Roadblock XX
by Myra Love
  Article # 293 Article Type: Fiction

“How…? What…?” I stuttered and looked to Anita for help. She, however, stood silently with her arms folded across her chest and looked from Andrew to me and back again.
Andrew smiled at me. There was not a trace of his usual condescending hostility in the smile, and I didn’t know what to make of that. “I drove around with the cat in the box for about fifteen minutes before he started yowling,” he began. Then he stood up. “Do sit down, Mother,” he said gently, indicating the chair he’d just occupied.
“That’s my seat,” Laurel spoke up, but he ignored her and continued to urge me to sit.
“It’s all right, Andrew,” I said. “Laurel was sitting there.”
He looked blank for a moment, as if he’d forgotten who Laurel was. Then he sat down again. “Very well,” he continued. “The cat began to yowl, as I was saying. Then he started to rattle the box. I pulled over by the side of the road and looked back to see that he had gotten part of the lid open and was tearing at the rest. So I knew I had to get him somewhere safe or else he’d be tearing around inside the car.”
He sighed. “Your home was the only place I could think of that was close by. I remembered from childhood that you’d always left a key under that large plant on the back step. I hoped it was still there, and fortunately it was.”
“You went to my house?”
Andrew nodded. “I’d have phoned to ask your permission first, of course, but I know you never turn on your cell phone.”
Anita chortled. “She never even takes it out of the car.”
I glared at her. “I hate it when those things go off in public.”
Anita nodded. “So do I. But you can put it on vibrate.”
I sniffed disdainfully. “I don’t want some electronic doohickey giving me a massage I’m not expecting.” I glared at Andrew. “You could have phoned here,” I said accusingly,
He nodded. “I did. Tried anyway. But the phone just rang and rang. I guess the answering machine isn’t working.”
“It’s off,” Laurel piped up. “I always turn it off when I’m home.”
“In any case,” Andrew continued, “I dragged the box of screaming, clawing cat into the house and released him.” He held up his left hand. “Got more than a few scratches for my trouble. I’d forgotten about the kitten though.” He shook his head ruefully. “Foolish of me. When they saw each other, all hell broke loose.”
Anita chuckled. “I can well believe it.”
Andrew smiled a little nervously. “Well, the cats chased each other, and I chased both of them. I wanted to keep them from killing each other and from doing any damage to the house or its furnishings.” He sighed and shook his head. “You’d think father and daughter would get along better than that!” He addressed me with his next remark. “Eventually the kitten ran into Father’s study, and Roadblock followed. I heard the sound of falling books, and when I finally caught up with them, the kitten was high on the shelf where Wordsworth’s poems had been a few moments earlier. Roadblock had gotten onto the desk and was trying to jump up on the shelf from there, but he couldn’t quite manage. He’s a hefty one, isn’t he?”
Dennison cleared his throat loudly, but Laurel was the only one to pay him any mind. She stared at him briefly, rolled her eyes, and began to pick at the edge of her sweater.
Andrew was too caught up in his narrative to pay attention to either one of them. “So I was going after Roadblock. I almost had him when he slipped out of my grasp and kicked a whole pile of papers from the desk onto the floor. Then he raced out the door.” Andrew paused for a breath. “I followed him into the living room. He was on the sofa, lying like a pile of limp wool. I thought maybe he’d had a heart attack from the chase, but he was just resting. When I went over to him, he lifted his head and let out a small grunt. I decided to leave him in peace and check on the kitten.”
Dennison grumbled something under his breath that sounded like, “Stay tuned,” and Laurel giggled in response. Dennison looked at her and smiled faintly. She smiled back.
“The kitten was still high up on the bookshelf. I was afraid she couldn’t get down, so I walked back to the storage room and brought a ladder back. Once I’d set it up so that I’d be able to reach her when I got to the top and started to climb, she hopped sideways and nimbly leaped down, first to a lower shelf, then to the top of the old mahogany chest of drawers, and finally to the floor. By the time I’d gotten down off the ladder, she had disappeared. I walked out to the living room and saw her perched on the window ledge where she could keep an eye on Roadblock while enjoying the late afternoon sun.” He chuckled. “I went back into the study to pick the papers off the floor, and my name jumped out at me from the one lying atop the mess.” He looked at me and made a face. They were Father’s letters to you,” he informed me, as if I didn’t know. “The ones he wrote while you were separated.” He sighed. “Why did you have them out on the desk?”
