“Ha!”
He looks at me and starts to reply but thinks better of it. Simon has often joked that he has Irish Alzheimer’s—he only remembers the slights, the grudges.
“This is different,” he says. “This is my career. This is what I’ve chosen to do with my life. I don’t want this to be . . . I don’t know . . . tainted, I guess. I don’t want to get this position because I turned the tables on the dean and blackmailed him or something.”
“You won’t get the position unless the faculty votes you in, unless you get it on merit,” I say. “All you’re doing is making sure the dean doesn’t sabotage you.”
He shakes his head, long and slowly. “No, Vicky. I’m not doing it.”
Simon heads off to bed drunk and depressed, and past his bedtime, given how early he gets up in the morning. I tuck him in and head down the hall to the office.
I told Christian Newsome I’d show him the trust language that restricts how Simon spends his trust—how it cuts his wife off from any access to the money until ten years of marriage.
I pull up the PDF of the amendment to the Theodore Dobias Trust that gave Simon his money, but with the string attached. I fix on that language, that wonderful little surprise that Ted left Simon on his death:
(a) In the event SIMON gets married to an individual (“SPOUSE”), the proceeds of this trust may not be spent in any way by or for the benefit of SPOUSE for a period of ten (10) years following the first day of SIMON’s marriage to SPOUSE. This restriction includes, but is not limited to, the following: (1) expenditures on anything that would jointly benefit both SIMON and SPOUSE, including but not limited to . . .
What an asshole, to do that to Simon against his wishes. Give him the money or don’t. But to do what he did, to hog-tie Simon like that, to put his foot on the chest of Simon’s marriage before it even starts? Talk about emasculating.
And, of course, there’s this:
In and only in the event that SIMON and SPOUSE remain married for the period of ten (10) years, and no petition for dissolution of marriage has been filed by either SIMON or SPOUSE within that time, the restriction on the expenditure of proceeds in paragraph (a) above shall cease to operate.
If you stay married to Simon for ten years like a good girl, “spouse,” and if nobody’s even filed for divorce within those ten years, “spouse,” then you can put your greedy, grimy hands on the money. Because then you’ll have earned it, “spouse.”
Why so cynical, Teddy? Not every woman marries for money.
Only some do.
In the corner of the room, the printer starts grinding and spitting out the pages of the trust. My phone rings, a FaceTime call from my nieces, the M&Ms, Mariah and Macy. I throw in my AirPods so the noise won’t awaken Simon.
When I answer, it’s only Mariah, the thirteen-year-old, on the call. As best as I can make out through the grainy image, she doesn’t look happy. No one can perfect a frown better than a thirteen-year-old girl.
“Hi, pumpkin!” I say, trying to keep my voice down, closing the office door.
“It happened,” she says.
It— Oh, right.
“Okay. Well, okay. We knew this would be coming, right?”
She nods, but her face wrinkles into a grimace.
“It’s okay, Mariah, it’s normal, perfectly normal. You put a pad on?”
She nods her head, tears falling. It’s emotional enough, getting your period the first time; not having your mother around, and having all that come back, too, doubles the fun.
“Great! So listen, did you talk to your dad?”
“No!” she spits out.
“Well, honey, you can’t keep this from your father. He knows it’s coming, too.”
Yes, her father, my ex-brother-in-law, Adam, knows that adolescent girls get their period. And without a wife, without a woman in the home, he’s been terrified of this moment. Men have no clue about the female anatomy.
“When are you . . . when are you coming?” she manages.
“I’ll come this weekend, honey, okay? I’ll come Friday night and stay the weekend.”
“Okay,” she whines, “but when are you coming for good?”
Oh, that. “November,” I say. “Remember, I told you—”
“But November’s over two months away!”
I take a breath. November’s more than two months away, yes, but it feels like it’s coming quickly.
“Mariah, honey, I will be here anytime you want to call me between now and November. I’ll come see you this weekend. I’ll spend the whole weekend. We’ll get milkshakes at that place you like.”
“Barton’s.”
“Barton’s. It’ll be fun. Really,” I say, “November will be here before you know it.”
When I’m done with Mariah, I walk down the hallway to check on Simon. He’s peacefully asleep, having drunken dreams about grand juries and law school deans.
I’m leaving in November, no doubt. It’s best for everyone, Simon and me both, and those girls need me closer. But I can’t leave Simon like this. Not with his future at the law school twisting in the wind.
Because that’s exactly where things stand. If Simon lets the dean hold his past over him, he might as well pack up now and leave. And that would kill him. He could teach elsewhere, sure, but he loves Chicago, and he loves his law school.
He’ll always have that look he had on his face tonight. The look of defeat, resignation.
No. I won’t let that happen. I’m done asking for Simon’s permission.
This dean is mine.
I pick up my phone and dial Rambo’s number.
“Miss Vicky!” he calls out from his speakerphone. “Isn’t this past your bedtime?”
“I need your services again,” I say. “When can we meet?”
20
Simon
I don’t “obsess” about Mitchell Kitchens. I just think about him sometimes.
There was the “Mini-Me” nickname, of course. He’d pick the most embarrassing times to use it. Coming off the bus every morning in front of the others. In front of a hallway full of students. Sometimes he’d find me in the crowd at a school assembly. He even said it once in front of my mother, on a day she had to pick me up from the principal’s office because I was sick, and we passed through the gym while Mitchell was working out with the other wrestlers on a mat. (The gym teacher was the wrestling coach, so while everyone else had a regular phys-ed curriculum, the wrestlers all had the same gym class and they just used it as a regular wrestling practice in addition to the one after school.)
Anyway, my mother and I were passing through the gym, and there’s Mitchell calling out, “It’s Mini-Me! Hey, Mini-Me!” I didn’t respond. I knew what that usually meant—he’d yell louder and keep at it until I acknowledged him, until he’d thoroughly humiliated me. But I figured that with my mother standing there, he’d back down. He didn’t.
My mother stopped on a dime and turned in his direction. She didn’t speak. I didn’t even see the look on her face, but I could imagine it. Knowing my mother and her wicked intellect and verbal skills, she probably had a dozen comments at the ready that would have left a Neanderthal like Mitchell mute. But she just stared him down, and then we kept walking.
She never brought it up. She must have known how humiliating it was, and she probably decided that she would leave it to me to raise it. I never did.
I wish it had stopped at the nickname. That was bad enough. But it didn’t stop there.
Not pleasant memories. So it’s a good thing I don’t obsess about him.