All That Money

LAYTON

The lawyer was waiting for me when I strode into his office at ten o’clock on the dot. He stood, a somber expression on his face as he shook my hand. “Layton, I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you,” I replied automatically, the same reply I’d been giving for days now.

Motioning me into one of the high back black leather chairs around the conference table in his office, he took his own seat at the head. There was a thick brown file lying on the table, with a smaller manila envelope on top.  

“Your father left you this letter,” Clayton started, sliding the envelope off the file and handing it to me. I took it, but didn’t open it. “Would you like a moment of privacy to read it?”

I shook my head. I didn’t need to read it, especially not while sitting in this lawyer’s stuffy office. It was lined with books I would bet he hardly ever opened, and filled with oversize furniture. There were oil paintings on the walls. Not of dogs playing poker, but of birds in flight.

If I was ever going to read Dad’s letter, it would be somewhere more comfortable. Perhaps at home, after at least half a bottle of scotch and possibly nearer to the time of my own demise than I hoped I was at now.

No good could come from opening that letter. In all likelihood, it was only a letter left behind to talk about what I had—or should have—accomplished. I had no interest in opening it.

Maybe one day when I was old and retired I would feel differently. My life would have been lived my way then, despite whatever it was the letter said. If I read it now, I was probably going to end up living under the crushing weight of father’s disappointment for the rest of my life.

A bit of a waste, since I wasn’t doing badly at the moment. I enjoyed what I had and I had what I enjoyed. A nice car, a comfortable apartment.

My architecture firm was taking off big time. We’d been gearing up for the projects we had now for years. At thirty, I finally felt like it was my time to really fly. My dues had been paid and now I was ready to live my life.

Preferably without Dad’s final words to haunt me for the rest it. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d like us to continue. I need to get back to the office.”

Clayton nodded, even if he did look mildly surprised. Undoubtedly, he had been expecting waterworks, me weeping over the last words my dad would ever give me. If that was what he wanted, he was going to have to look elsewhere, he wasn’t getting that from me.

Sitting back in his chair, he pulled the brown file closer and opened its cover. The file had to contain more than Dad’s will, but I could see the lawyer had placed it on top. I could make out the first line on the top page. It read ‘Final Will and Testament of Jeffrey Arthur Bridges.’

A chill ran down my spine. I had known, or assumed rather, that I would see those words one day. It was the nature of life after all, a child outliving his parents. I just didn’t know it would happen this soon.

I was only thirty, and Dad had only been fifty-eight. Both of us assumed this day was further in the future than it ended up being. A tremble passed through my hands, but I clenched them into fists. There was never a time to show weakness, not even now. I had remained impassive during the funeral. I would bite back everything I felt and do the same now, as was the way of the Bridges men.

 If there was ever a time Dad would’ve been proud of me, it would have been now. Then again, probably not. He would simply say that this was how he raised me to be, and walk away.

Flexing my jaw, I nodded at the lawyer to continue. Gingerly, he opened the will to the first page. “I’ve reviewed this document. It was witnessed in this very office and has been kept under lock and key ever since. However, if you wish to contest it, I can’t stop you.”

“I understand.” I also understood he probably had to say those words, and that others found them reassuring, but I really wished he would get on with it.

“As you know, you are your father’s only surviving family member. He has left his personal fortune to you, Layton.”

I nodded, the numbness I’d felt earlier, now spreading and doubling in strength. I couldn’t think of a single word to say, so I kept quiet and waited for him to continue. “There is, however, one stipulation to your inheritance.”

A stipulation? I frowned. Whatever it was, I could handle it. “Okay.”

“The condition upon which your inheritance rests is that you must hire your father’s accounting manager. I have her details for you, they’re in the papers you have to sign accepting the inheritance and the condition on which it is dependent.”

I had to hire his accounting manager? Billions of dollars bequeathed to me on the condition I hired some woman? A part of me wondered if this was the final stab, one he was delivering from the grave. If it was, I didn’t get it.

Brushing the thought aside, I reached for the fountain pen I kept in my pocket. It didn’t matter who the woman was or why he wanted me to hire her. I wanted to sign these papers and get this over with.

If I had any hope of actually starting to process the fact that he was gone and that I was going to have to live the rest of my life without him, I needed to get the legalities and the formalities behind me. Lifting up the pen, I didn’t ask any questions about the woman. “Where do I sign?”

Clayton laid out several documents on the table, turned them and slid them across the polished wooden table to me. “There.”

Tabs had been stuck on various pages, I read them quickly and scribbled my signature beside the tab at the bottom of each one. When I was done, I handed the papers back to the lawyer and hauled ass out of there.

Back in my car, I took several deep breaths and watched the usual morning traffic pass me by. What had struck me these last couple of weeks was how life just seemed to carry on. Despite everything my dad had done, the articles and the aeronautical advancements he made, people went about their daily lives as though nothing had changed.

Pulling on the latch to open my glove box, I slipped Dad’s letter inside. I was intent on joining those people and carrying on with my daily life.