Esme and the Money Grab: (A Very Dark Romantic Comedy)

by Paloma Meir

  I held my hand against his cheek at one point at dinner. I couldn’t believe he was real. Landon Aldridge, the perfect man.

  …

  Have you ever seen a romance movie? You know how those films cut to a montage of the couple falling in love? It almost always happens in New York, and they always take a carriage ride through Central Park. When I was a little girl, I worried that I would never fall in love because we didn’t have carriage rides in Los Angeles. I shouldn’t have worried.

  The following week with Landon reached highs higher than any film I had ever seen. We snorkeled, we surfed, the two of us lay on the beach hand in hand, talking. Every night we would get dressed up and go to dinner. One night we even drove into Honolulu.

  On Christmas morning, we took leis down to the beach and threw them into the ocean in honor of my sainted parents. I broke down in tears as I recited a prayer in Spanish. Landon held me tight, while stroking my hair and telling me everything would be okay. And in his strong arms, it was all right again.

  I pretended I had left something behind on the beach as we walked back to the hotel. I ran back to the shore and tossed a single Plumeria in for Mr. Galloway. I didn’t have time to say a prayer for him, but I don’t he would have minded.

  He was an atheist, one of those long-winded ones too. He might as well have been an evangelical with the way he spoke about his lack of faith. He was more of a zealot about his lack of belief, than I was in my belief.

  At the end of our days and nights together Landon would walk me back to my cottage and kiss me tenderly at the door. And no, I didn’t let him come inside. This is not that kind of story. I’m a nice Catholic Colombian girl.

  All too soon, the vacation was over. He changed his airline ticket, and we flew home together on the same flight. We drank Champagne on the redeye flight and quickly fell asleep.

  Chapter Ten

  You know what happens in those romance films after the montage? Strife. We were walking right into it.

  The driver dropped us off a little after sunrise. The two of us were sleepy, and Mila was meowing. I worried her ears ached from the flight’s descent. She clawed at her case, fighting to get out.

  Landon wanted to carry my luggage into the house. I said no. He was insistent. I was too tired to shoo him away. My stomach clenched as we trudged up the driveway to the front door.

  The odds of there having been a problem with the air-conditioning while we were away were low. Still, it wasn’t a chance I wanted to take. Having Landon, or anybody in the house seemed like a bad idea to me.

  I opened the door and turned to Landon, ‘Well, thank you. I can take it from here.” I put Mila’s carrier down and tried to take my suitcase from his hand.

  “I’ll bring it in. You have your hands full with Mila and your handbag.” He walked past me. I felt like I was going to vomit. I walked in behind him resigned to my fate.

  I took a deep breath as if I were tired, not searching for noxious scents. The room stunk, but not of a dead body. I had been around several before with caretaking. A few of my patients had passed on.

  Death had an unsettling sweet odor. The smell of Mr. Galloway’s home was more human, a dirty sweaty human, like Hollywood Blvd. on a hot summer day.

  “What is that?” Landon jerked his head back and his nostrils flared.

  “I don’t know but—

  “Esme,” Mr. Galloway’s recliner swung around to face us. Jack jumped out of the chair, lunging for me, as if he were attempting to fly across the room.

  Suddenly the earth beneath us shook with a tremendous force. Mila screeched in her carrier. The sound of rattling filled the air, and the objects on Mr. Galloway’s shelves bounced.

  “You thought you could get away from me?” Jack was within grabbing distance of me. Landon threw himself between the two of us, holding his arm out, his body stooped as if he were trying to find his center of balance with which to hold Jack off.

  He didn’t need to, the largest of the pre-Colombian bowls flew off the high shelf, hitting Jack against the side of his head. He tumbled to the ground, unmoving.

  The sound of the art objects crashing to the floor filled the room. The largest bashing sound coming from the garage. I knew it was Mr. Galloway, but I couldn’t care. Jack looked dead, and I had seen the dead many times. I knew he was gone.

