In A Year

Here I am, trying to make sure everything is accurate. So much is riding on this. I have boxes of receipts and a folder with the past year’s bank statements. None of it was as important as the little black book in my purse. Everything must match this little book of sixty pages. One of my favorite movies is Rent and the opening song never meant so much until this year. I agreed to do this. I could have said no, but I didn’t and here we are. We’re sitting in this cozy little office with boxes, a folder and this little black book waiting to talk to my grandparent’s lawyer.

Let’s go back a year ago, I had just married my boyfriend, Ruzna. We arrived home after our honeymoon and there was a certified letter waiting for us at the post office. We picked it up with all of our held mail. The letter was from a law office telling us we had until the next day to come to them. We tried calling them, but no one answered the phone. The next morning, we were at the office at 9 am, as requested. We didn’t speak while we waited, not knowing what to say or think in this moment.

“Mr. & Mrs. Pearsell?”, an older gentleman in a tailored suit asked as he walked up to us.

We stood up as he approached. “Yes”, we said in unison.

“I’m, Mr. Hawthorne, please follow me to my office.” He turns and walked away. We followed him to a small conference room. There were two other older gentlemen seated at the table. “Mr. Carey and Mr. Neubors”, he said as he pointed to the men sitting at table. “Please have a seat.” He took his seat on the side of the table with the other men.

“Hello Mr. & Mrs. Pearsell, I want to thank you for coming today. I know you’re curious as to why you are here.” said Mr. Neubors. We nodded as he continued, “Due to your recent wedding a trust has open for Mrs. Pearsell. This trust was started by your paternal grandparents when you were born.”

“Excuse me sir, I don’t have paternal grandparents. Hell, I’ve never met my father. You must have made a mistake.” I got up to leave.

Mr. Carey says, “Mrs. Pearsell, we assure you we have the correct person. Your mother is Carthena Cartwright born in Woodstock, Alabama to Philmore and Cavner Cartwright.” When I sat down, he continued, “The funds in the trust are to be giving to you upon your one-year anniversary provided you complete the tasks outlined by your grandparents. You will be given $20,000 today to spend over the next year. You cannot spend this money on drugs or alcohol. You cannot gamble with this money; this also excludes buying stock or lottery tickets. Do you understand so far?” We nodded and he continued, “We will give you these rules so you can look them over later, but we must get you to sign a few documents asserting that you will adhere to these rules and complete all the tasks”

Mr. Carey talked for what seemed to be an hour and I listened intently, but I really never met my grandparents. My parents never married and my mother never told me who my father was. All of this seemed a little crazy to me. This is a shock to know I had family all this time and they never came to see me. I have so many questions, but Mr. Carey is holding a pen out to me. I look at Ruzna and he shrugs. I look down at the paper and the words seem to jumble up on the page. One signature away from a yearlong obligation.

“You can always decline and you will still get $5,000 today.” Mr. Neubors said with a smirk.

“What happens to the rest of the money?” Runza asked.

“It would not be your concern anymore.” Mr. Hawthorne said. “But should you sign and complete the year you will never have to worry about money again. All you have to do is sign the paper and stick to the rules. Also, you have to record every transaction in this black book. Or you can walk out the door.” He slides a small black book with my name embossed in silver across the front.

“Can we have a minute to think this through?” Runza said, it’s like he knew what I was thinking.

“Sure, we can give you 30 minutes, after that we need an answer.” Mr. Carey said. “We will give you the room.” They all left the room.

“We don’t have to do this, Faiza. We can go home and continue with our plan.” Runza said as he hugged me.

I snuggled into his chest and didn’t want to think of anything more than about his arms around me. This is not how I expected to spend the day after our honeymoon. I sighed and pulled away. “I think we should do this. We can do a lot of good with this money. Yes, we could walk away and slowly build to this, but it’s right here, right now. Neither of us ever thought something like this would happen. Why not take this opportunity.” I opened the black book and on the first few pages was the rules and stipulations. It seems like they are setting us up to succeed all we have to do is commit. “I’m going to sign the paper. I know this is unbelievable, but we have to give it a try.”

Runza smiles and kisses my hand. “I support your decision. I know we will do great things with this money.”

