Finding Liberty

by B. E. Baker

  CAN YOU COME VISIT THIS WEEKEND? I HAVE SOMETHING TO SHOW YOU.

  My fingers hover over the phone. Rob doesn’t usually send three messages in a row without some kind of response from me. Because I’ve reduced him to adhering to typical relationship rules, so insecure about whether I’m still invested in us. A lesser man would have thrown in the towel. But Rob’s not even in the same zip code as any of the other men I’ve dated.

  YES, I text. Then I delete it. Because I can’t. If I fly to Atlanta, I’ll cave. I’ll tell him to move, or I’ll move, or anything at all to make this work.

  Although, this is him asking me to do something. He’s not throwing out ultimatums, but it’s a start. Maybe it’s the stepping-stone to him asking me for what he needs. Maybe he’s becoming vested enough in his own needs and wants to start carving out some space for himself. Could he protect us from what we might become otherwise?

  WHAT’S THE SURPRISE? I finally text back.

  No response. Drat.

  Rob and his stupid surprises.

  I hate them and I love them. No one has ever tried to surprise me other than my dad, and those are always hit and miss.

  Surprise, we’re going to Turkey for a week! You’ll hate the food, and no one wears deodorant. Just what teenage dreams are made of. Or surprise, I’ve decided to buy a three-wheeled car for you to drive! It looks bizarre and feels unsafe. Good luck. Surprise, we’re skipping school for a month to go to Bora Bora. The weather is great, but of course you won’t know a soul and the WiFi is spotty at best.

  Mom always hated Dad’s surprises. For me and Trig, sometimes they were awesome, but they were always… unreliable. Rob’s surprises have all been good, so far. Even so, his propensity to insist on leaving me guessing just like my dad worries me.

  My mom on the other hand, nothing’s ever a surprise with her. She’ll drill you to death on the details, but she won’t ever take you off guard. Not with presents, which she usually calls me about weeks ahead of the event to pre-approve. Not with trips, which she’s unlikely to ever plan anyway unless it’s for the launch of some new company or product line. And certainly not with family business. She’s always sending out memos and emails and texts updating me on the status of, well, everything. Then her assistant follows up to make sure I received the memo, email and text if I don’t reply promptly.

  Why did my parents ever think they might make things work? They’re a circle and a square. My mom hates surprise and it fuels my father, who’s always flitting from one thing to the next. My mom loves work, and growth of financial plans. My dad hates anything to do with numbers and figures. He broke out in hives once when my mom made him attend all the board meetings and weigh in on every trust decision for a month. His doctor literally diagnosed him with chronic stress fatigue.

  From one month’s work.

  “Mail.” Blake dumps a huge pile of letters into my box.

  “Wait, why is there so much?” I ask.

  He shifts toward the door. “Some of it might have got sorted wrong. Sorry about that.” He darts out.

  I exhale and begin to flip through it.

  A large, recycled paper envelope catches my eye. The paper is embossed and looks almost like a wood grain. It boasts an Atlanta return address, the Callanwolde Fine Arts Center. I slide my finger under the flap and open it. Inside there’s a thick, creamy invitation to the Grand Opening for the Robert Graham ‘Art To Surround Us’ Exhibit, and the launch of Cultivate. It’s tomorrow night at seven.

  I think I’ve discovered Rob’s surprise.

  I flip the invitation over and my eyes scan for details. On opening night, select pieces will be auctioned, and all proceeds will go to a new charity Robert Graham recently founded. The rest of the pieces will be available the following day at fixed prices, probably based largely on the prices set by the auction. Brilliant.

  My eyes are drawn to the bottom, where gold ink outlines the word CULTIVATE.

  Robert Graham, a veteran himself and a recipient of the esteemed purple heart, surrounds himself with friends and former vets who have suffered injuries that leave them unable to walk or run as they could before. He’s established Cultivate as a charity intended to: 1) provide accessibility for places without, 2) modify housing and work situations to support differently abled persons, and 3) provide materials and supplies needed by applicants to pursue their dreams without limit.

