Chapter 2 #3
It went on like that for hours: Grandma and Grandpa pulling me in different directions, Ms. Tambrie fussing at me to refill the sweet tea, random people stopping to chat about how nice the service had been or how ungodly hot the summer was shaping up to be.
Each time another neighbor or distant relative pulled me aside, my heart stuck in my throat as I worried, This could be it, this could be the person who asked intrusive questions about me coming out, or offered to pray for me, or said, But are you sure, honey?
Maybe you just haven’t met the right guy—
But nobody said a word about it, even though I could tell they knew.
Their voices were too pleasant, too casual, while their eyes bored into me in a salacious, voyeuristic way.
All I could think about was blowing off steam with Emma and Candor later, then flying home tomorrow and leaving this all behind.
Twenty-two hours till I’m free, I told myself as I checked my watch again.
“Louisa,” Dad said a while later, resting a hand on my shoulder. He leaned in and spoke softly into my ear. “Go take a break. I know it’s been a long day. We’ve got one last thing to get through and then we can go home.”
I frowned, trying to imagine what this one last thing could be. “You mean we’ve got to get through cleanup?”
Dad blinked a little too fast. “No. The attorney’s coming. For the reading of the will.”
This was welcome news, because it meant my grandparents would be sequestered away for a while, no doubt grabbing for every last dime of Uncle George’s money. “Sounds good. I’ll stay out of the way.”
Dad’s mouth hung open. “Er … no. We’ll need you there, too.”
My pulse quickened. “What? Why?”
Dad hesitated. I knew he was the executor of Uncle George’s estate, and that he’d already seen the will, so did that mean…?
“Wait, am I in the will?” I asked incredulously.
Dad cleared his throat and squeezed my shoulder, already turning away. “Just. Go have a moment to yourself.”
I stared after him, but then Grandma rounded the corner with that taskmaster look in her eyes, and I bolted up the stairs before she could notice me. I shut myself in the study, away from the barrage of voices and chores, and tried to calm my racing heart.
I can’t be in the will. No chance. Dad just wants me there for emotional support while he deals with Grandma and Grandpa. I just have to get through this one last thing, and then I’m free to let loose with my friends tonight.
The room was blissfully quiet. The curtains were open to the late afternoon sun, and dust motes floated idly across the air.
The desk surface was covered by one of Grandpa’s WADE ELECTRIC blueprints, this one showing the layout of a local dentist’s office.
Yet another victim Grandpa had tricked into giving him business, probably by capitalizing on the Wade name.
He would probably leech even more clients now that he was sure to inherit Uncle George’s real estate empire.
I found the desk drawer where Grandpa hid his stash of MoonPies, opened one, and savored the sugary taste. Then I plopped myself on the old brown leather couch, stretched my legs, and fell asleep before I’d even wiped the sugar from my mouth.
An hour later, after the guests had gone home and my little cousins had taken my place in the study, the family gathered around the old oak table in Grandma and Grandpa’s dining room.
“Louisa, this is Mr. Otis Penny,” Dad said. “Uncle George’s attorney.”
Otis Penny rose from his chair. He was a portly middle-aged Black man dressed impeccably in a tailored Italian suit, topped off with an emerald silk ascot. He studied me through a pair of horn-rimmed glasses that magnified his keen, yellowing eyes.
“You’re the great-niece?” he asked in a baritone voice.
“Yes, sir.”
“Hmm.” He frowned like I had failed a test. I glanced at my dad, but he was making a show of shuffling his papers, carefully avoiding my eyes.
“Let’s get to it,” Grandpa barked.
There was a scuffle as seven chairs scraped the wooden floor.
Grandpa leaned back at the head of the table, one leg across his knee like he was settling in for a report from his inferiors.
Grandma sniffed and tapped her manicured nails on the polished table.
Aunt Shannon sat with her hands folded primly like a schoolgirl, no doubt trying to model appropriate behavior for the rest of us, while Uncle Keith sat there looking like he wasn’t quite sure what to do with his face.
I sat next to Dad, twisting my hands in my lap, my heart pounding with anticipation.
I expected to start with pleasantries, maybe platitudes about how sorry Mr. Penny was for our loss, but he was having none of that.
He jumped right into the will with a dry, legalistic focus, droning on about “If you’ll look at page four, point three…
” Every minute or so, he stopped to mop his sweating forehead with a monogrammed handkerchief.
After the third go-round of this, Grandma hissed at me to bring him an iced tea.