I was about to tell him I didn’t owe him an explanation when it registered that his question was not the usual challenge. He really wanted to know.
“I was rereading them, trying to figure out what I should have done,” I replied honestly.
“Done about what?” he asked.
“About you and James. After all that had happened, I trusted your father to tell you the truth when he’d promised to do so. But recently I began to wonder if he had.” I grimaced and suppressed an urge to wring my hands.
“He did,” Andrew said, “or at least part of it. But he told us in a way that made us think you were unreasonable and that he was humoring you in order to bring us all back together as a family. Then a months after you let him come back, he told us we were going off to military school” He shook his head. “We blamed you, of course.”
“What do you mean by ‘of course’?” I demanded. “I did everything I could to keep you at home.”
“Except throw him out again,” Andrew replied, a faint, bitter smile playing around his lips. “It was hardest on James. He felt that you’d rejected us in favor of Phoebe. And he hated military school with a passion.”
“I know that, Andrew,” I said, trying to control my annoyance. “So you read my letters.”
He nodded. “Yes, I did. And I now understand a lot that I didn’t before. And I’m sorry for a lot of the conclusions I drew that were inaccurate.” He took a deep breath. “I also saw her picture.”
For a moment I didn’t know whose picture he meant, then I realized it had to be Jenny. I had one in the folder with Lawrence’s letters to me.
I stared at him, and he smiled.
“She was beautiful,” he said softly. “And Phoebe doesn’t look a thing like her.” He grimaced. “I have to admit that she does look a lot like Father though. More so every year.”
“Well, she is his daughter,” I replied gently.
He nodded. “He told us he wasn’t sure, you know. But he was willing to take her in because it meant so much to you.” Andrew stared blindly at the wall behind my head. “But in the letters he admits she’s his.” He shook his head. “Why did he lie to us?”
I couldn’t bring myself to answer his question, but Anita stepped in. “He wanted, no, he needed your respect and your good opinion. I doubt that he realized initially that gaining your respect would mean that he’d have to ruin your relationship with you mother and do lasting damage to your opinion of her.” She sighed. “I hope you can put things to rights now. Not only between your mother and you but also between her and James.”
Andrew nodded. “But I still don’t like the idea of having that dammed funeral parlor bear my name. It gives me the creeps.” He glared from me to Anita and back again, as if challenging us to change his mind.
“That’s an easy problem to solve,” Anita said, with a smile. “Once Phoebe and Steven take over the business, it can be renamed.” She looked at me. “Is Phoebe going to call herself Mrs. Shields?”
I shook my head. “No. We had a long conversation about that. She doesn’t want to take Steven’s name. She wants to continue to call herself Euler, though, of course, she’s never legally been a Euler.”
Andrew and Anita stared at me in consternation. “I thought Lawrence and you adopted her,” Anita said finally.
I shook my head. “No, I couldn’t persuade him. That’s why I have always referred to her as my ward, not my stepdaughter.”
“So what is her last name?” Andrew demanded. “Legally, I mean.”
“I suppose she is still technically Phoebe Andrews since Jenny was Jennifer Andrews.”
“Well, I like Shields better,” Andrew announced. “If Phoebe and Steven agree to change the name of the business to Shields’, I’m willing to relinquish my claim to it. And I’m sure that James, once he knows what the letters contain, will do so too.”
I could hardly believe it would be that easy, but for the first time I had some hope that the endless feud that had torn my family apart for so many years might end before I closed my eyes for the last time.
“This is all very touching, I’m sure,” I heard Dennison say, “but it’s highly inappropriate that our hearing be turned into a family reunion.” He stood up. “I’m going to leave now, Miss Carswell. All you’ve done is drag me from my home to downtown to this house, and we are no closer to resolving the issue of my pens than we were before we started. I shall contact my attorney and issue a complaint to the town managers. And I shall take this matter to a real court instead of relying on an incompetent, semi-senile woman to resolve it.”
“Oh, sit down and shut up, Dennison!” Anita said. “You always were a pompous ass.”
“Really!” Laurel exclaimed. “That’s a very rude thing to say, Miss Carswell.”
“Rude?” Andrew shouted at her. “After what that lout said, her reply was measured and restrained. What is wrong with you, Laurel?”