I sign the document and we started discussing our plans just as the lawyers walk back in the room. Mr. Neubors is first to speak, “I see you have signed the papers; do you need us to go over the rules again?”

“No sir, they are all here,” I said as I held up the black book.

“Well then, we will see you in a year. Good luck to you both,” said Mr. Carey.

“I will walk you out.” Mr. Hawthorne said as he held the door for everyone to leave the room. He walked us back to the lobby, “I wish you well. See you in a year.” He handed us a cashier’s check for $20,000 and left.

We stood staring at the check for a minute, then we walked out with the check, the black book and a plan. We took the check to our bank to deposit. We were told the funds would not be available for several days. While we waited for the check to clear we solidified out plans on how to spend the money. $20,000 is not a lot of money when you think about it, but if spent properly it can help a lot of people. We wrote out our list of local charities and organizations. Then we wrote letters to each company that we were going to send with the donations. We had a hard time dividing the money evenly. We decided we would send 4 checks a month.

The day before the funds were available, we sent out the first 2 checks. We included a self-addressed and stamped envelope with each payment in case the organizations wanted to send a thank you note. We kept every piece of paper that documented the use of the money. Some places sent thank you cards and others even sent us gifts. We labeled and boxed everything. A week before we were to return to the lawyer’s office, we sent out our final check. The day before we received our final thank you letter.

Again Mr. Hawthorne came to collect us from the lobby area. Runza wheeled all the boxes behind us to the conference room. This time there were two more people in the room with Mr. Neubors and Mr. Carey. It was an older couple; they were whispering to each other as we walked into the room.

“Good to see you again Mr. and Mrs. Pearsell, I see you’ve brought some stuff with you. Do you have the black book?” Mr. Neubors asked.

I nodded and pulled it from my purse. I looked at the older couple and they were now smiling at us.

“We will have our assistance look over the information while we talk to you.” Mr. Carey stated just as three young people came in an took the boxes and one young lady held her hand out for the book. I handed it to her. This is it. No turning back now. Either we succeeded or failed. Either way we helped a lot of people this year and were very proud of that.

“Mrs. Pearsell, these are your grandparents Mr. and Mrs. James.” Mr. Hawthorne stated pointing to the older couple.

“We’re so happy to finally meet you,” Mrs. James said with a gentle smile.

“I wish I could say the same.” I said, “I didn’t even know you existed until last year. I’m sure you had your reasons for staying away, but I’m not ready to hash that out right now.” Runza held my hand, because we had discussed the possibility that they would be here today. We decided that we would get through this final session with the lawyers and then move on with our lives with whatever money we earned after this past year.

Both Mr. and Mrs. James looked hurt. Mr. James was holding his wife’s hand as well. “We understand. There is nothing we can say to excuse our absences, but we hope to get to know you, when you are ready.” Mr. James stated.

I did not respond and we sat in silence awaiting the results. We sat like that for 2 hours before the young lady that took the book came back in. She had the book and some papers. She smiled as she made her way to Mr. Carey and gave him the items. He looked at them and smiled. He passed them to Mr. Neubors and Hawthorne. They also smiled.

“It seems congratulations are in order.” Mr. Hawthorne said, “You completed the task accurately to the penny.” He then he looked at my grandparents. “They did it!”

Mrs. James started crying and Mr. James said, “I know you aren’t ready to know us, but our son was a rebellious child. We only learned about you after you were born, but didn’t know how to approach your mother. Our son had seven daughters with different women. When he died, we decided to try to help you girls. We know this was a lot of work to get your inheritance, but we wanted to ensure that we left our money and estate in the hands of someone that would not squander it. You were our last hope.” As he talked, I grew anger because not only did they stay away from me, but I have six sisters. He continued, “You have inherited billions of dollars and you can spend it how you see fit. We will give you the addressed to your sisters and we will be around for as long as we’re able. When you are ready, we can talk about the past.” With that he and his wife left.

“Here is all you will need moving forward. Here are all of your assets and your sister’s information. If you would like to keep our law firm as your lawyers, we would be happy to help. If not, there is a list of capable law firms that are just as good.” Mr. Neubors stated as he slid a folder across the table to us.

Runza and I left the office feeling elated. We walk in with $200 to our name and we walked out billionaires. This year was challenging, we grew closer and now have the rest of our life to do more good things.