CALIFORNIA PARADISE
Chapter Five
It was a week later. Jack and Rose were
living together; across the hall from Rich. He had seen no need for a two
bedroom apartment, broke his lease, and moved with the cheerful advice from
Jack and Rose.
Everyone seemed undoubtedly happy until a
manila envelope came in the mail.
"It’s a lawyer’s office, Jack," she
told him. "They want us to come down there tomorrow afternoon."
*****
"Mr. Lawrence will see you now,"
the clerk told them.
Jack and Rose walked into the lawyer’s
office; both with worried expressions on their faces.
"Please, sit down," the pleasant,
middle-aged man told them. "Are you Mr. Dawson?" he asked Jack.
"I am."
"Well, I have some good news for you.
Your Great Uncle Marly just passed away--leaving you an estimated sum of three
million dollars."
"You’re kidding!" Jack stood up,
knocking his chair down.
Mr. Lawrence laughed. "Congratulations.
You and your wife shouldn’t have any problems from now on."
Rose blushed.
*****
"Why didn’t you tell me you had a rich
uncle Marly?" Rose asked him.
Jack shook his head. "I never knew. I
remember my dad telling me that I had some very honorable distant relatives,
but I never imagined anything like this."
"Still. They must have known something."
"The only family I ever knew was my
parents."
"So, Mr. Dawson, what are you planning
to do with all this money?" she teased.
"I’ll tell you, but first you have to
promise not to laugh."
"I would never do that!"
"Pinky swear?"
She laughed. "Pinky swear."
"Okay, I want to go to an architectural
school. I want to be an architect, Rose."
She kissed him. "Okay."
"So, what do you want to do?" he
asked her.
"Well, you know how I was telling you
about how my parents got divorced when I was ten and they both got remarried
later?"
"Yeah."
"Well, my birth father is living in
Switzerland with his second wife. I’ve only met her once in my entire life, but
she’s really young, really pretty, extremely caring, and she just happens to be
one of the best known actresses in the world. I want to sail to Switzerland and
talk to her. I want to be an actress, and right now she’s the best connection
I’ve got."
Jack put his arm around her.
"Sailing?" He gave her a quizzical look.
"Please, Jack. Besides, what are the
odds of two shipwrecks happening in the same two peoples’ lifetimes?"
"Okay. If that’s really what you
want."
"It really is."
*****
"So, are you still in one piece?"
Rose teased Jack.
They had sailed safe and sound, without so
much as a bump. They had switched ships four times, and were now in a taxi to
go visit Rose’s dad and stepmom.
"Are you nervous?" he asked her.
"I haven’t seen them for over seven
years."
"They never wrote to you? Nothing?"
"Of course they did. But Mother never
let me read the letters."
"That seems pretty cruel."
"I’m sure it wasn’t her wish entirely.
My stepdad wasn’t too thrilled when all I did was rave about Daddy and all he
ever got were cold stares."
"Seems to me you were a pretty difficult
child," he teased. The cab came to a halt. They were outside the gates of
an exquisite mansion.
"Well, it looks like we’ve arrived at
the castle," Jack said.