Chapter 5 - ANDREW’S MONEYAndrew was not a billionaire.
Not remotely.
At death, his net estate after taxes, debts, insurance proceeds payable to the estate, and business interests was likely to settle around $2.8 million.
A lot of money.
Life-changing money.
Not private-jet money.
Most of it was not sitting in checking.
Retirement.
A modest commercial property interest.
The Mercer note.
Cash reserves.
His share in a consulting company.
Life insurance for me and Nina sat outside parts of the estate.
Our own house still had a mortgage.
I still worked.
I managed hospital construction projects for a regional engineering firm.
Nina attended public school.
The yellow dress really had cost twenty-nine dollars.
Sylvia hated that.
She believed if money existed, it should be visible.
Andrew did not.
He wore Costco sweaters and drove a seven-year-old Subaru until the transmission failed.
I loved that about him.
Charles called it “cosplaying poverty.”
Andrew would laugh.
Then buy Nina ice cream.
After he died from a sudden cardiac arrhythmia at thirty-eight, something changed in Sylvia.
She began talking about “Mercer standards.”
At first I thought it was grief.
She sent Nina expensive dresses.
Nina wore them sometimes.
Then Sylvia complained when she saw photos of Nina in Target pajamas.
She bought designer shoes Nina refused because they pinched.
She told me:
“Andrew worked too hard for his daughter to look ordinary.”
I answered:
“She is ordinary.”
Sylvia stared at me as though I had insulted Nina.
I meant:
Allowed to be.
Allowed to wear leggings.
Allowed to spill juice.
Allowed to lose one sock without it becoming evidence that her mother had failed socially.
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I did not realize Sylvia and Charles had started interpreting my refusal to display money as something shameful.
And Vivian was listening.
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