Finding Me (3 page)

“Nah. There’s nothing left but Daddy’s office. I guess I have
all day tomorrow to get it knocked out while you two are slaving away at your jobs. This extra time is definitely the one benefit of being fired.” Kelli thought about the room she’d put off until last. Cleaning it out seemed so final, going through his personal things too invasive. Everything about emptying out that room struck her as being wrong.

She had no idea how wrong it would turn out to be.

3

O
dd that my first entry into this journal isn’t about Daddy and Mimi at all. It’s about my
other family, the one I never knew.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve had this dream. It’s my only “memory” of my mother, brother, and sister, though it’s really not a memory at all. It’s a figment of my imagination, because this is not at all the way it happened, and I have no idea what they even looked like in real life.

We are in a car. I am in the back seat
holding Scruffy, my favorite stuffed dog. My brother is on
my right side with his hand stuck out the back window, my sister on my left, leaning forward so that I can see her blond curls. My mother is driving, and they are all singing a completely nonsensical song, something about Scruffy and me. I can never quite make out
the words. Everyone is giggling and laughing, right up until
the moment the windshield explodes and glass goes flying everywhere. I hear them screaming, and then it goes silent and
dark. On the good days, I wake up as soon
as the glass shatters. On the bad ones, I lie
there alone and frightened in the silent dark for what
seems like forever, calling for my mother but hearing no response except my own cries.

This morning was the latter type. I hope this is not a sign of what’s ahead.

Even from the road, Dad and Mimi’s house felt empty. The
Sold
banner across the realty sign in the front yard reminded Kelli that by this time next year it would be as if she and her parents had never existed here at all, erased from their home of the past twenty-four years. Kelli turned into the driveway, which still held her father’s truck, tool chest across the bed, as if waiting for its driver. Only the
For Sale
sign in the back window told the truth of the situation.

Well, sitting in her car, staring at the house was accomplishing nothing. Kelli climbed out of her lime green Ford Fiesta and couldn’t help but touch the hood of her father’s old white pickup. After several weeks of sitting unused, a layer of grime had settled over it. Kelli made a mental note to wash it soon. She pulled open the driver’s side door and climbed in, the torn vinyl of the seat scratching her legs. She wrapped her arms around the steering wheel and leaned her forehead against it. “Oh, Daddy, I wish you were here.”

No answer. Only silence.

She climbed out and made a spur-of-the-moment decision to tackle the car cleaning first. She found all the supplies in the garage and got started, soon deciding a wax job was in order, too. Vacuum, tire treatment, dash dressing. She didn’t stop until there was absolutely nothing left she could do to the old heap.

Finally, she made her way inside the house. As she entered, she noted that the place had taken on something of a musty smell, with only a hint of Mimi’s perfume and Daddy’s turpentine
still left in the air. She stopped at the door to the living room, looked at the bay window—the place that was always home for the Christmas tree. Twinkling colored lights and tinsel filled her memory, then were jerked away by the realization that this year at Christmas, she would be alone. Yet one more layer of sting added to the constant pain of the past weeks. She shook her head and started down the hall, toward the next task.

Her father had been positively territorial about his office. Kelli had never been allowed in there. Even Mimi kept a wide berth from this room, so cleaning it out for the new owners felt a bit like a violation of her father’s sacred space. Especially now that she was armed with the combination to the safe—which she’d come across in some other paperwork just last night. At least it would save her the expense of having to call in a locksmith.

Suddenly, she was five-year-old Kelli again, playing with her Barbies in the living room. She was getting them ready for a ball with the prince, so they were dressed in their finest shiny gowns and wearing all their best jewelry.

She heard the clank of metal coming from inside Daddy’s office and knew what that meant. It was just a little safe in the bottom of the closet, and he was always very secretive about what was inside. She looked down at her finely dressed dolls and all the jewelry they were wearing and wondered if maybe Daddy had some jewels in his safe. Probably. Rubies and diamonds, she guessed, and maybe a few sapphires, too.

The rules were very firm. If Daddy was in the office with the door closed, he was not to be disturbed. Today, however, the door remained slightly ajar, which meant it was okay to go see him, right?

Kelli really, really, really wanted to see the jewels. So, as quietly as she could, she tiptoed down the hall. The door was cracked
open a couple of inches, but since the safe was against the back of the hallway wall, there was no way to see it without entering the room and looking back toward the closet. She pushed at the door oh so slowly, hoping it wouldn’t make a squeaking sound and give her away. It didn’t.

