“Something like, He wouldn’t give me the money.”
“How old were you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I remember something; I don’t know!” She was emotional now. Amanda snatched several of the tissues and wiped her eyes. Her mascara was running.
“Ooh, Alice Cooper, I like that look,” Riley quipped.
“What are you talking about?”
“You’ll see. Now continue. Your mom gets out of the car, your grandmother is in the driver’s seat, and you’re locked in the back seat.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Not hard to fill in the blanks, Amanda. What then?”
“Well, when Nina started leaving, she was going real fast, you know? I turned around and saw my dad.” She stopped talking. It appeared that she couldn’t reestablish the memory, as if it was a radio signal losing strength when her mind collapsed back onto more comfortable thoughts.
“Go ahead.”
“Nothing,” she said. “He was just screaming. I remember him screaming.”
“What were you doing?”
Amanda looked at her with teary eyes. “Nothing. I just sat there,” she said, and sat still.
“Amanda?”
“Nothing, lady. I was cool. It was cool.”
“Okay, we’re cool,” Riley responded, holding out her hands. “We’re cool. How old were you?”
“I don’t remember. I’ve tried to forget all of that.”
“Did you try to forget, or were you expected to forget?”
“I don’t know what you mean by that, but I do remember that it happened right after 4-H camp in Clemson.”
“Yes, I know the 4-H camp. I was a counselor at that camp when I was an undergrad at Clemson. If I recall, it’s mostly kids who are seven to ten.”
“That’d be about right.”
“You know, Amanda, that’s the most impressionable time for a young lady.”
“I’m exhausted. Can I go? Will you just sign this stupid piece of paper?”
“Not yet. But eventually, if we keep talking like this. First, though, I want you to take a look at something.”
“Not again. Okay, he never missed a child support payment.”
Riley laughed. “We got that point through last night, did we?”
“Maybe.”
“Ah-ah. Do I need to put you back on the witness stand?”
“No, please, I’ve seen better acting in high school. I admit he didn’t miss a child support payment.”
“I’ll have you know I was the drama queen of my high school. I played Annie.” Riley held up a big swatch of her reddish-brown hair and then pointed at her fair skin. “It was almost blonde way back then.”
Amanda laughed. “I took drama. Then I got into modeling. Revlon used my lips for lipstick advertisements.” Amanda puckered her lips so that they were plump.
Riley looked about nervously, then leaned forward, her eyes darting back and forth. She held a finger up to her lips. “I think I hear the paparazzi. There’s a back way out of here,” she whispered.
Again, Amanda giggled.
Riley stood, and so did Amanda. “Not so fast, young lady, we’ve still got ten minutes. I want you to read something for me. Classwork, you know,” she said looking down her nose. Riley handed Amanda a legal document. “Have you ever seen this?”
She eyed the first sentence that read: CASE #0456 MELANIE GARRETT PLAINTIFF vs. ZACHARY A. GARRETT RESPONDENT. “No, I don’t think so. What’s a plaintiff?”
“The plaintiff files for divorce. The respondent, your father, is the one who didn’t want it.” It was a leap, and it was a liberal interpretation, she knew, but it was a subtlety that Riley felt was important.
“That’d be about right. If my dad was abusive, Mom would have been the one to put her foot down and get out of it.”
“We’ll get to that later, dearie. There you go, getting ahead of yourself. Now, turn to page two and read paragraph one.”
Amanda shuffled the pages and remained silent as she read.
“No, out loud, please. I want to hear it too.”
Amanda looked at Riley and then back at the document. “Captain Zachary Garrett cedes all financial assets to include stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and present savings accounts to Melanie Garrett. The estimated sum of these accounts totals $98,042.00. In exchange for the lump sum grant, Melanie Garrett agrees to full joint custody of their daughter, Amanda Garrett, and that in addition to every other weekend, and every other major holiday visitation, Captain Garrett is granted, authorized, and awarded sixty days of residential custody in the summer months, provided there is no conflict with Amanda’s schooling.”
Amanda rested the paper in her lap.
“What do you think, sport? Did you know any of that before?”
A long moment of quiet passed between them. Amanda dabbed at her eyes with a few more tissues. Riley sat in the chair, allowing Amanda to have her moment.
Amanda’s eyes moved to Riley’s. “I cried,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“I screamed and cried, ‘I want my daddy!’ ‘I want my daddy!’ That’s what happened in the back of that car!” She was sobbing now. “I can’t believe they did that to him.” She was convulsing. “I just wanted to spend some time with him, and all they wanted was money.” She was heaving. “I just wanted my daddy. Why couldn’t they let me be with him? And now he’s dead. He’s gone. He’s really gone.”
Riley moved over to the couch and pulled Amanda close to her. She was crying too.
A half an hour had passed when they heard a knock on the door. Riley stood and opened it.
“Hi, ma’am. I’m Jake, we spoke in the parking lot—”
“Yes, Jake, come in.”
“Is everything okay? Her mom’s freaking out, calling me every five seconds, telling me she’s going to report Amanda as missing. Then her grandmother called, demanding to know where we were and who you are.”
“I understand. Why don’t you have a seat?”
Jake sat next to Amanda, whose head was in her hands. He could see she had been crying. “You okay, babe?”
Amanda lifted her head and slowly turned toward him.
“My father’s dead. How could anything be okay?”
Nina Hastings drove her minivan hunched over the wheel, speeding up I-85. To an outside observer, she would have looked like Cruella De Ville with her silk scarf fluttering in the breeze from the open window.
She whipped onto I-485, then I-77, and shot like a rocket into Dilworth, finally screeching into the parking lot of Riley Dwyer’s office building. She took a moment and gathered herself, checking her makeup in the visor mirror, eating her rage as she did so. Still simmering, she stepped outside of her van and gained her composure, pulling down on her turquoise top, straightening her shell necklace, and smoothing her satin white Capri pants.
She then marched into the building, found the office, and breezed into Riley Dwyer’s office as if she held the deed.
Riley, Jake, and Amanda all looked up from the sofa, tissues littering the floor like peanut shells in a bar.
“We’ve had about enough of this nonsense. Amanda, get your things. Let’s go,” she barked.
“I’m sorry,” Riley said, standing and placing herself between Amanda and Nina. “This is my office, and I don’t believe you’ve got an appointment.” Riley was moving slowly toward Nina, who stood her ground.
“Don’t give me any of that crap, lady. Amanda doesn’t have to be subjected to this. You will be hearing from an attorney in the morning.” Nina was trying to look past Riley, but the therapist was doing a good job of cocking her head, blocking Nina’s view.
“He’ll have to make an appointment, too,” she laughed.