I sat up straighter. Suddenly, there seemed like a way out of this mess.
“If your sister refuses, she gets absolutely nothing.”
The shock must have been written all over my face because he chuckled. “There’s more,” he continued. “Your father left you this.”
He slid a letter across the table to me.
My hands shook as I opened it. It was my dad’s writing. Dawn, my darling,
I know Charlotte, sweetheart.
I know what she’ll do. But you are smarter than her. You always have been.
The money is in a safety deposit box. Use it wisely, my girl. I love you more than anything.
—Dad
I stared at the details of the bank account, but I froze. “I don’t know the code to the safe deposit box,” I whispered. The lawyer smiled.
“The watch,” he said simply. I took Dad’s watch off my wrist and turned it over. On the back, there were tiny scratches.
Four digits, faint but visible. A code! Matthew grinned.
“Your dad was a genius, Dawn.”
I couldn’t help it. I laughed, like really, really laughed, for the first time since he died. Charlotte had the house, but she also had all the debt.
And she had just kicked out the one person who could save her from losing everything. I was still staying at the bed and breakfast a few days later when Charlotte called me. I let it ring while I went to get myself a glass of water.
Then, I picked it up. “Hello?” I said sweetly. “You knew, didn’t you?” she spat.
“Knew what?” I asked. “The house,” she snapped. “The lawyer just called me.
There is debt. A lot of it. Like thousands of dollars.
If they aren’t paid off, the house gets taken, Dawn. And you…” she let out a shaky breath. “You have the money, don’t you?”
I leaned back in an armchair, twirling my dad’s watch around my wrist.
“I might have the money…” I said. “But we don’t exactly have a good history, do we? You did kick me out.”
She was silent.
“You have to help me!” she said finally. I smiled. “I would have helped you, Charlotte,” I said.
“If you had been nicer to me growing up, sis. Maybe then, I’d feel bad.”
Then I hung up. I was going to be in the bed and breakfast a little while longer.
Matthew was helping me look for a furnished apartment. “Something small will be perfect,” he said. “You have a few months before you go off to college, Dawn.
You don’t need to be tied down to a big home. An apartment is the way to go. And you’ll be eighteen soon and then you can do whatever you want.
For now, you need to focus on school.”
“Thank you for helping me,” I said. “I would have been lost without you.”
“Dawn, your father told me all about you and how difficult your sister made your life. Especially after your mother left the family.
I promised your father that I would get you back on your feet.”
A few weeks later, I was in my little studio apartment in an artsy part of town. It was near to my school and the coffee shop, and I loved it. I don’t know what became of Charlotte, but when I walked past our house one evening, I saw a SOLD sign in the front.
I probably should have felt bad, but I didn’t. It wasn’t my home without my father. And at least, he was still looking out for me, even if it was through Matthew.
What would you have done?