She crept inside and finally came to the point where she could see her father. Just then, a board creaked beneath her feet, causing her father to jerk around. “Kelli, what do think you’re doing, coming in here? You know the rules!” He shouted the words at her, and his face turned bright red. “Never, ever, ever, are you allowed to come in here when the door is shut. You know that.”

“But, Daddy, the door wasn’t shut—”

“Don’t you dare lie to me, young lady.” He stood up and started toward her, and Kelli could see the vein bulging at the side of his forehead. Usually that only happened when he was really mad at Mimi. “You get out of here right now. Do you understand?” He pulled the door open and pointed her out toward the hallway.

Kelli had her head down and tears streaming down her cheeks as she walked past him. Daddy had never talked to her that way before, and she had been telling the truth. As she got beside him, she mumbled, “The door wasn’t closed.”

The swat that landed on her rear end hurt all the more because she hadn’t seen it coming. “Ouch.”

“You ever sneak in here like that again, and you’ll get worse.” He slammed the door behind her, leaving Kelli crying in a crumpled heap in the hallway. The next day, he’d installed a lock on the inside of the office door. It was the only time in all her life Kelli could remember that kind of anger from her father directed at her.

Now, twenty years later, she stood at the door to his office, once again wondering what kind of treasure her father had hidden in his safe. She moved toward it, her heart pounding like it had all
those years ago. She reached forward and turned the dial to the right, confirming the number on the piece of paper. Then back left. Then right. Then left.

As the light from the room filtered inside the safe, Kelli saw a stack of extra-large manila envelopes. She pulled them out and flipped them over to see them neatly labeled across the front with a black Sharpie. She recognized her father’s block handwriting, which came as no surprise. The first envelope read
Starting Investments
. She pulled out a stack of official-looking documents. The top sheet was a statement from Smith Barney, as was the next page and the next. All investment stuff. An account opened in 1989, with regular deposits every few months. It wasn’t a particularly large sum, and since it was over twenty years old, she couldn’t figure out why he’d kept this, much less locked it in his safe. All of his current investment information had been in his filing cabinets.

1989?

That’s when it hit her. These papers couldn’t be from 1989, because the house fire that took the lives of Kelli’s mother, brother, and sister had happened in 1991. That same fire had destroyed every single one of their family photos and mementos. Any paperwork also would have been destroyed.

It took only a few seconds before Kelli realized that these documents could have easily been copies made from the broker’s office. Of course they could make duplicates.

She skimmed over page after page. Opening investments, deposits made, securities bought and sold until numbers all melted into one another and became nothing but an amorphous blob of indecipherable information. There was no reason she could discern as to why these particular documents would have been placed inside the safe. “So much for the mystery and excitement in here.”

She pulled up the next envelope. It was simply labeled
Documents
. She opened it to find Social Security cards for Dad and Mimi. Hers had likely been kept there too when she’d been a child. Her vaccination reports were in there, and various licensing paperwork. All these things would have been placed there to prevent fire damage, she supposed.

“You found your way into the elusive safe. No wonder you didn’t want any help, you were planning to keep all the riches for yourself.” Denice’s voice behind her caught her by surprise.

“I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Obviously. It’s a good thing I’m not a robber.”

Kelli shrugged. “Wouldn’t matter much if you were. This thing is filled with old investment paperwork and Social Security cards. Nothing too exciting, that’s for sure.” She tilted her head. “What are you doing here?”

“Just came by to check on you. You’re not answering your phone.”

“Oh shoot. I must have left it on silent again.” Kelli picked up her phone, saw that she’d missed six calls, and sighed. “I don’t know why I always do that.”

Denice rolled her eyes. “I’m willing to forgive you yet again, and I came by to tell you that Jones is about to throw some stuffed burgers on the grill, and he’s made your favorite. You in?”

Kelli glanced at the next two envelopes. One marked
Miscellaneous,
the other
Odds and Ends
. Not exactly compelling. She looked at her watch and was surprised to see how late it was. “I must have spent more time on Daddy’s truck than I realized. Come to think of it, I haven’t eaten since breakfast. Jones’s burgers sound good.”

“Great. I’ll see you at our place in twenty minutes.”

“Okay, let me just lock this stuff back in the safe—for whatever reason, it must need to be in the safe. I’ll finish dealing with it
tomorrow.” Kelli flipped off the lights as they left her father’s office, but an uneasy feeling followed her down the hall. It poured itself into her and made its presence felt for the rest of the evening, although she couldn’t give a reason for it. Something wasn’t right, she just didn’t know what or why. Yet.

4

I
t was almost noon when Kelli pulled into her parents’ driveway the next day. She went straight to the office, determined to finish the cleaning today.