Doomsday Rebirth novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Cookout

At her uncle's family cookout Gillian asks for ten years of bank statements out loud, and his wife reads the number to twenty relatives, and on Monday the bank freezes the account because her fiance says she is unwell.

Twenty-two relatives were eating potato salad on a deck my father's money had paid for.

My uncle Gordon stood at the grill in a golf shirt, turning bratwurst and telling the story of how he got the lake house for a steal.

I stood at the far end of the deck with a paper plate and counted the boards.

Lacey had driven me out to Avon Lake in her little blue Honda, because I wasn't sure I could drive and keep my face straight.

She had come to my door at ten that morning with two iced coffees and a bag of kettle corn.

"Dexter's a mess," she said as we pulled out. "I told him he's an idiot, for the record. Whatever he did, I'm on your side."

She meant it, and that made it harder to look at her.

I had spent ninety-one days at her elbow in a shelter kitchen, and I knew exactly what that voice sounded like when it told four hundred people I was a thief.

I took the coffee and said thanks.

On the drive she did what she always did, which was make it easy.

She told me about the county's new parking rules, and the woman at the front desk who cried about it, and she did the voice.

I laughed in the right places.

And behind the laugh I went down the list again, as I had all night.

The first name on my list was the man at the grill.

The county commissioner who ran the Terminal had bought food and cots for a thousand people three months before, and put his own staff on a list.

Dexter had signed half the purchase orders.

I had cooked that food, and I knew where all of it had been stored.

At the lake house, Lacey handed me a plate of corn.

"Eat," she said. "You look like you've been up all night."

"I have."

"Then eat and stay close. Gordon gets weird when he's got an audience."

She had it exactly right, and I was starting to hate how well she knew me.

My uncle saw me and opened his arms.

"There she is! The runaway bride!" he said to the deck. "Don't let her scare you, folks, she and Dexter are just in a spat."

Everybody laughed.

He hugged me and said into my ear, "We'll talk after we eat, kiddo."

"No," I said, loudly enough for the end of the deck to turn around. "I'd like to talk now."

The deck went quiet except for the grill.

"Uncle Gordon, I want ten years of statements for Dad's account. Everything since the funeral."

"Gillian. Honey. It's a family party."

"That's why I'm asking here."

His smile stayed put.

"It's trust business. It's boring. We'll sit down Sunday."

"It's Sunday now."

My aunt was standing by the patio door with a pitcher of lemonade.

She didn't laugh with the others.

"Gordon," she said. "The folder's on the kitchen counter."

"Honey, don't."

She put the pitcher down and went inside.

My uncle's hands were tight on the tongs, and for the first time since the cookout started he wasn't talking.

She came back with a green accordion folder and opened it on the picnic table, between the potato salad and the buns.

She turned over papers with her thumbs.

Twenty-two people leaned in, and a cousin put down his beer.

"The closing on this house is March," my aunt said. "One hundred twenty-eight thousand down."

She looked at the next page.

"The boat slip is another forty."

"Honey."

"And the account your brother left Gillian had three hundred forty thousand in it, and the bank letter in here says there's a hundred seventy-two left."

Nobody ate.

Somebody's kid asked what a trust was, and was shushed.

I kept my voice flat, because I had learned in a shelter kitchen that the flat voice is the one people hear.

"Wire the three hundred forty to my account tomorrow before noon," I said. "All of it, not what's left."

"I don't have it liquid, Gillian."

"Then sell the boat slip."

My aunt shut the folder.

"He'll do it," she said. "Or I'll be reading the rest of this to the Rotary."

Gordon looked around the deck.

Every relative he had ever bragged to was looking at him.

"Monday," he said, and his voice cracked. "Noon."

Lacey was beside me before I knew she had moved.

She squeezed my hand and whispered, "Oh my God, you did it. Come on, let's get you some air."

On the dock, she held my phone while I breathed, and scrolled through my calendar like she always did.

"I'll put the dress fitting in mine so I remember to be mad at him that day," she said, and typed it into her own phone.

I let her.

I had no reason not to, yet.

Monday at ten I was at the bank with my father's death certificate, my ID and a plan for noon.

The teller made a phone call and came back with a different face.

"Ms. Corrigan, I'm sorry," she said. "The account has a hold on it."

"A hold from who?"

She turned her screen a few degrees toward me.

"From your fiance," she said. "He filed a letter on Friday saying you may be unwell."

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