Spencer was twenty-nine, had never held a job longer than five months, and lived in Carla’s guest house in Burlington, where his primary responsibilities were sleeping until noon and ordering things off the internet with her credit card. His most valuable possession was a gaming chair.
Carla laid out her case like a board presentation. The firm was built with her money. The house down payment—she’d given us $30,000 seven years ago and had not stopped mentioning it since. In her mind, she was co-owner of everything Joel ever touched, and now that he was gone, she wanted her investment back with interest.
The only thing she didn’t want was Tessa. She said it so matter-of-factly, like declining a side dish at a restaurant. No, thank you. Not the child. Just the assets.
I stood there holding coffee that had gone cold twenty minutes ago and said nothing. Not because I agreed, but because my brain couldn’t process losing my husband and being robbed in the same month.
Two days later, a certified letter arrived from Axel Mendler, attorney at law. Carla had filed a formal will contest and a creditor’s claim against Joel’s estate for her $185,000 loan—two legal fronts at once, before Joel’s flowers had even wilted on the grave.
But Carla wasn’t content to wait for the courts. She drove to Joel’s office, walked in like she owned the place, and introduced herself to the staff—two paralegals, a receptionist, and Gail Horvath, the bookkeeper who’d been with Joel for six years. She told Gail to print the revenue reports for the last three years.
Gail printed them. Carla looked at the top line—$620,000 in annual billings—nodded like she’d confirmed what she already knew, and left.
She never asked for the expense reports. She never opened a single folder that wasn’t labeled income. It was like checking your bank balance but only looking at deposits and deciding you’re a millionaire.
Then she started calling Joel’s clients—no law license, no legal authority, no idea what half the cases involved—introducing herself as the person overseeing the transition. One woman, a car accident victim whose case Joel had been building for eight months, called me in tears asking if she needed to start over. A man with a workplace injury claim simply hung up on Carla and called another firm that afternoon. Most of Joel’s clients, understandably alarmed by a phone call from their dead lawyer’s mother, transferred within days. She was systematically destroying the revenue stream of the very business she was fighting to own. Like watching someone set fire to a house while arguing with the insurance company about how much it was worth.
Then Spencer showed up at my front door with two duffel bags, a PlayStation, and a large bag of barbecue chips, announcing he was moving into the guest bedroom because “Mom said it’s basically ours now.” He didn’t bring sheets or a pillow. I called the Covington police. Two officers confirmed I was the surviving spouse and escorted Spencer back to his mother’s Buick. He left the chips on my porch. I threw them away.
