Chapter 8: What Was Written Before the Accident
I called Gavin back immediately.
"What will?" I said.
"Dana had a will drawn up about eight months before the accident.
She was young, but her mother had d*ed without one and it had been a mess.
She was careful about things like that." His voice was steady.
"I was the primary beneficiary.
She also had a small life insurance policy.
Same beneficiary."
"And after the accident?"
"I don't know.
I have no way of knowing.
I'm not in contact with her lawyer, and Richard controls all access to her affairs now." A pause.
"But I know she had assets.
A condo she owned outright.
Savings.
The policy.
And I know that Richard moved fast on a lot of things in those first ten days."
I sat down on the edge of the kitchen chair.
"Are you saying you think he changed her will?"
"I'm saying I don't know.
And I can't find out.
And that bothers me."
"Gavin." I kept my voice even.
"If what you're suggesting is true — that Richard manipulated a woman in a coma for financial reasons — that's a serious allegation."
"I know what it is."
"Do you have any evidence?
Anything concrete?"
"No.
That's why I need someone on the inside." His voice tightened.
"Look — maybe I'm wrong about the money.
Maybe he genuinely did all of this out of love for a daughter he barely knew.
Maybe I'm the villain in his version of this story.
But someone should be asking these questions.
Someone who can actually get answers."
After I hung up, I didn't move for a long time.
I thought about Richard's face when he talked about Dana laughing at Agatha Christie.
I thought about the handwritten care schedule in the briefcase.
I thought about a man who showed up every single night for twenty-two months, without fail, to sit beside a woman who sometimes didn't know his name.
And I thought about how none of that made Gavin's questions disappear.
In the morning, I called Patricia.
She listened without interrupting as I laid out everything — Gavin's account, Richard's account, the question of the will.
When I finished, she was quiet for a moment.
"The nursing staff notes are real," she said.
"I can't share them directly with you, but I can tell you they exist and that they were part of the reason I supported Richard's decision at the time."
"And the will?"
"That's outside my knowledge.
That would be a legal matter." She paused.
"But I can tell you this — in fourteen months of working with Dana, Richard has never once asked me about her finances.
Not once.
He asks about her therapy progress.
Her pain levels.
Whether she's been sleeping.
Whether she asked for anything." A pause.
"That doesn't prove anything.
But it's what I've seen."
"What about Gavin?
If Dana were to recover more — if she were to regain more memory — would she have the right to choose to see him?"
"Absolutely.
If Dana expressed a clear desire to see someone, that would supersede any standing instruction from her next of kin.
Her autonomy, to the degree she can exercise it, always comes first." Patricia paused again.
"Is there a reason you're asking?"
"I want to know what the right thing to do is," I said.
"And I'm not sure anyone in this situation has been doing it."
She was quiet for a moment.
"Then maybe," she said carefully, "the right thing is to let Dana have a voice.
Not through Richard.
Not through Gavin.
Through someone she hasn't met yet.
Someone with no stake in the outcome."
May you like
I looked across the kitchen at the empty chair where Mom had sat two nights ago, holding a photograph of a woman she'd never met.
"I think I know who that might be," I said.
