Free The Inheritance (Volume Two) by Zelda Reed

would gladly take a seat at the devil’s table, sucking down the blood of their enemies, swapping stories of how much money is in their bank accounts and what dastardly deeds they committed to get it there. My father is no angel, no saint and he isn’t the sort of man to die from a cold.
    “You found him?” I say, shattering the silence.
    Ashleigh furrows her eyebrows. “What?”
    “At the restaurant you said you found my father’s body on his bedroom floor.”
    She nods. “That’s right.”
    “What happened?”
    Ashleigh ducks her head and shrugs. “I think he stopped breathing in the middle of the night. Or maybe he had a heart attack. I don’t know for sure. The doctor’s wouldn’t tell me anything since I wasn’t family.”
    “But he died here? In this house?”
    “Yes,” she hisses. “How many times do I have to say it?”
    “I’m sorry,” I say, sitting up.
    She clutches my father’s urn to her chest, pale arms wrapped around it, cradling it as if it were a child. “Have you cried?” she says, staring up at me. “Do you feel anything at all about your father’s death?”
    I think of the stretch of time I spent in the lawyer’s bathroom, clutching my legs close, pressing my forehead against my knees, my body wracked with sobs, my face dripping with tears.
    “No,” I say. “I haven’t. But try not to hold it against me.”
    Ashleigh lowers her eyes. “I’m just trying to understand why you hate him so much.”
    “It’s complicated,” I say. “And easier if you don’t think about it.”
     

Eight
    Before I call Northwestern Memorial Hospital, I call Gina and leave a message: “Hi, It’s Caitlin, I just have a few questions about my dad and thought you could help. Give me a call when you can, thanks.”
    It’s been a few years but I still know Gina. I know she’s sitting at her office job, staring at my name on her phone. One missed call. One new voicemail. Chewing her nails, debating whether or not to call back. She isn’t doing anything important. Answering calls at whatever call center she works at now, reading dully from a script, counting down the hours until she can clock out and go home. Maybe I’ll give her a call on the train, she’ll think, maybe I’ll force her to grab dinner with me.
    The nurse at Northwestern – “Marilyn,” she says between a yawn. – tells me I need to call the Chicago Police Department. The police department tells me I have to come down and provide my birth certificate, social security number, state ID or driver’s license before they tell me anything. I pencil in an appointment for tomorrow, too exhausted to do anything else.
    Ashleigh and I have dinner in Chinatown, five dollar meals with two choices of meat or vegetables and a bowl of rice. Ashleigh speaks to the waitress in flawless Chinese, expertly handling her chopsticks, popping orange chicken into her mouth between large gulps of white rice. I opt for a fork, content not to embarrass myself.
    “My mom’s from China,” she says. “I’m adopted.”
    She tells me about her father, the doctor who lost his job two months ago due to a religious outburst of anger.
    “One of the residents, some mouthy kid with red hair, was like this huge atheist who could not shut the fuck up about how intelligent people couldn’t be Christians. When he found out my dad was religious – and he’s like, really religious, I’m talking church every Sunday, leads a bible study group religious – this kid freaked.
    “All day, all week, he rambles on and on about how much of an idiot my dad must be for believing in this man in the sky, and how he can’t possibly be a good doctor because his belief in ‘magic’ will always trump logic.”
    One afternoon her father had heard enough and, red-faced and foaming at the mouth, he dammed the boy and all who thought like him to hell.
    “And my mom doesn’t work,” she says, between sips of tea. “So they’re living off my dad’s savings and my