  “Jack, no, no,” I ran to his side, and held his head in my lap, “ No, no, no,” I kept saying over and over again as I rocked my oldest friend in my lap, tears streaming down my face until I couldn’t see.

  “Esme,” Landon placed his hand on my shoulder as the earth returned to its previous stillness, “I’m going outside to call an ambulance. My phone isn’t getting reception here.”

  “No, no, no…” Was all I could say.

  Jack had aged ten years since I had last seen him a few months before. He was skeletal, the stink of the room was from his unwashed body. His bright blue eyes were in a cloud of yellow instead of white. Three of his bottom teeth were missing.

  What had happened to him? Where had my Jack gone? I couldn’t see him anywhere within the lifeless body in my arms.

  “Esme…” Landon said to me through a veil of echoes, “I’ll be right back, I’m going to call 911. I’ll go check the garage too, make sure that noise wasn’t the water heater. We wouldn’t want a gas leak.”

  “No, no, no,” I continued, unable to tell him to stay out of the garage.

  “Jack, I’ll be back in a moment…" I kissed his forehead and laid him gently on the ground.

  “Landon…” I called out as I heaved my unwilling body towards the garage.

  He screamed. I was too late. He had found Mr. Galloway.

  …

  “Esme,” Landon came to me as I entered the garage, “You don’t want to see this. I don’t know what’s going on but—

  “It’s Mr. Galloway. I did it—

  “What do you mean you did it? The man is wrapped in some sort of particle rock—

  “It’s kitty litter. Let me explain…”

  The numbness I felt when my parents had died fell over me as I told Landon part two of the story of my life, the part I had altered, okay, straight up lied about in Hawaii. His expression was blank as I told him the story but his were piercingly cold as it went on.

  “Why do you think you killed him? He was old. Was he not strong enough to bend down and pick up the pills?”

  “He was mobile, he didn’t have those kind of problems… Didn’t you hear me? I wished him dead and then he was dead.” I looked over his shoulder to see Mr. Galloway’s partially unwrapped body. He looked as fresh as the day I had wrapped him up.

  “Are you magic, Esme? Wishing someone dead doesn’t kill them.”

  “I don’t know,” I yanked at my hair in hopes of waking myself up from this nightmare. “I’m a glorified Latina housekeeper. What do you think the police would have thought?”

  “I think they would have thought very old man died after arguing with his much put upon caretaker.”

  “You don’t know how the world works Landon. People, your kind of people, see me and think poor, desperate, lazy, criminal.”

  “My kind of people?” He asked with a trace of sarcasm.

  “Not your kind of people. I didn’t mean that. It’s just the way this city, maybe the world works.”

  “I would love to have spent my life with you, showing you how wrong your thinking is… but now…”

  “But now, what?”

  “It’s not important anymore.” He rubbed the top of his head, “In the living room, that’s Jack? The one who wasn’t taking the breakup well?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, well, that was an understatement. The way it looks now, is damaging. I’m going to call 911. When they get here, you’re not going to say a word, but you will listen to what I’m saying and when they eventually interview you, you will parrot back what I said to them. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m risk
ing my law degree, and possibly my freedom on you. Are you sure you can do this?"

  “Yes, but you don’t need—

  “Esme, you weren’t the cause of this, but what happened after? It doesn’t look good. I’m going to say some things about your maniac old boyfriend, who tried to kill you. It might get rough. Can you handle it?”

  I was going to say, no, you can’t do that, but I suddenly felt the spirit of Jack propelling me to say, yes. I swear I heard laughter from Mr. Galloway too. I blocked out the voices of my parents. My head was too busy with people no longer alive.

  “Yes,” I went back to Jack, sat down next to him and held his hand in mine. Within a few minutes paramedics and police swarmed around us. I couldn’t quite hear what Landon was saying to them, but I figured it out.

  Jack had been stalking and terrorizing me. Mr. Galloway, out of the goodness of his heart had let me stay with him, for my protection. Landon and I had gone away for a vacation and come back to this scene. We were just as baffled as to what had gone on while we were away as the police were.

