Chapter 4: The Papers Inside the Envelope
The ladies lounge was empty and too bright after the ballroom. The sconces in there were on a dimmer that someone had turned all the way up, and the mirrors doubled everything. I could see the stain from two angles. It had started to dry at the edges, a darker ring around the red, and the small smear on my cheek had caught and dried too. I didn't try to fix it.
I sat on the little velvet bench against the wall and put my clutch down next to me. The envelope was warm from where I'd held it. Tan paper, the kind with the metal clasp and the string, held horizontally like they'd taught someone to carry it so it wouldn't bend. My name was typed on a white label on the front. Eleanor M. Ward.
My hands were shaking a little. I tell myself it was the air conditioning in that room.
I undid the clasp. The string wound around itself twice. I could hear the chandelier buzz from the hallway outside, and a cart rolling past with dishes.
Inside there were three pages, stapled once in the corner, plus a loose cover sheet on heavy letterhead. The letterhead said Halverson & Park, Attorneys at Law, with an address in town near the courthouse. I knew the name. They had done the closing when my husband and I bought the house on Maple thirty years ago, before they merged and before Halverson retired.
The cover sheet was addressed to me. It said Re: Quitclaim Deed - 14 Maple Street. It said, "As discussed, enclosed please find deed transferring your interest in the above-referenced property to allow clear title to vest in the newly married couple as contemplated. Please execute where flagged and return in the enclosed envelope at your earliest convenience. We have marked signature and notary blocks for your ease."
There were little yellow flags stuck to the edges of the deed itself. Sign here. Little arrows. A pink sticky note that said Notary on the last page.
I stared at that phrase. As discussed. We had never discussed it. No one had discussed anything with me.
The deed underneath was already filled out. Grantor: Eleanor M. Ward. Grantees: Matthew R. Ward and Jessica L. Halverson. For consideration of Ten Dollars and other good and valuable consideration. It described the house by its lot number and subdivision, the same legal description I'd seen on our mortgage paperwork for years. It would have taken my name off it completely. I own half of that house. Since my husband died, Matthew and I have owned it together, tenants in common. I live there. He lives there when he's not with Jessica at the apartment they've been renting. That was the arrangement after the funeral. That was how I could afford the taxes.
There was a blue pen clipped to the envelope. Someone had thought of everything.
I turned the deed over and then back again. My breathing sounded loud in that tiled room. I could see myself in the mirror opposite, pale blue dress ruined, holding those papers in my lap like a student with homework.
Then I heard the line again in my head, the way the woman who handed me the envelope had said it. "Your mother asked me to bring an important document about the home where you both live." I had thought, for a second in the ballroom, that she meant me. That I had asked someone to bring it. Which made no sense and I'd been too embarrassed to sort it out with wine drying on my chest.
She didn't mean me. Of course she didn't. She meant Jessica's mother. Jessica Halverson, daughter of the Halverson on the letterhead. The woman who'd brought the envelope to the ballroom wasn't a courier. She was family, or close enough to say "your mother asked me" and mean Jessica's mother had sent her.
I felt that click behind my ribs. It wasn't my document. It wasn't my idea. It was theirs, prepared in their office, carried into my son's wedding reception and handed to me after someone threw wine on me, timed for when I'd be too upset to read carefully and too surrounded to say no loudly.
I folded the cover sheet back. My hands weren't shaking as much now.
The door to the lounge opened and a young attendant in a black vest peeked in. She saw me and started to say, "Ma'am, can I—" and then she saw the dress.
"I'm fine," I said. My voice came out thinner than I wanted. "I'll be out in a minute."
She nodded and backed out.
I looked down at the flags again. They had even put a little purple tab where the notary would stamp. There was a self-addressed return envelope paper-clipped to the back, already stamped.
I didn't sign. I slipped the deed and the cover sheet back into the manila envelope, one page at a time so I wouldn't crease the flagged corners. I wound the string around the clasp again, twice, the way it had been. I put it flat on the bench and put my clutch on top of it so it wouldn't slide.
The stain on my dress had gone cold. I touched the edge of it with two fingers and felt the fabric stiff.
May you like
I wasn't going to sign anything in a bathroom while my son's wedding was happening on the other side of the wall. I wasn't going to sign it as a gift, either. A gift is asked for.
I picked up the envelope and the clutch together, both held against me with both hands. I looked once more in that bright mirror and walked to the door.
