up.

He sat up to see Daniella beside him with a plate of warm spaghetti and a glass of water, smiling at him.

“Big brother, wake up and brush your teeth. I heated up the food.”

He yawned lazily and opened his eyes. The first place his eyes went to was the trading screen.

The lines kept climbing in colorful green, and the right icon seemed to be showing extra zeroes from what he remembered. He immediately sat up and grabbed the laptop. The sleep vanished from his eyes, and his mind instantly became alert.

“It increased to ten million dollars.”

A huge smile spread on his face, but he soon frowned. The zeroes seemed to be more than that, and the numbers kept steadily increasing by the second, frightening him.

He quickly checked his main account, to confirm his trading balance, but it was still the same case, the numbers kept steadily increasing.

“Ten million, hundred… a trillion?” His eyes went wide with shock, and then his heart sank.

“My computer must have broken down or caught a bug.” The joy he felt when he woke up disappeared, and he closed the trading account to fix the malfunction.

But after thirty minutes of running a thorough check using his extensive knowledge of computers, he didn't find anything wrong with any of the apps, system, or even the trading account.

He opened the trading account again, and this time it had increased to ten trillion, making him even more confused.

“Could it be that this is a dummy account, not real dollars? Did I misunderstand? She could have given me this to practice trading. But why is it showing ‘exchange and withdraw to bank account’?”

The twins who had brought their food to the room to eat with him kept watching him. The frown on his face had gotten so deep that the space between his brows had formed furrows.

“Big brother, what's wrong?”

“This won't do, I need to take this to a professional to check if this is real or not. This is beyond my capacity.”

He quickly got up and rushed into the bathroom. In a few minutes, he had brushed his teeth, taken his bath and dressed up in his faded jeans, T-shirt, and black hoodie.

Caelum intentionally wore hoodies to prevent the previous day's situation from recurring. He couldn't afford being delayed by the nosy crowd.

“Big brother, you haven't eaten.”

“You both can have it. While returning, I will buy more food. If I'm not back on time, you can use the remaining things in the kitchen to prepare egg fried rice and meat. I will be back before evening. Denise, don't forget to take your drugs.”

He grabbed the laptop and rushed out of the house.

The twins looked at each other, their eyes mirroring the confusion on the other's face.

“What do you think is wrong with big brother? Didn't he say last night that his school was on vacation?” Daniella asked, reaching for Caelum’s plate of food.

“He's not going back to that cursed place, is he? I don't want him to return sad anymore. If only I'm not so sick, he wouldn't have to work so hard and endure insults.”

“Denise, you're talking nonsense. How's this your fault?”

Daniella shoved a fork of the spaghetti into Denise’s mouth, stuffing him up.

“Eat this and cleanse your mouth of such annoying filth. Tch!”

Denise forced a smile, trying to chew on the food which was nearly falling out of his mouth. He blinked back tears and shoved more food down, hoping it would be enough to block the cry in his throat from spilling out.

Caelum met his landlord at the entrance, and was about to run past.

“Hey boy, I was coming to look for you.”

Caelum looked back and saw him with some thugs, making him briefly stop.

“Don't worry, I will return with the rent. You will have your money by nightfall, I promise.”

“Look here, I don't have time for that nonsense of yours. I'm going to settle this my own way!”

But Caelum didn't hear him, he was already running towards the major road to hail a cab and failed to notice the thugs the bald headed fat man came with.

All he could think about was confirming if the money was real or not. As for the rent, he could always withdraw the deposit in his education fund, reserved for his final year clearance fee.

The landlord gestured to the boys.

“Let's go back. If he's not back before noon, we will go on with the initial plan. One way or the other, I would have my money in full.”