Rosie Girl

by Julie Shepard

  22

  I’M HAPPY to finally see John again when he opens the agency door for me. His craggy face lights up, making me feel welcome.

  “How’s my old friend Rosie?”

  “Living the dream.”

  He reaches out with one of those half-shake, half-hug kind of things. Because he’s so tall, my head grazes his shoulder. He’s dressed nicer than both times I saw him at Lou’s—gray slacks and a long-sleeved white shirt cinched at the neck with a dark red tie (positioned at the proper length, I might add).

  “Is Mac here?” I ask, peering around him, concerned that he may not be. I’ve waited all day to show up in the outfit I labored over this morning. The beaded necklace and matching earrings, the snug capri pants, the soft yellow sweater I’m hoping he’ll want to touch. I didn’t check my hair fifteen times on the bus ride over here for nothing. I may have been suspicious at first when he offered to work for free, but Mac has proven to be professional and gentlemanly. I’ve not only become reassured by these qualities, I’m also oddly attracted to them. To him.

  “What, you don’t want to talk to me anymore?” John asks.

  “No!” It comes out stronger than I intended. “Of course I do.” I smile wide, even touch the sleeve of his shirt, hoping to undo my rudeness.

  The wrinkles in John’s cheeks deepen when he smiles. “Good. I don’t want you sore with me.”

  “Never,” I say, and then Mac enters the room, his disheveled hair free from gel and resting just above his shoulders. He’s wearing the same stiff khakis he wore the day I met him and a long-sleeved polo, but it’s black and holds the creases of an expert ironing job. I look down, and there are the boat shoes, striped socks peeking out the top. Last week I found them geeky, today not so much.

  “Hello there,” Mac says, polite and perfect. Is his smile lingering? Is he staring at my fluffy sweater, wondering how it would feel to touch? I hope so. The three of us stand in a triangle, occupying the space between the lobby and the hallway.

  “Well, I’m here if you need me,” John says, flattening his tie, even though it’s hanging fine. He turns to Mac before disappearing into his office. “You’ll go over what we discussed,” he says, his eyes darting at me. “Good to see you, Rosie.”

  “You, too,” I say, really meaning it, but instantly distracted by his comment.

  Mac extends his arm into the dark hallway. “After you,” he says, and I can’t go fast enough.

  • • •

  Before I hand over the document, I waste no time following up on John’s cryptic remark. “What was your uncle talking about?”

  “First things first. Let’s see what you found yesterday.” He wiggles his fingers in the air, palms up. An excited child awaiting a gift.

  “That’s second,” I say, part cute, part serious. “Tell me.”

  “I will,” he says, “but would you let me work in my own order, please?” He smirks, pulls out my Ziploc bag from a drawer, and places it in front of us. “I forgot to give you this,” he says, and hands me a piece of paper. It’s a list of everything in the bag, plus his signature at the bottom and a stamp of the office logo. “That’s a receipt for your personal items. Just hold on to it.”

  I thank him and tuck it in my bag, making a mental note to tell Mary. I had totally forgotten about her suggestion and yet Mac still came through.

  He proceeds to lay out the items, introducing each one as if I’ve never seen them.

  “I’ve been studying each piece. We’ve got two pictures to work with. This one here, of your parents at some sort of social gathering. Let’s call that the party picture. And this one, of your mother in the ski jacket. Let’s call that the snow picture.”

  He’s getting me excited, like there really may be a trail to follow.

  “We’ve got the bracelet, which I’m not sure how it connects to anything, but it was hers, so that’s fine.” When Mac slides it to the side, I take it.

  “Do you think I can have this back?”

  “Of course,” he says.

  “It’s a bracelet. I don’t think it means anything. It’s just something from her childhood I guess my dad wanted me to have.”

  “Cross it off the list, then, okay?”

  I respect his professionalism too much not to do it right then and there, so I pull out the receipt and we both initial the eliminated item.

