Chapter 3 - A Door That Opened|
June was waiting beside a dented green station wagon when Naomi stepped off the bus.
She wore a man's overcoat and two different gloves.
For a moment, neither woman moved.
The last time Naomi had seen her aunt, she had been sixteen and furious because June had argued with her father during Thanksgiving dinner.
She remembered thinking that adults should know how to keep a pleasant evening pleasant.
Now she wondered how many things she had mistaken for bad manners.
June approached and held out her arms.
Naomi stepped into them.
The crying began without permission.
June held her through it, one hand resting against the back of her wet sweater.
“You can tell me in the car,” she said when Naomi could breathe again.
“Or next week.”
Her shop occupied the ground floor of a brick building on a street of hardware stores and small restaurants.
SECOND PAGE was painted on the window in blue letters.
Inside, books waited beneath weights on long wooden benches, their damaged spines exposed to the light.
The apartment upstairs smelled of toast.
June showed her a narrow bedroom, placed a clean towel on the bed, and handed her a key.
“The bathroom lock sticks.”
She demonstrated the trick with the handle.
Then she left Naomi alone.
No one had ever explained a lock to her as something she was entitled to use.
She slept for four hours.
When she woke, twenty-three calls had gathered on her phone.
There were messages from her mother, her father, the wedding planner, and a number she recognized as Duly's private line.
His first message contained only her name.
His second told her to answer.
His third said they needed to discuss this like adults.
Naomi put the phone facedown.
Downstairs, June was repairing a family Bible for a woman who had paid in installments.
“I can help,” Naomi said.
Her aunt handed her a pencil and a stack of intake forms.
“Then check these against the books on the cart.”
It was ordinary work.
For twenty minutes, it kept her hands steady.
Then her father left a voicemail saying that if she refused to call, he would report her missing and explain that she was not herself.
June listened without interrupting.
“We need somebody whose job is to represent you,” she said.
“I don't have enough money for a family lawyer.”
“Good.”
June removed her glasses.
“The family has enough lawyers.”
Mara Chen arrived after closing, carrying a paper bag of sandwiches and a laptop.
She had helped June with a commercial lease years earlier.
Before discussing fees, she asked Naomi whether anyone had threatened her and whether she wanted her location disclosed.
Naomi answered no to the second question before she knew her voice could sound that certain.
Together they arranged for her to confirm directly to the police that she was an adult who had left voluntarily.
Mara then sent notice to the lawyers representing both families.
Naomi was safe.
She would communicate through counsel.
No one had permission to collect her belongings on her behalf or sign anything in her name.
“Do I have to go back because we're married?” Naomi asked.
Mara looked at her across June's kitchen table.
“No.”
Naomi waited for the qualification.
None came.
She unzipped the duffel and took out the blue folder.
Inside were her birth certificate, copies of the shares her grandmother had left her, and a packet added by her father's lawyer the week before the wedding.
The lawyer had marked several pages with small yellow flags.
Mara read the first page, then returned to the beginning more slowly.
“Has anyone explained this transaction to you?”
“My father said it would simplify things after the marriage.”
“What things?”
Naomi could still hear the impatience in his voice when she had asked that same question.
“He said I was worrying about details.”
Mara turned the packet so Naomi could see the signature page.
“These details put your shares under your husband's control.”
Outside, June pulled down the shop's metal blind.
The sound made Naomi flinch.
Mara noticed but did not pretend otherwise.
“We can take this one page at a time,” she said.
May you like
Naomi drew the folder closer.
For the first time, she read what the men in her life had expected her to sign.
