"No," I tell him.
"When your father first decided to have this company take over management of the house, there were some items left in the attic and storage space. He asked us to store them and use the fund left for the maintenance of the house to pay for the fees until he came back for the items. Since he has not returned for them, we've been paying for the unit since."
He looks down at his desk as he talks about my father not returning, glossing over the sentence like he doesn't even want to say it. No one in Sherwood knows the full story of what happened to my father. No one but Sam. He's the only one who was there when it happened and knows there's more to it than him just no longer being around. I'm sure there are stories and rumors. He's probably been crafted into some sort of folklore character around here. I haven't heard any of the stories. I'm glad. I don't know how I would react.
"I didn't know about it. You say it's been broken into?" I ask.
He nods regretfully.
"At least, someone tried. It doesn't look like they got all the way inside. But the door and lock are damaged. I wanted to make sure you knew so you could check the contents," he tells me.
"I don't even know what's in there," I point out.
"I still suggest you take a look and let us know if it seems anyone has gained access."
It's the plea of a company that doesn't want to be held legally responsible for a failure in security. He reaches in his desk drawer and pulls out a pair of keys hanging from a ring with a large white rubber number marker on it. He holds them out to me, and I take them.
"Do you have any idea who might have tried to get inside?" I ask. "Aren't there security measures in place?"
His face goes slightly paler, but he doesn't let his smile drop.
"Yes. The storage units are behind a large gate with code access. The code is on the back of the keychain, by the way. Unfortunately, it is possible to climb over the fence surrounding the entire grounds."
"There aren't any surveillance cameras?"
"Only on the front gate."
I nod. "Maybe something you should look into. Thank you. I'll let you know when I've checked the unit."
Derrick stands and offers his hand. I shake it and head out of the building without casting a look toward Pamela. Outside, the rain has started to fall again, and I duck my head to keep it from my face. I get into the car and lean my head back against the seat with a heavy sigh.
Glancing down at the keys in my hand, I debate going straight to the unit or finishing my other errands for the day. Curiosity wins out. I rev the engine and head for the storage company on the other side of town.
Chapter Eight
I'm not sure to expect when I pull up to the fence surrounding the storage unit and type in the code written on the back of the key tag. The gate shivers and groans before finally relenting and opening slowly enough for me to want to drive forward well before it's open. I have no idea what might be in the unit waiting for me, and I'm more curious by the second. I wonder why my father never told me about the things left behind in the house. I don't understand why he wouldn't come back and get them or ask for them to be sent to us. The amount spent on the rental fees for the unit could easily have covered shipping to us.
When the gate finally opens, I drive through and follow the signs bolted into the sides of the cement buildings to the back bank of units. It's only a few dozen yards away from the fence surrounding the grounds. Whoever tried to break into the unit only had to climb the chain link, hop down, and cross a section of pavement I doubt gets seen more than a handful of times each week, if that. Two light poles tower on either corner of the parking lot, but their tiny, angled heads likely only create pools of light that stretch a few feet around them to either side.
"Not even giving you an A for effort," I mutter as I climb out of the car and walk up to the door to the unit.
I see the signs of damage Derrick mentioned at the office. It's clear someone took some sort of tool to the door and to the lock itself. Someone put a lot of effort into breaking that lock before something scared them away. Or maybe they just gave up. Either way, they didn't get inside, which leaves the mysteries inside to me.
During the few times I ventured into the attic when I was younger, I was more invested in finding a hiding spot than paying attention to what was around me. The nooks and crannies were great for curling up with a baggie of snacks and a book, but I don't remember what made them. I can't think of what they would have left behind to end up stashed away back here for years. I've never had a storage unit, so my only personal frame of reference is movies and TV shows. Which, of course, means I'm envisioning stacks of nonsensical furniture and endless towers of cardboard boxes.
I don't know if I'm relieved or disappointed when I open the door and there's one old chair and a few plastic totes. It looks like my grandparents took some time to condense their belongings and trade out their old cardboard boxes. As I run my hand over the top box, imagining my grandmother packing it, it hits me, she isn't the one who left it and the others behind. It was years between my grandparents' deaths and my father giving control of the house over to the management company. My grandmother would have no way of knowing the items in these boxes were going to be left or put into storage, which means it had to be my father who did it.
But why? Why these things? I still remember when my grandmother died, following my grandfather only a few months after his death. We went to the house and cleared all of their personal possessions out. I remember how empty it felt when we opened the door, and I knew I wouldn't smell my grandmother's perfume or my grandfather's pipe tobacco wafting out to welcome me in. There would be no biscuits and gravy for breakfast or overflowing bowl of fruit in the middle of the kitchen counter that looked too pretty to disrupt but was so delicious on a hot afternoon. Somehow that was sadder than when we finished taking the clothes out of the bedroom closets and dropped her toiletries into the trash. Her shampoo bottle was nearly full. I'll never forget that.
Even after I left Sherwood for the last time, never intending on going back, I figured my father would. That house meant so much to him, and I knew he would make his way back there some time. When he told me it was becoming a rental property, I never wondered about the possessions still in the house. Over the years, pieces of their furniture ended up in our house and pictures appeared on the walls. Dad would come back from a visit with boxes to go through so he could gradually dismantle the existence of the house frozen in place when my grandparents died. It never occurred to me that he chose to leave some things there.
Taking the top off the first box, I glance inside. It's an assortment of old Christmas decorations. They don't match the tree my father always put up each year, meticulously arranged, so it looked like the front of a magazine. I also don't remember any of them from the holidays we got to spend with my grandparents. There aren't many of those in my childhood. It seems like while everyone else heads for their families' homes for Thanksgiving or Christmas, for us, it meant steering clear. When my father disappeared, I started to wonder if not being with my grandparents at the holidays was because of him. Not because he didn't want to be with them, but because someone would expect us to be there.