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Chapter 48
I took mytime making the rounds. I was careful to spend alone time with each of the kids.
Most everything was the same. Shawna was working on some secret project with my grandfather. She only hinted that it had something to do with artwork.
Jane was a little tougher to corral. I sat next to her at the dining room table, where most homework was completed. I said, “How’s school? Anything giving you a problem?”
The teenager let out a laugh. “I’m a little stuck in Calculus II. Think you can explain it?” Her look effectively communicated what she thought of my math skills.
“What about creative writing? I’m good at that.”
“If you mean supportive, you’re right. All you ever say about any of our essays is ‘Good job.’”
“Can I help it if you are all so talented?”
Jane scowled as she looked at the empty page in front of her.
I gave her a few seconds and said, “Talk to me. What’s wrong?” I knew each of the kids’ moods. Jane got frustrated but not openly angry.
She looked at me, and I saw a tear in her left eye. “I’ll admit I’m annoyed. I’ve been journaling since I was eight and always get an A on any English or writing assignment. Trent, who spends more time thinking about sports, gets recognized for the first thing he’s ever written.”
“But his subject matter might have helped. He has a unique view of adoption and culture.”
“And I don’t? I’ve written essays on being one of ten adopted kids. On what it’s like to be obviously Asian in a multicultural family. I never even had a teacher bring it up. Trent writes the same sort of essay and he’s going to meet the mayor.”
“I’ve met the mayor. It’s not much of a thrill. In fact”—I lowered my voice to sound conspiratorial—“he’s a bit of a dick.”
That made her laugh. She gave me a spontaneous hug. If I’d made her feel a little better, she had put me in a great mood.
Then I found Brian, who wasn’t in school anymore. He was also the source of most of my concerns. Since coming home from prison, he’d given us a few scares. At first, he had been sullen and he disappeared all day long. Later, I learned he was going through air-conditioning repair school. He had wanted to surprise me. And he had.
We sat together on the couch. He was still wearing his gray uniform shirt that said BILL in lovely embroidery across his right chest.
When I asked him about the name, Brian said, “At first it was just because they didn’t have a uniform for me. Then everyone thought it was funny. Now I just sort of answer to the name Bill.”
I laughed. “That’s exactly how things happen at the police department. Usually it’s with a nickname. You do one thing you regret and the next day you’re stuck with some nickname you don’t like. I almost got hung with the label Kickback.”
“What’d you do? It doesn’t sound like that bad of a nickname.”
“Unless you’re on your third week in uniform and you step behind a mounted unit, then slip in the horse’s poop.” I paused as Brian laughed. “What made it worse was, the cop on the horse looked behind me and shouted, ‘Get out of there, you idiot. Do you want to get kicked back into the Stone Age?’”
Now a couple of the other kids had wandered in to hear the story.
“A few of the other rookies heard it, and I had the nickname before I went home for the night. Thank God it was the end of my week and I had a two-day break. The nickname was forgotten by the time I went back to work. I think I would’ve been named Kickback to this day if I would’ve had to go right back and face those guys.”
We were holding dinner until my grandfather arrived. He was polite enough to call and say he was being held up at Holy Name, but then Bridget let it slip that I was home. I had kinda wanted to see how surprised he would be to see me.
When Mary Catherine cautiously approached the couch, I knew there was a problem. She gave a quick look to Brian, who took the hint and found somewhere else to go. Most of the other kids were busy again with their own projects.
I hate waiting to hear bad news. All I could say was “What’s up?”
She brought a piece of paper clipped to an envelope from behind her back. “I was going to break the news to you this evening.”
“No one is getting suspended from Holy Name, are they?”
“I wish it was that simple.”
I knew it was important, then. Mary Catherine took church and school at Holy Name very seriously. Some of it had to be her love for Seamus. I gave her my full attention.
She said, “It’s a certified letter from the IRS.”
I had an idea where this was going.
“We’re being audited going back five years.”
For some reason Senator Lom Wellmy’s face popped into my head. I glanced at the paper Mary Catherine handed me and said, “I think six years is the legal limit for review. I’m not sure I make enough money to worry about it.”
“You think they’ll ask questions about the apartment? Or the trust set up to pay the taxes?”
“I don’t know. I wonder if we need a lawyer. An accountant at the very least.” Years ago, my first wife, Maeve, had cared for an elderly man who lived in this apartment. She had completely changed the man’s perspective and life. He had gone from being a sour old curmudgeon to wanting to come to the kids’ birthday parties. When he died, with no heirs and few friends, we had been shocked to learn he had transferred the title of this beautiful apartment to Maeve and me. He had even set up a trust fund to pay the taxes. I thought I’d been straight with the IRS concerning the apartment. I guess that was about to be tested.