  “Moving on,” he says, getting back to work. “We have your birth certificate, which seems odd to me.” When he looks up, there’s genuine concern in his eyes.

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s yours.”

  “Meaning?”

  “These other items. They belonged to Justine. But the birth certificate belongs to you. So it got me thinking that there must be a clue in here.” He scans the folded piece of paper I never gave much consideration. I figured Dad just wanted to leave me an extra copy.

  “I think . . . I mean . . .” It’s the first time Mac has stumbled through a thought. “I don’t believe your father left these items randomly. I think they’re clues.”

  A part of me thinks it’s cool that my dad orchestrated this little mystery, but it’s a really small part. The bigger part has always wondered why he didn’t simply leave a single note in that box: Your mother is alive. She is (fill in the blank with her location). It’s the why that’s had me more nervous than anything. Maybe she’s in jail. Maybe she took off with someone else. Or maybe she just took off. I’ve heard people do that sometimes, when they can’t handle the pressure. Is that what happened? What if she couldn’t handle me?

  He folds up the birth certificate, picks up the pictures, and tucks them carefully back in the bag. “But clues to what? I’m still not sure.”

  “You can’t leave me hanging!”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to. I’m still doing some research, so I don’t want to tell you anything until I know for sure. One of John’s rules.”

  I pout, pick at an invisible tuft of yellow yarn from my sweater.

  “Look, it may turn out to be nothing,” he says, a weak attempt to pacify me. “Let’s focus on what you found yesterday.”

  Something tells me there’s no use arguing. Plus, he’s not charging me, so I have to keep my demands to a minimum. I pull out the stapled stack of papers and slide it across the desk. Like a student waiting to get a test back, I sit and wait, my stomach in knots. But it does give me a chance to study Mac while he studies something else. The way his hair parts to the side and curls up at the ends. I bet it’s soft. The caramel skin of his throat where it disappears into his shirt. The hair on his forearms, wispy and blond. I bet that’s soft, too. I haven’t wanted to touch another guy since Ray.

  Immediately, I push the image of his face out of my head, wipe it away with a scouring pad until all I see is Mac again, his head hung over the stuff I brought. He’s reading with fierce concentration, sort of like I do when I’m trying to figure out a pattern based on a magazine photo. I can see the design, but I’m not always sure how it got that way. I hope Mac has better analytical skills than I do.

  He makes little grunting noises with the flip of every page. I can barely keep the toes of my silver ballet flats from digging into the carpet.

  “Well?”

  Mac drops the document on his desk, shrugs his shoulders. “Looks like a standard will and testament.” The flatness of his voice deflates me. “Nothing unusual jumps out at me—”

  “Are you sure? I know I saw my name in that mess.”

  “It is, in several places. You were his daughter—of course there would be multiple references to you.”

  “You looked like you were skimming,” I say. “Take your time.”

  His shoulders bristle in defense. “I could take all the time in the world and still not completely understand this document.”

  I don’t believe him. He’s like a B
oy Wonder. Between his above-average intellect and weird-but-kinda-cute above-average maturity, I’m just waiting for his cape to slip out from under his shirttails. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that he flies around at night rescuing victims of random crimes. Aside from all that, he must be good if he’s actually taking up space in this snazzy office. Family or no family—John William Brooks, PI, is not going to keep around someone who can’t carry their weight. This much I can tell.

  Mac rubs the back of his neck. “I’ve only taken a few legal classes so far to satisfy my criminology degree. John will need to take a look at this.”

  “Can he look at it now?” I ask, kicking myself for brushing him aside earlier.

  “Follow me.” Mac grabs the will, and I fall in step behind him.

  • • •

  “We need your help.”

  John slaps closed the file he had been reading and displays open palms to receive whatever we’ve got coming his way. “Figured as much. That’s an awfully bright SOS sign illuminated above your heads.” His lame jokes I don’t miss.

