Goodnight Beautiful(10)
And then Sam got to the last page, with the big reveal. Ted and Phaedra had divorced, and he’d been given a sizable amount of money in the settlement. He wanted Margaret to have half of it. Two million dollars, Ted wrote, explaining he had already deposited the money in an account in Margaret’s name at NorthStar Bank. Please don’t be stubborn about this. Use the money as you’d like, for you and Sam. You’ve worked hard raising our son, and truly I can never repay you for that.
Margaret was watching television when Sam went to see her the next day. He could tell by the look on her face that her mood was stable. “Mom, what is this?” he asked her.
Her face reddened when she saw the letter, embarrassed, like the time she found Sam in the garage with a copy of Hustler magazine. He said he found it at school, too ashamed to tell her that his father had given it to him; that Ted had been giving Sam his copies since Sam turned twelve.
“Sit down,” Margaret said, taking the letter from him. “Let’s talk.” And just like that he was a kid again, that look on her face as she tried so hard to connect with him, the only guy she had left. But this time he was actually interested in what Margaret was saying. The whole thing made her so mad, she confided. Ted Statler, thinking he could make up for everything he’d done simply by throwing money at her—money he did nothing to earn. Her jaw was clenched with anger as she spoke, which Sam found utterly thrilling. His mother was angry at Ted Statler, the world’s biggest shitbag. Finally. “Which is why I’m giving all the money to you,” she said at the end of her diatribe.
He couldn’t believe this was his mother, the same woman who had been such a doormat all his life. “What?”
“I’ve started the process of giving you power of attorney,” she said. “You’re getting everything I have, including your father’s money.”
He must have read the letter two hundred times on the train ride back to New York the next day. The whole thing infuriated him at first. His mom was right, it was exactly as hypocritical and manipulative as one would expect from Ted Statler, a man who’d deigned to call his son no more than a handful of times in the last several years, thinking all could be forgiven with the sweep of a pen.
But then Sam started to think what his father’s money could afford him—a simpler life, a little bit of luxury. He’d been ready for a change after nearly a decade working in the children’s psych ward at Bellevue Hospital, teaching grad students and treating irrevocably damaged children. And suddenly he felt better about the whole thing. On their second date he told the story to Annie, who wisely suggested he wait until his mother signed power of attorney over to him before spending the money, but it was complicated. Sam couldn’t say no to the money, nor could he stand the idea of having it. So he spent it, compulsively, every purchase aimed to wipe that smirk off Ted Statler’s face. Once he got started, he couldn’t stop himself—and on the stupidest shit. A nearly $5,000 Eames executive chair made of polished die-cast aluminum and locking casters? Thanks, Dad! A Lexus 350 with leather interior and automatic ignition? Thanks, Dad! Living large on credit, all of it to be immediately paid off as soon as his mother signs the money over to him, which is literally any day now, according to Sally French, the director of Rushing Waters.
But that was three months ago, and his mother still hasn’t signed the documents. “We’re working on it, Sam,” Mrs. French keeps assuring him. (She’s also been telling him to call her Sally, but she was their next-door neighbor growing up and he finds it impossible to reimagine her as a peer.) Margaret has deteriorated more quickly than anyone expected and, as legally required, has to endure a series of tests to prove she’s signing the papers in sound mind. She keeps failing.
He’s trying not to worry. It will all be fine. She’ll pass the tests, and he’ll get power of attorney. The money will transfer into his account, and he’ll wipe away the pile of debt he’s accrued, dozens of bills he’s been hiding here in his desk drawer, keeping them from Annie. (No need to worry her. It’s all going to be fine!)
The doorbell rings, and he slips the bills back into the drawer. With a deep breath, he presses the button to unlock the door.
“Hello,” Sam says, greeting the patient standing by the couch. “Come on in, sit wherever you’d like.”
Chapter 6
“A typical female can lay between 500 and 600 eggs,” I read on the website, repulsed. “Brown and yellow, with a skull shape on its thorax, it’s known as the death’s-head hawkmoth.” I take a closer look at the illustration, wondering if these could be the annoying things that came out of Agatha Lawrence’s boxes, eating their way through the linens. “In many cultures, they are thought to be a bad omen, and—”
Someone’s outside. I peer out the window. It’s Sam, sitting on the bottom step of the porch, reading. By the time I open the front door to join him, he’s on his feet, the book tucked under his arm.
“Shoot,” I say. “Was about to join you for a cup of coffee. Am I too late?”
“Yeah, I have to get downstairs. Was trying to get in some reading.”
“What’s the book?” I ask.
He holds it up. “Misery, by Stephen King. It’s totally deranged.” He lowers his voice. “Speaking of deranged, back to work.”