The Right Place and Time

The large door was stiff. It creaked and grunted in obstinance as Chelsea and Jamie battled to reveal what was behind it. As it finally gave way, they were greeted with a lungful of dust. They coughed and waved it away as daylight rushed in and their eyes adjusted, allowing them to marvel at what lay before them.

The two roommates had never fancied themselves executrices of an estate, and being 20 and 22, had no legal experience whatsoever. Not that they knew Mrs. Jacob that well… Save for a handful of sporadic conversations with her in the hallways, gifting the lonely old gal some baked goods at Christmas, and returning her cat when he escaped to loiter the building. The same small, slender, black-and-white cat was who led them to their gruesome discovery in the first place. He’d been meowing and scratching at Mrs. Jacob’s door for at least an hour before Chelsea got up and knocked. After a day of not being able to rouse her, they’d contacted their landlord. Long story short, their neighbour was found.

It was soon discovered that not only did she not have a will – she didn’t have any family. The girls had never really noticed that Mrs. Jacob never spoke about any children or friends, or anyone for that matter. Their conversations weren’t consistent enough to ascertain anything too personal about the woman. The other residents had never seen anyone visit her, and there was no emergency contact listed on her decades-old lease documents. There was no one else. Seemingly, the only two people she had ever spoken to were Chelsea and Jamie.

“The property management firm would like to give you the opportunity to take over Mrs. Jacob’s estate,” the Lawyer explained, looking far less interested than he sounded. The girls sat anxiously on their couch, listening to the man wax through some boiler-plate legalese. Occasionally he’d cast a quick but judgmental glance around their messy living room.

“As far as we can tell, you’re the only people she knew, and the property management firm is uninterested in taking ownership of the estate.”

“What happens to her stuff if we don’t do this? To the cat?”

The Lawyer responded very casually. “If you’re not interested, everything gets donated and the cat will go to the shelter. There’s no will, so there’s probably not a lot of money involved, if any.”

The girls looked at each other, stunned. Jamie broke the quick but uncomfortable silence.

“Can we think about it…?”

“Of course. We can give you 48 hours to decide, after that we’ll proceed as I mentioned. Please give us your answer as soon as possible.”

With that, the Lawyer placed a card on a clear edge of the messy coffee table and left. Chelsea and Jamie sat in stunned silence. The cat, whose name they’d never learned, jumped up onto Chelsea’s lap. She scratched his ears.

They mulled it over and called the Lawyer the following afternoon to tell him they were up to the task. He invited them to his office to sign some papers and get the key to Mrs. Jacob’s apartment.

The apartment door swung back to reveal the smell of age. Of walls and carpets that hadn’t been cleaned in years, having absorbed all the scents and smells of her life. It was dark and musty; it seemed sunlight was something seldom seen in this apartment. They peeled back heavy layers of curtain from the windows and turned on all the lights. It looked like a relatively standard senior citizen’s home – an old La-Z-Boy facing an even older tv, a dinner tray holding an empty coffee mug and a neat stack of puzzle pages torn from newspapers. The living room was tidy and unassuming. On a shelf lived a variety of books and magazines, and a few choice trinkets and figurines. The only thing missing was photos.

The bedroom held much of the same. The closet held little more than a few outfits and a winter jacket. Chelsea pulled open the drawer of a nightstand. In it, a trove of newspaper crosswords in various states of completion. Chelsea mindlessly grabbed a handful of the paper to put in a trash bag, but her hand hit something solid. She stopped and let go before searching the pile. Hidden was a little black notebook.

“Is it wrong to read this..?” Chelsea said, plopping herself down on the bed and staring at the book. It looked old but the spine was unbothered. There was a leather string wrapped several times around and tied into a very secure bow. Jamie came around the bed and sat beside her friend.

“Well… It’s just gonna get thrown out, right? She’s dead… Not like she can get embarrassed..”

They stared awkwardly at it for a second before Jamie reached over and pulled the bow loose. They chuckled uncomfortably. Chelsea pulled the rounds of string off and opened the book. She angled the book to flip through it but after a few pages went by, an inch-thick chunk of paper flopped over followed by the back cover. Her thumb found the cause of the flop – a block of pages that had been skillfully glued together. The top page had an address and unit number written on it, and there was the shadow of something behind it. They copied the address down on one of the blank pages at the beginning of the notebook before Chelsea pressed her thumb into the void. The paper broke and gave way to a hole that had been carved into the block of pages, and there was something in it. A key!

They found nothing else of interest in Mrs. Jacob’s apartment. The girls found themselves exhausted, but the burning curiosity energized them. They mapped out the address and found the drive was about an hour. The sun was long gone, so they decided to relax and go in the morning. Any hope of rest was robbed by sheer anticipation.

