Black Forest, Denver Cereal Volume 5 (41 page)

“
It’s our pleasure,” Emily
O’Malley Barth said. “Please come in.”

The young man stepped into a McMansion
tucked between Parker Boulevard and South Quebec in Aurora. A fit
middle aged man came to the top of the stairwell.

“
Geoffrey, it’s Jammy
Schmidt,” Lizzie’s mother said to her husband. “You remember,
Seth’s agent, Schmidty?”

The man trotted down the stairs to shake
Jim’s extended hand.

“
James Schmidt,” Schmidy
said.

“
You have some information
on the lullaby?” Geoffrey asked as he gestured toward an archway on
the left.

The couple walked out of the entryway.
Schmidty followed Geoffrey and Emily into a spacious living room.
As they entered the room, a Hispanic woman wearing a maid’s uniform
arrived.

“
Lupe, can you get us
some…” Emily stopped talking. She looked at her husband and then at
Schmidty.

“
Champagne to celebrate,”
her husband said.

“
Schmidty?” Emily
asked.

“
Tea would be great,”
Schmidty said.

“
What kind?” Lupe
asked.

“
Just regular tea, maybe
some milk.” Schmidty smiled and Lupe nodded.

“
You heard what my husband
said, Lupe. Champagne and some tea for our guest,” Emily sneered at
the woman.

Lupe gave her mistress a curt nod. Her eyes
caught Schmidty’s as she turned. He smiled at the woman’s slight
roll of her eyes before she left the room.

“
Frankly, I’ve been a
little surprised that you’ve done so little to sell the lullaby or
any of our catalogs,” Geoffrey said.

“
I work for Mr. O’Malley,
sir,” Schmidty said.

“
Our catalog includes Mr.
O’Malley’s best works,” Geoffrey said.

Schmidty cleared his throat. Lupe returned
with a porcelain tea pot, cup and saucer and a matching cream pot
on a delicate tray. She set his tea down on the granite coffee
table in front of him and left the room.

“
You have information for
us?” Emily asked.

“
Have you sold any of our
songs?” Geoffrey asked. His face held the lusty look of a starving
man standing over food.

Schmidty focused on his tea to keep from
screaming ‘Your songs? Your songs? These songs don’t have anything
to do with you,’ at the man. He let out a breath. He was a third
generation music agent. He wouldn’t let this prick throw him off
his game. After all, he had begged Seth to let him come today.

“
I have a potential buyer
for two of the songs you have the rights to,” Schmidty said. “Glee
wants to use ‘Like a rainbow’ in one of their shows and Disney has
requested the use of the lullaby for one of their summer
tours.”

“
Fabulous!” Geoffrey
clapped his hands together. He leaned over to give Emily a wet,
loud kiss on the cheek. “That’s wonderful news.”

“
It’s about time,” Emily
said. “I thought you’d forgotten all about these songs.”

“
Oh no! There’s no way I’d
forget about these songs.”

The simple honesty of the statement startled
the Barth’s. Lupe came in with a bottle of champagne in a silver
champagne ice bucket and stand. She set the stand near Geoffrey and
left the room.

“
Let’s have a toast,”
Geoffrey said.

He took the bottle from the stand and opened
it with a luscious pop. Looking around, he noticed there were no
glasses.

“
LUPE!” Geoffrey
screamed.

Lupe trotted into the room with three
crystal champagne glasses. Geoffrey snatched one from her hand
making her lose her balance. She almost fell but Schmidty jumped to
his feet to right her. Stable, she set the glasses down. Nodding to
Schmidty in thanks, she left the room.

“
It’s hard to find good
help these days,” Emily said.

Schmidty forced the edges of his lips up in
a smile to hide his disgust. Geoffrey poured three glasses of
Champagne. Schmidty moved his to the edge of the coffee table.
While Geoffrey and Emily toasted their success, he opened his
briefcase and pulled out a file.

“
Are those the offers?”
Geoffrey beamed. He held his hand out for the documents. Schmidty
scowled and his hand retreated.

“
I’ve only brought one
offer for you today,” Schmidty said. “This is a copy of the divorce
decree between Seth and Emily O’Malley.”