  Mac hands over the will. “Take a look at this.” And then we settle into two cracked leather chairs opposite John’s desk. He picks up a pair of reading glasses and gets busy while Mac and I sit like schoolchildren waiting for the teacher’s instructions.

  Since his office is at the end of the hallway, I’ve never seen it before. It’s nowhere near as nice as Mac’s, the extent of his decorating a sad hanging plant, its leaves drooping toward the tile floor. But it’s more impressive in other ways, with a cluster of framed certificates on the wall and his diploma from the University of Miami in the center. Trophies and plaques with engraved footballs line two shelves on the wall to my right, bringing into focus what I had suspected at our first meeting. Behind him, a giant orange-and-green poster reads, IT’S ALL ABOUT THE U. John’s one of those lifelong Canes fans.

  My leg starts bobbing up and down like the needle on a sewing machine. I have a portable one in my room. Found it for five bucks at the Salvation Army. It can only do small jobs like hemming or appliqué work, but it’s a workhorse and it’s mine.

  Mac places three fingers on my knee to stop the nervous shaking. I look into his eyes, which say everything I need to hear: Relax. Trust me. I nod. He pulls his hand back, but the damage is already done. I felt the heat of his fingertips burning right through my capris, making it official. I’m totally attracted to this guy.

  For several more minutes, John flips through pages until a grin spreads across his face. “Well, here’s some good news.” Dreadful pause. “You’ve got money coming to you.”

  “Really?” I’m more surprised than excited, figuring it can’t be much. After all, if there had been a lot of money left behind, I wouldn’t have been forced to leave my old house. “How much?”

  “Fifty percent,” John says.

  “Why do you say it like that? Fifty percent of what?”

  “Well, at the time this will was drafted, in 2010, his estate was valued at close to a million.”

  “Please tell me you’re talking dollars, not marbles,” I say, my insides already beginning to crackle and pop at this unbelievable news.

  “I am.”

  “So I get five hundred thousand dollars?”

  “Give or take,” he says. “It’s been seven years. There’s probably a bit more than that with interest, which is why money set aside in a trust is given as a percentage, instead of an exact figure.”

  “Wow. That’s a lot of sketchbooks and designer shoes!”

  John never lifts his eyes off the page, doesn’t even crack a smile.

  “Wait.” My giddy excitement comes to a grinding halt. “If I get half, who gets the other half?” Like I even have to ask. John’s expression confirms it. “So we each get five hundred grand.” I let the number sink in and fill my mind with possibilities I’d never imagined. “It could be worse, I guess. He could’ve given her more.”

  “True.”

  “It still doesn’t make sense, though. We’re both getting money. Why keep my dad’s will hidden from me? And why don’t we already have the money? I don’t get it.”

  Several minutes pass before John asks, “Is this the original?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is this a copy of what you found?”

  “No,” I say, afraid it’s the wrong answer.

  “Then you need to return it,” he says, his eyes still glued to the pages.

  “What?” I almost shoot out of my chair.

  “You have to, Rosie, or she’s going to know you took it.”

  “So? I have every right to see my father’s will.”

  “Yes, but not by stealing her copy of it.”

  I snap my head to the side and bark at Mac. “You’re the one who told me to go there!”

  “Not with the intention of stealing anything, especially a legal document. I thought maybe you’d find—”

  “What? Another secret box? Come on, Mac. This woman knows the truth about my mother—some giant secret my father obviously wanted her to keep, too. But even now, over three years after his death? It doesn’t make sense.”

  I deflate in my seat.

  “You should have made a copy,” Mac grumbles, all irritated.

  “When? In the two whole minutes I was alone?” I’m being snippy, but I can’t help it.

  “Please, you two.” John removes his reading glasses to fix those steely-gray investigator eyes on us. “You want my help, you’re going to have to pipe down.” He continues to flip through the pages while I stew in my seat. The heat from Mac’s fingertips has grown cold, but so have I, frustrated with the prospect of having to concoct another plan to return to Scrap Metal Mania.