  The paramedics told Landon that it looked at as if Mr. Galloway had died a natural death. They didn’t understand why Jack had wrapped him up. One of them muttered, drugs, as they carried Jack’s body away to the ambulance to take him to the morgue for an autopsy.

  The police tried to talk to me, to get my version of events. Landon told them they could do it another time, that I was clearly in shock to have two people who had meant so much to me die so suddenly. He was correct.

  The police left a few hours later after giving me their card and telling me they would like to speak to me the next day, if I were up to it. I think Landon had scared them with his lawyerly talk. And then it was just the two of us.

  “You okay, Esme?”

  “I’m fine.”

  He stared at me as if I were a stranger. If I weren’t so numb, it would have broken my heart. I looked away.

  “I’m going to go home now…”

  “I understand.”

  “Yeah… If you need me—

  “I’ll be fine. Thank you.”

  I called a cab a few minutes after he left and took it to a small boutique hotel next to Whole Foods on Crescent Dr. I paid for the room with my ill-gotten money in the golden satchel. I had an impulse to give the bag of cash away to the bell-hop.

  I didn’t though. I’m a survivor.

  Chapter Eleven

  I was wrong about earthquakes. The one we experienced had only been a 4.0. It hadn’t damaged the city, but it had ended Jack’s life. He was the only recorded fatality. The story of the Jack and Mr. Galloway hadn’t made more than a blip in the local papers.

  The detective called me the next day. He didn’t ask me for my version of events, just confirming what Landon had told them. I mumbled yes, and the phone call was over in a few minutes. They seemed eager to put the case behind them.

  Mr. Galloway had died from a heart attack. He was a very old man, and the attack was always a matter of when not if. The time of death could not be confirmed, but it wasn’t a concern.

  The police believed Landon’s story. He was one of the Aldridges, what reason would he have to lie? He didn’t stand to gain anything from the death of Mr. Galloway.

  Jack, in their minds, was unrelated to Mr. Galloway’s death. He was just another petty criminal, a methhead, wanted for a liquor store robbery. His appearance at Mr. Galloway’s house, a bizarre coincidence to the actual death. His wrapping up of the body was written off to drug-induced psychosis.

  If he had lived, they would have arrested him. But he was dead. Open and shut case for the detectives. The end.

  Landon called to check on me a few times while I lay in bed, Mila by my side, in the small hotel room. His voice was cold, matter of fact. I understood. I stopped answering his calls.

  My final quarter at UCLA started in a few days. I would be a college graduate soon. The first in my family. It felt empty. My parents wouldn’t have been proud of the choices I made in the previous few months.

  I called Belinda and Mara to see if I get my old room back. They had rented it out. I thought of moving into the dorms at UCLA. I could finally afford it with my magical bag of money. I decided against it. Communal living in my frame of mind would have frightened the fresh and hopeful young students.

  I decided to go back to where I came from, back to Sun Valley. Live among my people. The rent would be inexpensive and the long bus trips back and forth to the campus would be a good start in terms of penance.

  Class didn’t start for another week. I decided to sleep the time away. I could find a new apartment later. I pulled Mila close to me and fell asleep.

  …

  The hotel phone not my cellphone woke me up a few hours later, “Hello,” I groaned into the mouthpiece.

  “Ms. Perez, you have a visitor, Mr. Serge Richmond. May I send him up to your room?”

  “I think you have the wrong room.”

  “He says that he’s Mr. Galloway’s attorney.”

  “Huh? Why? Okay, send him up.” I hung up the phone.

  I didn’t know whether to be worried. If I were in trouble, they would have sent the police, right? I couldn’t work up the energy to care either way. If I had to spend the rest of my life in prison, then that’s the way it would be. I was sure Landon would take care of Mila.

  I fluffed up the bed as best as I could and opened the window to let in fresh air. The room was a mess, clothes all over the floor, and room service trays I hadn’t put outside the door. Again, I couldn’t get worked up over it.

