And now, as I let him in, Baldy awkwardly clears his throat. His checkered bow tie stifles the noise from reaching its true potential.
“Do you need some water?” I ask. Unlike Baldy, I was brought up with social graces. If I had a car, I would have at least attempted to introduce it to a curb.
“Unnecessary,” he says. “You and I have bigger priorities to address.”
Oh, goody. “As long as I don’t have to lick any envelopes.”
“No envelopes are involved.”
Baldy surveys the shelves of Grandma’s occult-leaning pharmaceuticals, probably to avoid sighing over me again. He and I have known each other for a week, and he couldn’t make it clearer that I grate at the scratchy wool fibers of his being. I suspect he has an eldest daughter he’s projecting onto me. At least this would explain why he’s so invested in micromanaging my handling of Grandma Rose’s last will and testament.
“So,” I say, hoping to keep his visit short, “funeral’s done. Peachy. Now that that’s over, the probate should all just be downhill from here, right?”
Baldy rubs his unpleasantly wet-looking, stumpy nose. “Not quite.”
Rather than simply explaining like a normal person, Baldy drags himself theatrically into the center of the room. He settles for standing directly beneath the giant, dusty, and low-hanging chandelier. A blinding sheen bounces off his head. I consider grabbing sunglasses. Or SPF 50+ sunscreen. But I don’t, because that would be rude, and I’d prefer to stay in Baldy’s good graces. He holds my future in his pale, sweaty hands.
“There is a… hiccup,” he says at last.
Oh, crap. I can see from Baldy’s face that he’s about to do it again. He’s going to cruelly code-switch out of English into the foreign languages of Business and Law.
“It has,” he begins ominously, “come to my attention that your grandmother confirmed receipt of a creditor’s validation notice. A collections agency has petitioned the Massachusetts probate courts for possession of a portion of Rosamund’s estate, requiring us to follow the judge’s order to set up a payment plan to resolve the debt. Being that this is the case, I will need to intervene with a legal motion of…”
“Uh-huh,” I say. “Yep. Uh-huh.”
These are lying noises.
Because as might be expected of a twenty-two-year-old girl fresh out of college, I am lost. Completely in over my head. I have no idea how to read wills or contracts or IKEA instruction manuals, and not for lack of trying. The fact that I have been hired to perform audits at a professional level remains deeply mysterious to me.
Also, I suspect Baldy rambles like this to pad his legal fees.
“… and of course, that stipulation is magically binding.”
I blink. “Sorry, what?”
“This requirement of Rosamund’s will and testament is magically binding,” Baldy repeats, sniffing emphatically. I’m tempted to offer him a Kleenex and pretend I didn’t hear him mention magic, but with yesterday’s head discovery, I can’t let this go.
“Explain,” I demand. “But simply.”
“Until the will releases you, you will have to remain physically, corporeally in Salem.”
I take a moment to process this.
“No. I can’t do that,” I say once my blood remembers how to carry oxygen through my body. “I’m not staying.”
“You said you would uphold the requirements of this role, Samantha, when I called you to inform you of Rosamund’s most sorrowful passing—”
I interrupt. “Mymominformed me of Grandma’s death. And if I said yes to staying here, I meant for a few days, a week at most. It’s been a week. You told me I would be named executrix within the week, and guess what, I was! What more could she want?”
“Part of the instructions for the executor include guarding Rosamund’s spirit until it ascends.”
“You can’t be serious. That sounds like a quote from a nineties goth rock ballad!” Baldy shakes his too-shiny head at me. “Why hasn’t she ascended yet?”
“Per the wording of her will, ‘Once I am returned to the earth, my appointed must guard my spirit until the passing of seven tides, low and high, twice over.’?”
“I don’t remember you reading that part to me in your office a few days ago. Why would you leave that out?”
Baldy leaves my question unanswered as he rambles on mercilessly. “As I mentioned, the matter of the debt is indubitably keeping your grandmother’s spirit here. I suspect that she will need to remain until that piece is resolved. And of course, she must be waiting for the passing of the—”