  Rob’s selling his furniture, and he’s doing it to help create a charity I know he believes in strongly. A glint of black and white gloss catches my eye. There’s another paper in the envelope. I pull out the photo, an image of Clive, beaming for the camera from his wheelchair, shining cabinets at his chair height in the background.

  “Rob Graham lives what he espouses. He made cabinets for my home so I could cook and clean and function independently. He’s done it for three other friends as well. I’m proud to be the face of Cultivate. I can’t wait to see how far this will go and how many lives we can touch.” Clive Winsworth, 32, Navy veteran, President of Cultivate.

  Certainty floods my chest. I’ve been going back and forth with my parents over that trust provision, but yesterday my attorney handed me a bazooka, and I’m ready to use it.

  I text my mom. LUNCH?

  True to form, she replies seconds later naming the place and time. HOTEL MONACO. HALF AN HOUR.

  I text my dad next. PANZANO, LUNCH? HALF AN HOUR OR FORTY MINUTES? It’s dumb to say Panzano instead of Hotel Monaco like Mom insists on calling it, but he probably knows Hotel Monaco is her favorite spot. I’m worried he’ll figure out my plan. I’m hoping the actual restaurant name might throw him off the scent.

  Sometimes I don’t hear back from Dad for days at a time. But I’m in luck. SURE, BUT I’M BUYING.

  DEAL.

  I’ve never tricked my parents into being in the same place before, mostly because it’s a terrible idea, like convincing Russia and America the other is firing nukes and standing around to see who strikes first. If I manage to pull this off, I hope I survive it.

  I’m already at Hotel Monaco when my mom walks in, and I’m prepared for battle.

  “I was happy to hear from you,” Mom says. “I feel like you’ve been avoiding me ever since Trig’s wedding. We haven’t had lunch in weeks and weeks.”

  I have avoided her, mostly because I can’t handle her gushing about someone I’m trying to dump.

  “I’ll admit, I was hoping there would be three people here today,” she says.

  “Oh there will be,” I say, excited to surprise her. In a bad way.

  Her eyes widen. “Oh, that’s wonderful. I’ve missed Rob terribly.”

  My mom never misses anyone except her children. I knew Rob impressed her, but not this much. “Why do you like him?”

  Mom shakes her head. “I can’t say, and I know that’s a little odd. I’ve thought about it a lot, and the only thing I can pinpoint is that he felt genuine. He clearly cared for you, and he’s bright. When I researched him, what I found surprised me. He hopped around from place to place, you know. Marine, deployed, and then his injury you know and the subsequent recovery, and then back home. I can’t find a clear pattern, but every person we spoke to raved about him. I couldn’t find a single individual, in all that research, who had anything negative to say about Robert Graham. It’s almost like he’s an honest to goodness saint.”

  Of course she interviewed people. How embarrassing if any of them called Rob to tell him.

  “Mom, you can’t go around calling people he knows and grilling them.”

  She places her hand over mine. “For my little girl, I’d go a great deal further. But in this case, I think he really loves you. And I think he’d move heaven and earth for you. I don’t even care that he’s poor.”

  I roll my eyes. “He’s not poor.”

  She waves her hand in the air. “Fine, worth less than two million dollars. Same thing.”

  Not to most people.

  “But I thought about it this way. Unlik
e your father, who brought the trust and his family name, this Rob brings nothing. Which means he’ll be grateful for everything, unlike your wretch of a father.”

  “What a delightful surprise to see you here, Victoria.” Dad addresses Mom, but he’s glaring at me.

  “Wait, this is what you meant by three?” Mom practically spits the words at me.

  “Dad, please sit. I’m sure you two can survive one single, solitary lunch. Since I invited you both here to settle a trust matter, I figured you’d forgive me. No time like the present to vote on my future.”

  “What in the world are you talking about?” Mom asks.

  A waiter brings a basket of bread and I’m legitimately worried Mom and Dad might incinerate him by accident with the lasers they’re shooting at one another from their eyes.