Schmidty gave Emily and Geoffrey a copy of
the divorce decree.

“
If you turn to page
three, you’ll see the details for the property
allocations.”

A little stunned, Emily and Geoffrey obeyed
and turned to page three.

“
You’ll see under the
column titled ‘Songs’ that Emily O’Malley held the copyright of
these fifteen songs under two conditions: 1. The minor children
Lizzie and Julie Ann were in the household and/or 2. said minor
children were being supported or in need of financial support from
their mother.”

Emily and Geoffrey read along with Schmidty
and looked up at him.

“
I think we can agree that
Julie Ann and Lizzie are no longer receiving financial support from
you,” Schmidty said. “And, for that matter, haven’t in a very long
time. Even though you adopted the girls, Mr. O’Malley paid for all
of their expenses including boarding school and
college.”

Schmidty had to stop to let out a breath. He
hadn’t realized how furious he was until just this minute. Schmidty
fought to keep his face neutral.

“
That was a very tough
time, financially,” Geoffrey said. “The market was
down…”

“
Seth has plenty of money
and lots of songs,” Emily said. “What does he care?”

“
If you had been doing
your
job
and
actively sold the songs, we wouldn’t have had these problems. We
could have supported our children.”

“
Remind me,” Schmidty
said. “What exactly do you do for a living?”

“
I manage my wife’s
investments,” Geoffrey blustered. “Of course.”

Geoffrey looked at Emily who gave him a
smile. Her razor sharp eyes shifted to Schmidty.

“
Why do you have my
divorce decree?” Emily asked.

“
The copyrights to your
portfolio should have returned to Mr. O’Malley…” Using their
terror, Schmidty drew out the conversation. “Four, five…maybe six
years ago.”

Reaching into his briefcase again, Schmidty
came up with another folder.

“
We are prepared to file
in Superior Court to have Mr. O’Malley’s property returned to
him.”

Geoffrey and Emily started speaking at the
same time. The more they talked the louder they became. Schmidty
watched the household staff peek into the room to see what the
commotion was all about. Lupe gave Schmidty a sly smile. Schmidty
drank his tea and let them vent their rage. He’d learned from his
father, who’d learned from his father, the way to control a
negotiation was to tune out the bullshit. And these two were
bullshit. After a few minutes, Schmidty set his tea cup down and
leaned forward.

“
There is another option,”
Schmidty said.

Geoffrey and Emily fell silent. Schmidty
retrieved a third file from his briefcase.

“
But only one option and
it’s only available until one o’clock today,” Schmidty said. He
held the papers out to Geoffrey. “Mr. O’Malley is willing to allow
you to maintain copyright on this set of songs if you sign this
document.”

He set the paper in Geoffrey’s hand. It
infuriated him that these cretins would keep any of Seth’s songs
but Seth was insistent. Schmidty would do anything for Seth. He’d
do more than anything for Lizzie. Geoffrey read the documents in
silence.

“
What is it?” Emily asked
Geoffrey.

“
This is a release of
parental rights,” Schmidty said.

“
What? For the child
Elizabethe is surrogating for us?” Emily’s eyes became huge and
indignant. “That bastard. Who does he think he is? Geoffrey and I
haven’t been able to have our own children. When Elizabethe
offered… well, it’s been a Godsend. We’ve been getting the nursery
ready and…”

“
It’s customary, in
surrogate situations, for the biological parents of the child to
pay all the medical bills of the surrogate. Do you have any
evidence that you’ve paid even one medical bill?” Schmidty couldn’t
help himself. Venomous, he spit the words out at them. “Where is
the surrogate agreement? What is Lizzie getting from
this?”

“
You have no right…”
Looking at her husband, Emily gaped. Geoffrey was signing the
documents. “Geoffrey! What are you doing? Oh my God!”

With his eyes on Emily, Geoffrey gave the
papers back to Schmidty.

“
Now get out of my house,”
Geoffrey said.

Schmidty packed up his briefcase and headed
toward the door. At the door, he turned.

“
One more thing,” Schmidty
said. “If you change your mind or try to contest this in anyway, we
will take the copyrights back and will not hesitate to pursue legal
action for the back royalties.”

