5

 

I took extra care with dressing every morning.

Appearances were important. I made sure my clothes were neat and clean and every hair in place. My thick long black hair flowed past my shoulders. To get this look I had a standing appointment with my hair stylist every six weeks. She used a relaxer on my hair, so even though I had been running in the park and sweating, my hair kept its straightness.

Every morning I put on my Paparazzi shades by Tanevery, a hot new designer. If they were not on my eyes, they were across the top of my head. I topped off my look with one of my white long sleeved fitted buttoned shirts opened at the collar and a pair of jeans. I needed my appearance to speak for me, to say I was whole, my family was whole, and we were getting through this little setback.

My friends dressed the same way. The only thing that distinguished us from each other was our hair color and facial features. My hair was black. Callie’s hair was black. She was Asian, her ancestors from South Korea. The twins, Melanie and Stacie, had brown hair. And Steffy’s hair was blonde. Our classmates called us The Fairfield Quints, short for quintuplets. They’re going to have to shorten that to The Fairfield Quads since Steffy had shown her true colors and didn’t want to be around anyone associated with me.

Soon things got back to normal or as normal as they could be. I went to school every day. I worked on my newspaper story after school. But my saving grace was being in the park every morning before school.

I ran every day for a week until I could run no more. Now I would come to the park and just sit. I sat on one of the benches overlooking the river and let the sounds of the water rushing down river wash over me. I could breathe out here. I breathed in gulps of fresh air, which rejuvenated me. The air revived my brain and cascaded through my lungs. It went into my pores and cells. I gulped in all the air I could until the numbness went away. Then I could go to school and have a normal day.

But there was something missing deep inside. My world had turned upside down, and I couldn’t put myself back together again.

Mom’s park friends spoke to me, but they had stopped asking about her long ago. I half spoke to them. I didn’t want to be bothered. I wanted to be left alone. I needed to feel normal, so I spent this time talking to myself. I will get through this day unscathed. I will be happy today. My mind is strong, therefore, I can handle anything. I move through today with ease. The fresh air revitalized me and made me human again for the hours I spent in school.

Being home had also taken on a semblance of normalcy. But there was something between Mom and Dad that wasn’t normal. They argued a lot. First, they spoke in hushed tones. When I entered the room, they would change the subject. I only overheard the end of their disagreement. But there was tension between the two of them when there used to be peace and harmony. I didn’t understand what this might mean for our family. I just couldn’t handle any more drama in my life.

Mom had started cooking again, mainly to feed the many people who worked at our dining room table on Dad’s case. Every day when I got home from school, Mom was in the kitchen cooking meals like spaghetti, lasagna, and chili, to feed lots of people. Sometimes the lawyers and law clerks worked late into the night and would order pizza around ten o’clock. I usually grabbed a slice on the way to my room.

The evening before our Chicago trip I came home from school and Mom was in the kitchen making hamburgers, fries, and a mixed green salad for dinner. The lawyers got their food and went back to the dining table. Mom, Dad, and I ate in the kitchen. This was our ritual, as if life was back to normal. We usually talked about our day, mainly mine, but today I had something else on my mind.

“Dad, what are they working on?” I asked, nodding towards the people in the dining room.

“Nothing you need to be concerned about, Kitten,” Dad said.

I put down my fork, which held an assortment of salad fixings. “Dad, I’m not a baby anymore. You can tell me what these people are working on.”

He looked at me, as if making a decision. I could see he didn’t want to talk about it. In his own way, I’m sure he wanted to protect me from the horrors of the real world.

Finally, he said, “Not now. Later, when everyone has gone home.”

Around nine thirty that night, Dad called me into his study. I was amazed at the disorder. Papers were everywhere, file drawers were open, and stacks of folders were piled on the floor. In the past when I had come in here to talk to Dad, everything had been neat and in its proper place. Dad, behind his desk, motioned for me to sit in a chair across from him.

“What do you want to know?” he asked.

I looked at the disarray. “Everything.”

“I don’t know where to begin,” he said.

“Start at the arrest,” I said.

Dad smiled. “That’s a good place to start.”

He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. When he began talking again, his voice was barely above a whisper. I had to lean in to hear him.

“I am managing director at Williams Ortiz L.L.P. In a nutshell, the senior officers of the firm are accused of bilking money from clients and using the money to create grand lifestyles. As I told you last week, I was not involved in taking any money.”

“Then why are they accusing you?”

“It seems that Peter may have used hedge funds to raise money for the firm. Unfortunately, he made up fake financial statements for one of his clients and together with fake notes he also crafted, he sold the notes to hedge funds. The crime was that he did it without the clients’ approval or knowledge.”

