By “a handful,” I figured he meant my siblings and parents, so I just said, “That’s fine.”
“There is one thing I feel compelled to mention,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“I saw your aunt just yesterday.”
And this surprised me. “Oh?”
“She had me make some changes. Some of them were quite substantial.”
“Like what?” My chest filled with dread. Shit. She did it. She made me her heir.
“I’m not at liberty to say, but you’ll find out tomorrow. Just thought I should mention it.”
I found it obnoxious that he would flaunt “substantial” changes but not tell me what they were. But I supposed I already knew—she’d all but told me herself—so I just said, “OK.”
“I thought she looked remarkably well,” the lawyer added, for some unknown reason.
“Yes, well, I guess things can turn quickly,” I said, because what the hell else could I say?
“Quite a coincidence that she would pass right after changing her will, don’t you think?” His tone was suspicious. Accusatory, even. Like maybe I murdered her?
“What are you suggesting?”
“I’m an estate lawyer, not a detective,” he said dismissively. “I just thought you should know I’d been to see her.” Well maybe you murdered her, then.
“Thank you. See you tomorrow.” And I hung up.
Redding’s “substantial changes” warning was swirling in my head when I greeted Winnie and Charlie that night. I didn’t want to say anything （because I didn’t know anything）。 Plus they had been traveling all day and looked exhausted. So I shared the schedule （and some tears） and then went home.
As I climbed into bed that night, I thought about what Louisa’s death meant to me personally. Her house was my home away from home. I know that sounds like I was snubbing my parents; I wasn’t. It’s just they had three other, younger, kids to make a fuss over, and to fuss over them. Louisa only had me. I would miss our visits, and not just because of her cooking. I took care of her, but in some ways she also took care of me. Because what was my life if nobody needed me?
There was a time I had been close with Charlie and Winnie. We weren’t far apart in age. Charlie and I were on the opposite sides of thirty—I was twenty-nine, he was thirty-one. Louisa was away a lot when he and Winnie were little, so their dad had brought them down to hang out at our house. We lived in Huntington Beach, which （true to its name） was a beach town, and when our cousins came down we were in the water from sunup ’til sundown. Charlie and I punched at the surf as “Wave Man and Wave Boy” （I was “Boy,” since he was two years older） while Winnie, or Li’l Win, as we called her—which she loved （not）—built sandcastles and worked on her sunburn.
When we got too old for fighting waves, we got boogie boards and basically competed for who could get more sand in their balls. I never felt sorry for my cousins for not having their mom around, because they had us. We were a unit. We had each other’s backs. Like a family should.
But then their dad died, and they didn’t come to our house anymore, and we drifted apart. Charles Sr. had been the glue, the one who organized the get-togethers, created the WhatsApp group chat and populated it with memories and birthday greetings. When he died, our closeness died with him. My cousins retreated into lives that didn’t include me—or their mother, apparently. Those years when we were an extended family were the best years of my life. My own brother is ten years younger than I am—I barely know him—but Charlie was the brother I always wanted. Until life crept in and he wasn’t.
I thought about how tragedies have the power to bring people together. Maybe this tragedy was our chance to be a family again, revive our long-lost connection to each other? Louisa’s money could be the catalyst to new traditions. Because I would share it. It wasn’t what she wanted, but it was what I wanted. How could I not once again be beloved if I give my cousins what their own mother would not?
I had a vision for our future—there would be beach barbecues, Christmas dinners, camping trips with the boys, all funded by my generosity. Except it was not to be. Because Louisa had ruined everything.
Because wasn’t that just like her.
CHAPTER 34
* * *
ASHLEY
“Hi, Mom, it’s me,” I said, making no attempt to take the quiver out of my voice as I drove along congested Sunset Boulevard on the worst day ever. I had always tried to paint a rosy picture of my LA life when I called my mom, but today I couldn’t do it.