Geoffrey’s face went red with rage. Emily
flew at Schmidty with her nails. Schmidty blocked her attack with
his shoulder and jogged out the door. The door slammed shut. As he
ran to his car, he could hear Emily’s shrill voice followed by
Geoffrey’s rage. He used his automatic token to unlock his car. He
was starting the car when Lupe slipped into the passenger’s
seat.

“
You take me to Lizzie?”
Lupe asked.

“
I think Lizzie would
really like that, Lupe,” Schmidty said. “She’s been very
alone.”

“
That man forced Lizzie,”
Lupe said. “More than one time. Since she was in high school.
Awful, awful man.”

Schmidty held out his hand. Lupe took his
hand and gave it a squeeze.

“
Mr. O’Malley,” Lupe said
as the tires to Schmidty’s BMW left the gravel driveway for
pavement. “He crazy?”

“
Yes,” Schmidty said in
Spanish. “But not like that.”

Lupe raised an eyebrow at Schmidty. He
shrugged and she laughed.

“
Will he hire me to help
Lizzie?” Lupe asked in Spanish

“
Si. Es esta clase de
loco,” Schmidty said.

Lupe smiled. With a nod, Schmidt turned onto
Parker Boulevard for the quick trip back to where Lizzie was
staying.

~~~~~~~~

Monday afternoon — 2:48
P.M.

“
What are you doing here?”
Nash sneered at the tall, rail-thin boy lingering in the hallway
outside Sissy’s therapist’s office.

“
I…” The boy swallowed
hard and glanced around. As if to help him find what he was looking
for, Nash looked around too. The boy’s face turned to look at Nash.
“Is Sissy here?”

“
What’s it to you?” Nash
asked.

“
What’s it to you?” The
boy stood up a little taller.

“
Sissy is my sister,” Nash
said.

“
Your sister is Noelle.
You can’t trick me. We went to Smiley together,” the boy said.
“You’re Nash Norsen. And…”

“
Ward!” Sissy’s voice came
out more as a squeal than a voice. She trotted out of the office to
the boy. “What are
you
doing here?”

“
I…” the boy swallowed
again. Behind him, a sagging dishwater blonde woman walked down the
hall toward him.

Sissy’s voice brought Sandy, Aden, Noelle
and Charlie. Sissy’s ballet instructor Ivan stood in the doorway of
the office.

“
Ward?” the woman walking
down the hall said.

“
I heard you were here and
wanted to say Hi,” Ward said.

“
Hi!” Sissy said. Unable
to stop herself, Sissy repeated, “Hi!”

Sissy’s enthusiastic ‘Hi’ made brought color
to Wade’s cheeks. He stammered.

“
Okay kids,” Aden shoved
Nash and Charlie away from Ward and Sissy.

“
That’s my sister!”
Charlie said.

“
That’s
my
sister!” Nash
said.

“
Noelle and Sandy will
take care of this,” Aden said. “Let’s go find some of those amazing
brownies.”

He pushed the boys down the hall.

“
How
are
you?” Sissy asked.

“
I’m doing all right,”
Ward said.

“
I have to wear this thing
now,” Sissy held up a Body Media Kit. “It’s supposed to help me not
get sick and stay on my program.”

“
I have to wear one too,”
Ward indicated his arm. “Is this your…?”

“
This is Sandy,” Sissy
said. “And my new
sister
Noelle. This is my ballet instructor
Ivan.”

“
Wow, everything you
wanted,” Ward said. “And ballet too? I’m not allowed to wrestle
anymore.”

“
Ward struggles to keep
his weight up when he wrestles,” the dishwater blonde woman
said.

“
That’s my Mom,” Ward
said.

“
We’re trying it out to
see how I do,” Sissy said. “That’s why I have to wear this thing to
make sure I’m eating enough.”

“
Me too,” Ward said. “I’m
really happy for you.”

“
Ward? Are you ready?” The
therapist poked her head around Ivan. She smiled at the boy. Ward
nodded. He slipped past Ivan and went into the office. His mother
lingered in the hallway.