“So how do you come in?” I asked. “And Mr. Ortiz?”

“Well, Sam has his name on the firm. He’s a partner, and naturally, all partners will be investigated. I’m a senior officer of the firm, therefore I’m being investigated.”

“Did you know what was going on?”

“No,” he said. He drew in a deep breath and leaned across the desk. “There’s more.”

I waited, afraid of what he was going to say next.

After a while he continued, “The firm sometimes receives settlements for clients that are invested and paid out over a number of years. These are called structured settlements. Sam is accused of forging financial letters and financial statements that showed that the money was still in the accounts when it was not. The authorities are saying that he sold those accounts to investors who paid a reduced amount for them. The money was supposed to go to clients but didn’t. And Sam is saying that he didn’t forge the letters. He says Peter or somebody else did and signed his name.”

My heart stopped. I didn’t know if I wanted to hear anymore, but I had to ask. “What are they accusing you of?”

“Right now, they’re accusing me of being a party to this scheme.”

Dad looked me in the eye. “But I wasn’t. My first hearing of this was when everybody else heard.”

I didn’t know what to say.

“My job was to manage the other attorneys in the firm. I assigned them cases. I oversaw their work. That’s all I did. I’m not a partner in the firm. I didn’t sign anybody’s checks or have signatory authority on any of the firm’s accounts. Only Peter and Sam had that authority.”

“Can you prove you had nothing to do with it?” I asked.

His eyes seemed far away, as if he were looking into the future. “Yes, Kitten, I can.”

“How? Can you get back into the office to go over your files?”

“No, a receiver has been appointed to sort out the whole mess. It’ll take months to finish everything. But I’m no fool,” he said. “Ever since I started my first job, I’ve kept duplicate records of all my work. What’s not in these files is on computer disks. That’s why these people are here every day and night. My lawyers have them going through my files to build my case.”

“If the receiver is going to find out the same thing, why do you have to use your money?”

“I want to make sure we’re on the same page. Take last week for instance. The receiver said there’s a notation in the files that I received an $8 million bonus last year. I didn’t. On the same day that the $8 million is recorded, I have a cancelled bonus check for $780,000.”

“Uncle Peter is trying to implicate you?”

“I don’t think he did it intentionally,” Dad said. “I just think he was trying to make the books balance.”

I slumped down in my chair. Uncle Peter isn’t really my uncle. He’s always treated us like family and said I should call him Uncle Peter ever since Dad started working at his firm.

“Don’t worry,” Dad said. “The truth will come out. I wasn’t involved in any of the financials of the firm. I had a salary, plus a bonus, each year. This was meant to be a new type of firm. There would be no partners, except the two founding ones.

“However, no matter what Peter is saying, I know I’ve not done anything wrong. I believe God is good, and my faith in God is going to help exonerate me.”

“Then this will be over soon?”

“Yes, I have faith that it will.”

Dad and I sat there, not saying anything. I wondered where our lives were headed.

Before long, Dad said, “There’s something else I need to talk to you about.”

His voice was hoarse and his eyes spoke before his words. My heart fell. I knew what he was going to say.

“Your car. I’m going to have to sell it. My legal defense is costing more than I anticipated with all the extra staff needed to build my case.”

I tried but couldn’t keep my eyes from watering.

“Selling your car is the quickest way I can get extra money right now,” Dad said. “I’ll make it up to you. As soon as I’m able, I’ll get you another one. You can pick it out this time.”

I mustered a half smile.

“In the meantime, you can continue to drive your mother’s car.”

I wanted to talk to Dad about Mom but not tonight. I was too heartbroken. I had lost my beloved car.

Dad kissed me goodnight. “You don’t have to worry about a thing,” he whispered.

Easy for him to say! My car had become my identity. Proof that I belonged at Fairfield Oaks High with all the other cool kids. My car spoke for me. It said that I was one of them.

I lay awake a long while thinking over what Dad had said. Uncle Peter and Mr. Ortiz had been a part of our lives for years. How could they get my dad mixed up in something like this? They were upstanding people of the community. They were well thought of among lawyers. How could it go all wrong? They were the cause of my life crashing around me. Even if Mr. Ortiz didn’t know what Uncle Peter had done, he was still responsible because he didn’t properly oversee what was happening in the firm.

In spite of myself, tears flowed freely when I thought of losing my car. My sixteenth birthday present was gone. How could I face my friends? All the cool kids had their own cars. Nobody had to drive a parent’s car to school.