They hit the road before the sun rose, and soon they were standing in front of a storage unit. The key fit perfectly, but the lock was old, weathered and put up a hell of a fight. Once they finally defeated their steel foe, they had more trouble with the large rolling door. Expletives were hurled.

They heaved the door open and caught their bearings. A large cloud of dust was settling, and they surveyed the space as their eyes adjusted. To their immediate left, there was a stack of suitcases. Most of them were open and showcasing edges and sleeves of garments unseen in decades. Past that was a sea of boxes and crates that looked like they would have still been old 30 years ago. Jamie practically lunged at the suitcases while Chelsea pressed on through the mire of dusty memories.

The contents of the room spun a beautiful, but incomplete tale of Mrs. Jacob and the life she’d lived. Photos of her as a child atop a beautiful steed, clad in the finest equestrian gear. Of her teenage self in ornate gowns at large, fancy parties, or lounging by a large pool on a vast estate. Photos of her surrounded by friends and family – A surprising twist to everything they’d just learned about their late acquaintance. How could there be no one left to claim her things? How could a life so grand be reduced to such a small whisper?

They spent hours digesting box after box of loose photos, trinkets, clothing and more. With the treasure also came the trash – and the mouse droppings. They worked mostly in silence as they digested everything they were learning about their lonely neighbour. They moved and swept and sorted as much as they could before they ran out of room to move comfortably. They locked the unit back up (with a little less difficulty than their entrance) and went into the office to use the bathroom. While Chelsea was finishing up, Jamie went to the desk to ask about the lease. She finished her quick inquiry as her companion emerged, and they walked outside.

“It’s all paid up. For like twenty years, she said. It’s been abandoned for as long as she’s aware of, but it’s paid so they have no reason to go in.”

Jamie slammed the door to the old Toyota that took them to find some fast food. They sat as they ate and talked about what to do with their spontaneous inheritance. They needed a truck, at the very least. And probably a hotel room. Jamie called her dad. Within two hours, they had a truck and were shifting what they’d already combed through into the back of it. As they dug deeper, they noticed the items got larger and more ornate. Things were more spaced out, all covered in heavy plastic and a sheet of dust. An entire bedroom set laying mostly dismantled and in the back corner, and large cabinets full of beautiful china and tarnished silverware—nearly everything you’d need to furnish a small but very expensive home.

At the very back was a large hope chest. They worked together to peel the aging protective coatings off and stopped to marvel at the work of art. It was stunning. Flawlessly carved into the dark cherry wood was a beautiful filigree pattern. They lifted the lid to find a small carpet bag holding a tidy cache of handwritten letters and newspaper clippings. They’d been at the storage unit for hours at this point, and they were getting hungry. Jamie’s father had arranged a hotel room for the ladies, and they were eager for a meal and some rest. They grabbed the bag and locked up the unit.

Dining slowly on pizza, they each sat on a bed and devoured the stack of papers – Jamie reading the newspaper clippings and Chelsea reading the aged correspondence. They exchanged no words, just gasps and sighs induced by the juicy secrets held in the pages. Chelsea finished long before Jamie, digesting her food and her thoughts simultaneously as she stared off into space.

“Wow,” Jamie rubbed her eyes after setting the last article down. “So, from what I can tell – a girl named June Frankland went missing when she was 17. Her family owned a bunch of factories and was super loaded, and her dad was a politician. They reported her missing but were later found out to have disowned her for having an affair.”

“Well, that explains the letters… I think she was in love with her childhood friend, Marie. There’s a lot of really romantic, heart-wrenching stuff in here. The letters seemed to stop after Marie’s parents found her a husband. I guess Mrs. Jacob was really June Frankland.”

“So, Mrs. Jacob’s family just exiled her from the family for being a lesbian? What, did they just set her up in a different city and tell her never to call again?”

“There were a few letters from her mom here too,” Chelsea flipped through the letters before stacking them back up. “It sounded like she was sending June money and helping her a bit behind the dad’s back. Makes sense, she had a lot of really expensive stuff in storage.”

Jamie shook her head as she grabbed the pile of letters and newspaper to return them to the old bag. As she placed her hand inside, a small, dark, rectangular box hit her hand and got her attention. She pulled it out of the bag and opened it.

“Uhh Chels…” Chelsea looked at her pale friend, then at what she was holding. Two neat stacks of bills, each bound in a paper ribbon boasting it’s total – $10,000.

“Is that–”

Chelsea’s words were smothered by her disbelief.

“Twenty grand..”