When I returned with the cold sweet tea in my hands, Otis Penny was finally getting to the goods. “To my nephew, Tate Charles Wade,” he droned, “I leave my primary residence on Moreland Road.”
Dad visibly swallowed, clearly choked up.
“To my niece, Shannon Wade Wainwright, I leave a trust to be used for the purposes of educating her children, as well as my piano, to be used for her own enjoyment.”
Aunt Shannon made a show of closing her hands over her mouth as if she was going to cry, but her eyes remained completely dry.
“To my brother, Amos F. P. Wade, and my sister-in-law, Martha Mills Wade, I leave my painting of dogs playing poker, which they always treasured—”
Grandma made a face like she was smelling a steaming pile of horse manure.
“—and my entire portfolio of real estate holdings—”
Grandpa bounced his leg over his knee, looking smug.
“—with the exception of one property.”
There was silence as each of us waited for that dangling exception. Otis Penny seemed oblivious, licking his thumb pad to turn the page with an agonizing slowness. He scanned the next line with his finger, those keen eyes narrowing.
And then Otis Penny nearly shook me out of my chair.
“To my great-niece, Louisa Jean Wade, I leave my ownership stake in the Frisky Cricket.”
There was a ringing, palpable silence.
The what? I thought, looking around for someone to explain, but no one met my eyes. Grandpa had gone eerily still, his eyes narrowed on Otis Penny. Dad was looking intently at his papers and seemed immune to my pressing stare.
It was Grandma who broke the silence. “You’re being funny, Otis,” she said in a sharp voice that implied nothing whatsoever was funny.
“I’ve never been very funny,” Mr. Penny said matter-of-factly.
A booming thump rattled the table. Grandpa had slammed his fist down, his face going splotchy red. “Have you lost your mind?” he snarled. “How the hell can an underage girl inherit a goddamn bar?”
“A bar?” I repeated. My mind wasn’t working fast enough, and for some bizarre reason, I could only picture a metal crowbar.
“When was the last time George revised his will?” Grandpa demanded.
“May 25th of this year,” Otis Penny said firmly.
“Four days before he died?!” Grandpa roared.
“And you’re actually taking that seriously?
You know as well as I do that George wasn’t in his right mind at the end—painkillers addling his brain—he earmarked the other properties for me and he clearly meant for me to get this one, too. Fix the damn paperwork, Otis.”
Otis Penny stretched back in his chair. He seemed entirely unperturbed by Grandpa’s tantrum. “I’m afraid there’s nothing to fix.”
Grandpa looked ready to throttle him, but before he could argue, Aunt Shannon cut in. “Can’t she just sell it to some poor sap and make a few bucks to add to the family pot? Even if she’s underage, she should still be able to—”
“Louisa is eighteen,” my dad interrupted. His neck had turned red, but he spoke with unusual authority. “She’s a legal adult who has legally inherited the bar.”
Grandpa pounded the table again. “So what if she’s eighteen?! She doesn’t live here, she has no real-world experience, she’s about to ship off to the University of Rhode Island—”
“The University of Connecticut,” my dad corrected. He glared at his father and sister. “And you can stop saying ‘she.’ Louisa’s sitting right next to me, so let’s do her the courtesy of using her name when—”
“You watch your tone, boy! I’ve got half a mind to skin you alive, carrying out these ridiculous bequests, inviting this kook into my home to say the things you’re not man enough to say—”
“I had no control over how George structured his will,” my dad said evenly.
“Ohhhh, poor little Tate,” my grandfather said in a cruel, mocking voice. “Helpless little executor, tossed about by the winds, too weak to make your own decisions. It’s no wonder you couldn’t hack it as a quarterback.”
My father’s face burned. He sat slowly back in his chair, and in a flash, I saw him as a humiliated little boy at the dinner table, trying to find his place in this godforsaken family.
His whole life, he’d found solace in Uncle George, his oldest and greatest protector—but now that protection was gone.
And suddenly, I understood why Otis Penny was here: to be the buffer Uncle George could no longer be.
Dad had predicted his family’s behavior, and he’d called in reinforcements in the form of a dry attorney who had no skin in the game.
Otis Penny took advantage of the withering silence.
“I believe selling the bar was George’s intention, actually.
Before the diagnosis, he was in the process of negotiating with the university.
They’ve been making a land grab for quite a while now.
It’s my understanding that George hoped Louisa would follow through on the sale and pocket the proceeds. ”