  “Well, well, well. What do we have here?” John’s voice drops like a stone, but then he turns the page and says, “Wait a minute . . .”

  Something in John’s voice makes my belly do a somersault.

  “Wait a minute . . . ,” he says again.

  “Tell us!” I blurt.

  He uses his finger to trace line after line, hums, traces, then falls back in his seat once he’s done reading.

  “What did you find?” I ask, gripping the edge of his desk.

  “The needle in a haystack.”

  I don’t know what makes me more nervous—Mac, who’s shot up out of his chair, or the bombshell John’s about to drop. He’s got that look in his eyes, the same one I saw at Lou’s Deli when he told me he was passing off my case to someone else. Bad news is coming.

  “There’s a stipulation in the will. Regarding your stepmother.”

  “That can’t be good,” I say, knowing that a stipulation is just a big, fancy word for something—or someone—standing in the way of getting what you want. “If you tell me she can take my half for some stupid reason, I’m going to seriously lose it.”

  “No. It’s not a stipulation for you, Rosie. It’s a stipulation for her.”

  Okay, then. Go on, counselor.

  “The will states, should your father predecease his spouse, Lucille Goss Velvitt—Lucy,” he clarifies, “must continue to adequately take care of you until your eighteenth birthday, the age at which an individual is considered an adult.”

  I sense the stipulation slithering around the corner. “Or what?”

  “Or she doesn’t get her half.”

  My dad, even in death, protects me. My heart aches with a fresh wave of missing him. I’m all over the place. Ashamed of those times I cursed him for leaving us with nothing and having to move. Impressed that he hadn’t squandered his money, after all. He had been saving it. For me. Well, for me and that duplicitous cougar.

  “Lucy’s half,” John starts, perched to lay it on the line for me. “It’s being held in trust until your eighteenth birthday. Like yours. She only receives it if she continued to raise you .
. .” His voice trails off while he searches to repeat the exact words on the paper. “With proper parental guidance, which includes all basic needs of the minor Rose Annalise Velvitt, as well as reasonable care and support.”

  I almost choke at the last part. She definitely didn’t support me the other night when I swore that her boyfriend stuck his tongue down my throat.

  “So he was paying her off,” I say, which is what it really means.

  “In a manner of speaking. You can always contest it. Do your best to prove she was an unfit parent.”

  “To who?”

  “The executor of the trust. Whoever that is.” John pauses. “Has anyone ever visited since your father’s death? You know, to check on you, see how you were doing?”

  “No. Never.”

  “Then the lawyer”—John flips to the front of the will and reads from the letterhead—“Benedict Stephens or Russell Stephens is probably the executor. You could always plead your case to him.”

  The ungodly ring of John’s cell phone—a cross between rodeo music and a holiday carol—breaks his concentration. He checks the screen, then says, “Sorry, kids. I have to take this,” and hands the will back to Mac. “Don’t worry. We’ll pick up where we left off.” We’re dismissed with a signal to be quiet as he answers the call. Mac closes the door behind us, and I lead the way back to his office.

  “This is so messed up,” I say, plunking down into one of his seats. “Where do I go from here?”

  “I’m not sure.” It’s the first time I’ve heard uncertainty in Mac’s voice. I study the framed photos on the wall, trying to figure out what each one is. I can tell they’re ordinary objects, zoomed in a thousand percent, but that’s it. I grow frustrated and refocus my attention across the desk.

  “I’m sorry, Rosie.”

  “What for?” I ask, because I’m legitimately curious. He hasn’t done anything wrong.

  “That you had to find out something like this. It can, you know, throw off someone’s balance.”

  He’s got that right. Ever since my father died—and that’s been over three years—I’ve felt out of whack. Lost. Anxious. All I can say is, thank God for Mary. She’s grounded me, been that soft place to land when I was perched to fall. Then finding the box a couple months ago only made things worse. After all these years, learning that my birth mother was alive? I think I’m entitled to be a little off balance.