  A knock at the door, I got up to answer it. Mr. Serge Richmond was blindingly handsome with his glossy dark hair and well-tailored suit. I’m just stating facts, dear reader, I didn’t really care.

  “Ms. Perez,” He held out his hand. “Serge Richmond, attorney at Goldman, Reiner and Levis. We represented Mr. Edward Galloway, your former employer. We’re very sorry for your loss.”

  I stared at his extended hand for a long time before shaking it, “Thank you.”

  “May I come in?” He asked

  “Okay,” I wanted to ask why but couldn’t summon the words.

  I stepped aside. He confidentially strode across the tiny room, opened his briefcase and placed several file folders on the small table. “Ms. Perez?” He looked to where I was still standing in the doorway with a slight smile.

  “Esme, call me Esme.” I managed to join him at the table.

  “Esme, pretty name… I don’t know why…” He shuffled through a sheaf of papers.

  “Why what?” I asked.

  “We’ll get to that in a moment.” He smiled and lightly nodded his head as he found what he was looking for. I almost laughed. “Esme, you’re a very rich woman.”

  “What?” I asked with an abundant amount of paranoia screeching through my voice.

  Did they know about the watch? Were they taking pity on me by sending Mr. Richmond instead of the police? Thoughts flew through my mind. Did he have a plan for me to work the debt off? 40,000 dollars, I would be paying it off for the rest my life.

  I deserved much worse, but I wasn’t looking forward to it.

  “Mr. Galloway left you the entirety of his estate. Two caveats, but I don’t think they’ll be a problem.”

  “What?” I couldn’t have been more shocked, “The man hated me, taunted me everyday.”

  “He was worth roughly eighty million dollars, and he left it all to you. He may have taunted you, I would imagine that he did based upon one of the requirements, but he didn’t hate you. He left you a note…” He shuffled through the papers and handed me a sealed envelope.

  I didn’t take, “Could you read it to me?” My numb emotional state was growing surreal, with a fuzzy edge. I wasn’t quite sure I was awake.

  “Of course,” He painstakingly opened the envelope, as if trying to preserve its original condition. This made me smile.

  Esme,

  You were one of the good ones, but I never liked yo
ur name. Esmeralda Perez is the heir to my fortune. I suggest you sign the name change document the lawyer sitting across from you should be holding in his hands right now. If he isn’t holding it out to you, have him fired.

  What kind of a man wouldn’t abide by an elderly man’s dying wish? That’s not someone you want on you team. Fire them all, Esmeralda.

  Take care of Mila.

  Best, Edward Galloway

  Serge had reached across the table as he was reading the letter to me. In his extended hand was the name change form. I signed it.

  And broke down into a waterfall of hysterical tears, happy, sad, every emotion poured from me. Serge held me paternally in his arms. I soaked the shoulder of his suit.

  “He was such a horrible man,” I lifted my head and laughed through my sobs, “So mean… The things he would say… You have no idea.”

  “Esme… Esmeralda… I do know, stories of Mr. Galloway are legendary, mythical at our firm. The partner’s have been putting the rookies on his affairs for the past ten years. It’s a rite of passage.”

  “Was he always that way? Did something happen to him?” I continued crying my mixed emotion of tears.

  “No, as far as know from the partners in my firm, he was always this way. No sad story behind him. Some people are just born that way.”

  “Jack was born good…” I mumbled into his arms and cried forever more.

  Chapter Twelve

  A year later…

  I did move back into a very small apartment in Sun Valley. I didn’t stay there long. It felt martyrish after a few months. There were other ways to atone for my sins.

  I bought the apartment building across the street from the Catholic School Jack and I had attended as kids. It was a wreck, but I had a lot of money. The architect I had hired wanted to raze it and build anew.

  I think he wanted to build a world-class cultural center with the money from his new client. I just wanted the neighborhood kids to feel safe and at home. We compromised.