“I’m not sure, but I think that might be why the interview focused on my day-to-day activity. They wanted to see what I remembered and what I didn’t.”
Carl understood, then. “They were trying to figure out if he made you forget something.”
“Yeah.”
—Charter Observation Team – 309
3
Monday morning brought the sun, and the temperature had already climbed into the mid-seventies by ten. I showered and shaved and tried to prepare for a day I hoped would never come.
The law offices of Matteo, Santillan, and Veney stood in a nondescript three-story brick building on the northeast corner of Brownsville Road and Clairton Boulevard. The second and third stories were residential while the first floor housed the law office, a small pet store, and a laundromat. A Giant Eagle grocery store and shopping center dominated the opposite corner of the intersection, and I spotted no fewer than six women cross the street with laundry baskets (and sometimes kids) in tow, either dropping off laundry prior to grocery shopping or picking it up after, and as I sat in the uncomfortable pleather chair next to the receptionist desk of Auntie Jo’s lawyer, I wondered why someone didn’t move the laundromat across the street into the same shopping center as the grocery store.
Gerdy sat in an equally uncomfortable chair beside me, thumbing through a back issue ofPeoplepilfered from the small table next to the waiting area. Someone named David Koresh was on the cover with the titleThe Evil Messiah – Inside the Waco Cultblazoned across the front in bright yellow. Gerdy wore a pink sundress and flip-flops. With her legs crossed, her left shoe dangled precariously from her toe—I expected it to drop to the tile floor, but it never did, only swayed back and forth. I had been excused from school for two weeks. Gerdy was simply ditching.
The receptionist was in her mid to late fifties with close-cropped platinum blond hair and large glasses with a red frame. Today’s newspaper was spread out on her desk, open to the horoscopes and a crossword puzzle. She had one word filled in when we arrived fifteen minutes earlier—canine—and her pencil had yet to return to the page.
The phone on her desk buzzed, and she picked it up, glanced over at the two of us, then hung up. “Mr. Matteo is ready for you.”
We followed her down a narrow hallway with dozens of white file boxes stacked against the wall on the left to a small conference room filled with even more boxes. She cleared two spots at the table nearest the door and motioned for us to take a seat. “Give him a minute. Would you like coffee or anything?”
Gerdy and I both shook our heads and she left us alone, disappearing down the hallway back toward her desk.
“I think I’m gonna sneeze,” Gerdy said, her nose crinkled. “It’s dusty in here.”
I recently read a book by John Grisham calledThe Firm, and I suppose I expected Auntie Jo’s attorney (and all others, for that matter) to be housed in spacious offices trimmed in rich mahogany, richer leather, and carpet deep enough to swallow you whole. Instead, I was fairly certain I could hear the whir of washers and driers on the opposite side of the conference room wall, and my eye was drawn to the orange stain glistening with dripping water on the beadboard under the air conditioner at the window—the loud unit held in place by a length of 2x4 braced with old books.
I smiled at Gerdy. “Thanks for coming with me.”
She grinned. “Anytime.”
The truth was, Dunk was supposed to come with me. Mr. Krendal said he’d come, too. Dunk backed out last night and Krendal called me thirty minutes before we left the apartment. “Lurline called in, she’s running late. I’m stuck here. So sorry, buddy.”
“Dunk’s working, huh?”
I nodded.
If Gerdy knew what Dunk did to line his pockets, she never pressed me on it. Lurline had called Gerdy when she knew she’d be late to the diner—her little boy was running a temperature and she had to wait on the sitter. Gerdy had arrived at my apartment and was standing in the hallway about to knock, when I opened the door to head out. She smiled, simply said, “This is not something you should have to do alone,” and took my hand, leading me out before I could object.
Not that I would.
I was grateful for the company.
We heard a bang from the hallway, followed by a man swearing under his breath. Then: “Tess, how about spending a little time today on these boxes? Maybe relocate them to the storeroom?”
“Storeroom’s full!” the receptionist shouted back from the front.
“Maybe the basement, then?”
“I’m not going down there. You go down there.”
An overweight man in a brown tweed suit side-stepped into the conference room, the buttons of his jacket straining against his belly. He was frowning toward the front of the office as he tugged at the door and forced it shut behind him, the bottom catching on a rumple in the carpet.
Gerdy sneezed.
“Bless you,” we both said.
He reached a chubby hand out to me. “I’m Dewitt Matteo, your aunt’s attorney. I am so absolutely sorry for your loss. She was a fine woman. We actually went to Brentwood High School together back in the day. Back many days, now that I think about it. We reconnected when I started my practice here; I ran into her at that diner up the road. I’ve seen the both of you there, too. I was thin as a stick back in school. Tell Krendal I blame him entirely for this.” He grabbed at his belly and gave it a jingle, then unbuttoned his jacket and took a seat. “Played varsity basketball back then, if you can believe it. Josephine Gargery, fine woman,” he said again.