“What’s wrong with me?” she repeated. “What’s wrong with you?”
They glared at each other while I made eye contact with Anita, who was suppressing a smile and trying to look stern. I had no idea what she was smiling about, since she’d just been called incompetent and semi-senile. She winked at me and said softly, “I’m so glad for you, Marian.” I felt tears come to my eyes but hastily brushed them away. “Hmmph!” I replied just as softly, “we’ll see what comes of it.”
Dennison had continued standing. Emboldened by Laurel’s support, he stared from Andrew to Anita and back again. “I stand by what I said,” he growled. “And I’ll thank you not to call me names.”
“I’ll call you what I like,” Andrew replied. “I suggest you apologize to Miss Carswell immediately, if you don’t want to be called worse than a lout.”
“Stop it, both of you!” Anita said firmly. She turned to Dennison and said, “Either sit down or leave. It makes no difference to me. I’ve reached my conclusion and will communicate it to your lawyer. I’m sure he’ll pass it on to you in time.” She peered at him intently. “Of course, you’ll have to pay him for that.”
Dennison sat down. He grimaced. “All right, say what you have to say, please, Miss Carswell.”
Anita nodded. “All right, Mr. Wayne. First of all, you are free to reject any suggestions I make. However, you should be aware that if you choose to litigate, the fees that your attorney will require in order to represent you will be at least half the value of the pens about which you are quarreling, pens whose value has already been diminished by your selling off their boxes.”
“And by her inking them,” Dennison interjected.
Miss Carswell sighed and looked at him as if he were a very slow student indeed. Laurel shook her head. “I only inked sixteen of them,” she said. “There are hundreds.”
Dennison just grunted in response to Laurel’s comment. He smirked at Anita. “Well?”
“No matter what you intended when you signed the document that your attorney drew up, your signature confirms that you acquiesce to the surrender of your pens to Mrs. Wayne.”
He snorted. “I knew this hearing was a waste of time,” he said. “You never had any intention of giving me a fair shake.”
“Oh, I’d like to shake you all right, Mr. Wayne. You seem bound and determined to alienate me. I don’t know if that’s because you think that doing so will strengthen your hand in future litigation or if you are just incapable of behaving in a mature manner.”
“You never like me,” Dennison said.
“You’re quite correct about that,” Anita replied. “However I don’t have to like you. I just have to be objective.”
“You call your decision objective?” he shouted suddenly, jumping to his feet again.
“Oh do be quiet!” Anita said with a sigh. “You haven’t heard my decision yet. I’ve merely told you what I understand to be the legal implications of your signature on the property settlement.”
Dennison sat down and grimaced at her. “Do go on then.”
Anita cleared her throat. “I believe that you stated, Mr. Wayne, that you are in need of funds to supplement your medical insurance. Therefore, I suggest that Mrs. Wayne allow you to take possession of the pens on the list that Mrs. Euler was kind enough to bring with her today. Selling some or all of those should help you pay for the cosmetic surgery that you require.”
She looked over at Laurel. “Is that all right with you, Mrs. Wayne?”
Laurel nodded. “If you think it’s fair, Miss Carswell, it’s fine with me.” She giggled. “I think they’re ugly anyway, and I’d certainly never use any of them.”
“You’ve no taste, Laurel,” Dennison announced superciliously. “You never did and you never will.”
Laurel smirked at him. “Well, if those pens are so great, perhaps I should reconsider and not let you have them after all.”
“You’re not letting me have them. Miss Carswell is ordering you to turn them over to me.”
Laurel shook her head. “Some things never change, do they, Handsome?”
He stared at her blankly.
“I think we’re done here,” she said. She looked over at Andrew. “Will you help me find the pens on that list, please?” She smiled winningly, but Andrew shook his head. “I don’t know a thing about pens, Laurel,” he replied. “Besides I need to talk to my mother.”
Laurel looked hurt, and Anita turned to me. “I’ll help Laurel out while you and Andrew talk. Then I have to get home to Molly. Perhaps Laurel will give me a ride.”
I looked at Laurel who nodded, but I wasn’t sure she could be counted on to follow through. However, I didn’t have time to voice my doubts. Andrew came over and took my arm. “I’ll walk you to your car, Mother, and follow you home. We have a lot to talk about.”

 
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