Chapter 7: What Gerald Knew
I called the number back immediately.
He answered on the first ring, as though he had been holding the phone.
"Adelle." He used my full name.
Nobody called me that anymore except people who had known me before I became simply Mom.
"Thank you for calling back."
"Start talking," I said.
He exhaled.
"I owe you more than a phone call.
I know that.
But I need you to hear this first and we can deal with everything else afterward."
"Then say it."
"I met Lennox four months ago.
She reached out through a mutual contact — a man I used to do some property work with years back.
She said she was Terrence's wife, that she was concerned about your welfare, and that she thought the family needed to come together." He paused.
"She was very convincing."
"She usually is."
"She told me you had been showing signs of memory problems.
Confusion.
That you had made some poor financial decisions recently and that Terrence was worried but didn't know how to approach you.
She said having another family member on the petition would make it easier for the court to appoint Terrence quickly, without a long process."
"And you believed her."
A long pause.
"I wanted to believe someone had finally thought to include me.
I know how that sounds.
After everything with Mom's estate, I suppose I was easy to convince." His voice dropped.
"She told me she just wanted to make sure you were looked after.
That it was purely protective."
"She wanted the house," I said.
"Everything else was the story she told to get it."
"I understand that now." He was quiet for a moment.
"I spoke with her last week, after I signed.
I asked her some questions about the actual plan — what would happen to you, where you would live, how the property would be managed.
She was less careful than she had been at the start.
She talked about rental income.
She talked about what the property was worth on the current market.
She never mentioned you once."
I pressed my hand flat against the kitchen table.
"Did she say anything specific about the property value?"
"She had the address.
She had the square footage.
She had a number from what sounded like an informal appraisal." He paused.
"Adelle, she knew everything.
The mortgage payoff date, the estimated equity, the fact that you had contributed to their house purchase.
She had built a file on you."
"She's been building it for months," I said.
"I contacted a lawyer this morning," Gerald said.
"I want to withdraw my name from the petition.
My attorney says I can file a withdrawal before the hearing.
I want to do that.
And I want to tell your lawyer what I've just told you, if that would help."
I looked at the wall.
The clock ticked.
"Why are you doing this now?" I asked.
Not angry.
Genuinely needing to know.
"Because she lied to me to use me against my own sister," he said quietly.
"And because I have done enough damage to you already in this lifetime."
I thought about the fourteen years.
The funeral.
Our mother's small, disputed savings.
All that hardened silence.
"I'll have Diane call you today," I said.
"I'll answer." A pause.
"I really am sorry, Adelle.
For more than this."
I didn't say it was all right.
It wasn't, not completely, and we both knew that.
But I said, "I know," and that was honest, and it was enough to begin with.
That afternoon, Diane called me back thirty minutes after I gave her Gerald's number.
"He's credible," she said.
"And what he's described — the informal appraisal, the knowledge of your financial documents, the rental income conversation — that adds a significant dimension to what we're bringing on the fourteenth."
May you like
"What kind of dimension?"
"The kind," Diane said, "that may interest people beyond the family court."
