My Sister Handed Me a Folder at Our Mother’s Funeral, And Told Me Not to Open It Until Everyone Left

Part 3: Monday, Ten A.M.

The lawyer’s office was above the pharmacy on Main Street. It had been above the pharmacy on Main Street since 1978. Same wood paneling. Same green carpet.

His name was Mr. Hollis. He’d done Dad’s will too. He was one of those small-town lawyers who wore a cardigan under his suit jacket and kept a candy dish full of butterscotch on the desk.

Doug got there first. He was already in a chair when Emily and I walked in. He’d changed out of the funeral suit into khakis and a quarter-zip. He looked like he’d slept about two hours.

“Ladies.”

“Doug.”

Emily and I sat on the couch across from him. The folder was in my bag. I hadn’t decided yet what I was going to do with it. Emily hadn’t asked me to decide. That was the thing about my sister. She never asked. She just carried it herself and made room next to her in case you wanted to help.

Mr. Hollis came in with a folder of his own. Much thicker than mine.

He read the will out loud. He read it slowly, the way old lawyers do, with pauses in the wrong places. House to Emily. Investments split three ways per stirpes. Personal effects listed on Schedule A. Dad’s Franklin Mint coins to Doug. The truck to Doug. A small annuity to Aunt Diane. Charitable bequest to the Baldwin United Methodist Church.

Then he got to the number.

The number was $91,000 in the investment account, split three ways.

Doug did the math in about half a second. I watched him do it. I watched his jaw tighten.

“That’s not right,” he said.

Mr. Hollis looked up over his reading glasses.

“I beg your pardon?”

“That account had two hundred and something in it last year. I saw the statement. Mom showed me at Christmas.”

“Well, Mr. Reeves, this is the current balance as of the date of death. I have the statements here if you’d like to review them.”

Doug turned to Emily.

“Em. Where’s the money.”

Emily’s hands were folded in her lap. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to. She just looked at him, calm as still water.

“Emily.”

“Doug.”

“Where is the money.”

I hadn’t decided what I was going to do, but I decided then. I opened my bag and I put the folder on Mr. Hollis’s desk.

“Doug,” I said. “Read this.”

He looked at me like I’d slapped him. Then he looked at the folder. Then he looked at Emily. Then he looked at me again.

“What is that.”

“It’s the money. Read it.”

He took the folder. He opened it. He read the first page and his mouth went into a thin flat line. He turned to the second page. The third.

He got to the envelope.

He read Mom’s letter.

I have never in my life seen my brother’s face do what it did in that lawyer’s office. He read it once. He read it again. He put the letter down on the green carpet next to his chair like he didn’t want to be holding it anymore.

“There’s a sister.”

“Half,” Emily said quietly. “Half sister.”

“A half sister.”

“Rebecca.”

“And Mom just.” He stopped. He tried again. “And Mom just gave her the money.”

“She gave it to a trust for her son.”

“For thirty years she knew about this.”

“Yes.”

Doug looked at the ceiling. He put both hands over his face. He sat there like that for maybe a minute.

When he took his hands down his eyes were wet, and I hadn’t seen my brother’s eyes wet since he was twelve years old and his golden retriever got hit by a car in front of our house.

“Why didn’t she tell me.”

I opened my mouth to say something. Emily beat me to it.

“Because she was scared of you, Doug.”

He flinched. He actually flinched, in the chair.

“She wasn’t scared of me. That’s not fair.”

“She was scared you’d fight it. She was scared you’d try to claw it back. And Doug, come on. You know you would have.”

“I don’t.” He stopped. “I don’t know that.”

“I do.”

Mr. Hollis, God bless him, sat behind his desk and did not move a single muscle. He’d probably seen worse in this room. He’d probably seen a lot worse.

Doug picked the letter back up off the floor. He read it again. His lips moved a little.

“She says here she loved us all the same but not in the same ways.”

“Yes.”

“What does that mean.”

Emily didn’t answer that one. Neither did I. Some questions you don’t answer for your brother. You let him sit with them.

We got through the rest of the meeting somehow. Doug signed what he had to sign. Emily signed what she had to sign. I signed. Mr. Hollis offered us butterscotch from the candy dish and Emily took one, which surprised me, because Emily didn’t eat candy.

Out on the sidewalk it was cold and bright. Doug stood with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders up around his ears. He wouldn’t look at Emily.

“I need to get to the airport.”

“Okay.”

“I don’t.” He stopped. “I don’t know what to do with any of this.”

“You don’t have to do anything with it today.”

He nodded. He got in his rental car. He drove away.

Emily and I stood on the sidewalk for a minute. The wind was pulling at her hair.

“He’s not going to call for a while,” she said.

“No.”

“That’s okay.”

We walked to her car. I didn’t ask her if she was okay. I already knew the answer to that one.