  “Focus,” I say. “You’re here for me, so stop acting like babies.”

  They both completely drop their scowls as if they didn’t realize they were even doing it. Maybe they didn’t. Maybe it’s a reflex after so many years. “Mom sent me a copy of the trust, and I hired a lawyer so I could look into my options.”

  “The whole thing was set up for you, darling, I’m sure we can change it however you need,” my dad says.

  Mom rolls her eyes. “You would say that. We’re the trustees for a reason. To do what she might not be willing to do in order to protect her funds.”

  “For two more years,” I say.

  “Excuse me?” Mom asks.

  “I’ll be thirty in two years and five weeks,” I say. “At that point, I own my shares outright. Whatever remains of Dad’s share will pass to me and Trig on his death, which I hope won’t be for quite some time.”

  Dad beams at me. “Thanks sweetheart.”

  “But look, the point is—”

  The waiter approaches us, his hands behind his back. He should have held out a little white flag. It would have been just as obvious and possibly a little humorous.

  I order the same thing as always, and so does Mom. Dad takes more than five minutes to decide, grilling the poor waiter on ingredients and the chef’s preparation style. I really hope my kids aren’t this fussy, if I ever have any.

  “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way,” I say, “I’m ready to drill down to the point. I didn’t invite you here because I wanted to get the restaurant burned down, or purchased in a leveraged buy out.” I wink at mom. “But my attorney explained something to me. It’s a weird, old school doctrine called the rule against perpetuities.”

  Mom’s face blanks and I realize that she already knows. Somehow that makes me want to curl into a ball and cry. She’s known this entire time and she didn’t tell me? She didn’t release my funds when she knew she could? I knew Mom ruled over Dad and the trust with an iron fist, but I never thought she’d do anything that wasn’t best for me.

  “Clearly Mom knows where I’m going with this, but in case you don’t, Dad, let me fill you in. There’s a law governing family wealth transfer that allows a testamentary trust to continue to govern parties until the latest life in being, plus twenty-one years. In our case, that’s Uncle Benny, who was barely alive when this was written, and now it’s been twenty-eight years since he was born. Which means… I can dissolve this any time with one simple petition to the court of jurisdiction where it was created.”

  I cross my arms and dare my mom to argue with me. She won’t be able to resist.

  “But the trust contains several tax saving measures—”

  “All of which I will be able to transition,” I say. “As you well know.”

  “Why do you want to seize control now?” Mom asks.

  I glance at my dad, who would be popping buttons off his shirt if it had any, he looks so proud of me. It isn’t every day that someone outsmarts my mother. His chest is puffed out, and his eyes are sparkling. “Ah, the master crosses swords with her protégé and finally, for once, the master loses!”

  Oh good grief. “It’s not like that,” I say. “In fact, I don’t even care whether we dissolve the trust. But the thing is, I don’t want it.”

  My mom’s jaw drops.

  “I didn’t know I had the power to give it away, since unlike Trig, I’m not thirty, and I was the last heir, right? But then I went and gave Trig’s half back to his kids, so if I back out of my share, it just reverts to them too.”

  “Get to the point,” Mom says.

  “I want to donate my half to a charity called Cultivate.”

  Mom throws her hands in the air and starts wailing.

  Dad frowns. “I understand you’re charitably minded, and I appreciate it, value it even. But as you age, you’ll realize that—”

  “Knock it off, both of you, right now.”

  I glance around the room, my face heating at all the attention we’ve drawn.

  “I’m not asking for input or sage advice from the two biggest idiots I know. I’m putting you on notice that we can do this two ways. I can bring a lawsuit against you, which will be messily splashed all over the internet, and I’ll still get everything I deserve, because the law is clear. Or you can hand things over peaceably. Mom, you’ll still be able to manage Dad’s share and Trig’s, since I’m not handing that off.” I spin toward my dad. “And I’m not going to be impoverished by any means. I’ll have Nometry, and the many, many gifts you’ve given me. Presumably, you’ll continue with your extravagant gifts. I’ll still be worth nearly a billion dollars, Dad. That’s more than most people could spend in a lifetime.” I don’t mention that he could certainly manage. We all know that painful truth too well.

