Chapter 14 - A Sister Turns the Knife
Thomas compared the letter to my genuine signatures and immediately asked for its source.
Brandon said he had received it from Jessica as part of the transition packet.
Jessica denied creating it.
She said David's firm had prepared paperwork based on discussions with the family.
David, through counsel, said the document originated elsewhere.
Everyone seemed to agree that the letter existed.
No one wanted to own it.
A forensic examiner later concluded that the signature showed indications consistent with simulation, though authorship could not be determined from the signature alone.
Thomas urged us to let the evidence develop.
I was tired of evidence developing while the people I loved continued speaking to me as though I was the problem.
Then Jessica requested a private conversation.
I declined.
She asked to speak with my attorney present.
I agreed.
At Thomas's conference table, she sat upright in a cream-colored coat and placed her handbag precisely beside her chair.
For the first twenty minutes, she repeated how stressful the proceedings had become.
Then she said something that revealed the real purpose of the meeting.
"If you keep contesting this, the grandchildren could lose their homes and schools."
"That's not a reason to declare me incompetent," I replied.
"You don't understand the consequences."
"I'm beginning to."
She leaned toward me.
"Mom, you are seventy-one. What are you going to do with all that money?"
The room went silent.
There it was, stripped of professional vocabulary and concern.
My life had been reduced to the number of years someone thought I had left.
I looked at her carefully.
"Live with it," I said.
She blinked.
"What?"
"Live my own life. Pay for my care. Help people I choose. Paint. Travel. Stay in my house."
Her mouth tightened.
"That's selfish."
I thought of the school lunches, the loans, the hospital I had left alone, and the courtroom where she had asked strangers to take away my voice.
"Selfish is an interesting word for you to use," I answered.
Thomas asked Jessica whether she had any knowledge of the disputed signature.
She refused to answer without her attorney.
We ended the meeting.
In the elevator, I saw my reflection beside hers in the mirrored door.
For the first time I did not search her face for the child she had once been.
I saw an adult making choices.
And I knew that loving her did not require pretending those choices weren't hers.
Before the doors opened, she spoke so quietly that Thomas almost missed it.
"If Brandon goes down, I'm not going down with him."
I turned toward her.
"What did you do, Jessica?"
She pressed the lobby button again, although it was already lit.
"You'll find out soon enough."
Two hours later Thomas received a new production of emails.
One message, sent from Jessica's work account, instructed David's assistant to insert my signature image into a draft relocation authorization.
The subject line read: Use the version Mom signed last year.
May you like
But there was no version I had signed last year.