  “It would take years for you to work this out in the courts.” The gleam in my mother’s eye bothers me. Plus, the fact that she’s right. “The law may be on your side, but it’s not fast. And it has costs, and I have an entire team of lawyers ready to delay this until you’ve come to your senses.”

  I sigh. “What do you want, Mother?”

  “Don’t donate every last cent to this charity. You can be more… measured than that and still make a tremendous difference. If I’ve learned anything in my life, it’s that nothing needs to happen with the immediacy you feel in your youth. Donate a hundred million. Then consider other charities for the rest. What’s the rush?”

  “And in exchange, you’ll relinquish control immediately?”

  Mom shrugs. “If that’s what you want. But I know you don’t want to sit in all the board meetings and vote your portion. Nor do you want to lob a grenade at the entire institution.”

  Mom knows she’ll lose everything. All of the heirs will cite the same rule, and she’ll be queen of nothing.

  I have more leverage than I considered. Mom’s linchpin is that no one wants to do what she’s doing, and no one else can do it as well. But the restructuring would be a mess. And it would prove terribly expensive.

  And a hundred million is a lot of money for a start. Not close to three billion, but still a lot. It’s a dynamite beginning.

  “Mom, this doesn’t change my plans. I’m donating my entire portion to charity. I’ve had more than enough leg ups from the family. I’m done with dragging that monetary baggage around. I’ll keep my company, and the rest I’m donating over the next, let’s say five, years.”

  She bobs her head. “Fine.”

  “Alright then.”

  The rest of lunch feels like a scene from a reality TV show. I mostly sit and watch as Mom and Dad bicker, but there are flashes there. Flashes of inside humor, and fond glances I never noticed before. Do Mom and Dad actually… like each other a little bit? I never noticed under the smothering blanket of anger and frustration, but it’s there. A foundation of common experience, a history. And there’s something else, something I can’t define. I think that may be the real reason they never divorced. I’ll have to think about it. But for now, I pay the check while they’re talking and push back from the table.

  “Well, I’ve got a lot of things to do. But Mom, I need that first hundred million by tomorrow.”
/>   Her jaw drops. “It’s too soon. Nothing is that liquid.”

  “Good thing my trust manager is a miracle worker.” I look pointedly at my watch. “You’ve got three hours until the market closes.”

  Mom bolts upright. “I better head out. Bernard, you’ve got the check?”

  Dad nods.

  “I already paid it,” I say.

  Dad frowns at me. “I said I was paying.”

  “You’re looking for reasons to complain. It’s a drop in the bucket, Dad.”

  He circles the table and leans over to hug me. “It’s a sad day when a father can’t buy his little girl a meal anymore.”

  They may be confused and frustrating, but my parents love me in their bizarre, misdirected ways. I’m grateful for that.

  “I love you, Daddy.”

  “Love you too, sweetheart.”

  Strangely, my dad’s typical endearment makes me miss being called goose.

  I call my pilot on my way back to the office. “We’re leaving for Atlanta first thing in the morning.”

  This time, I’m going to be the one surprising Rob.

  27

  Rob

  In my wildest dreams, I never imagined this many people might attend my gallery opening. I never would have thought the venue could be a gothic-Tudor style mansion once home to Howard Candler, the president of Coca-Cola. In fact, only last night I dreamt that less than ten people turned up, mostly my direct family and Geo.

  But tonight I’m swimming in a sea of suits and evening gowns, and an absolute ocean of people are admiring and touching my furniture, which is all artfully displayed thanks to the genius and hard work of Christine and Geo.

  My baby sister Beth bounces up to me like a golden retriever. “Oh Rob, your tables and chairs and stuff all look amazing. And to think, Mom used to try and convince her friends to ask you to make them a coffee table. She’d tell them how badly you needed the moral support.”