Chapter 44: The Waiver
I opened on Tuesdays. Key with the green cap, alarm panel, lights, blind.
Marisol was at the courthouse on a forfeiture hearing and would not be in before eleven.
I did the alarm at 7:52 and the blind at 7:54 and he was standing on the pavement at 7:56.
He had been there before me. He had waited for the blind, which means he watched me open.
He is six foot two. Heavier through the face, hair cut shorter than he used to.
He wore a jacket with a company name embroidered small on the chest.
He came in and let the door close behind him and said, “Cass.”
I said, “Dean.”
He said, “You look good.”
I said, “What do you want?”
I am not proud of the speed of that. Four months on a telephone will do it.
He put a folder on the counter. Dark green card, a lawyer's name in the corner.
Not his lawyer's name from six years ago. A different firm.
He said, “It's nothing bad. It's just paperwork.”
That is the second time in eleven days a Halloway told me a thing was nothing.
He took out two pages, stapled, and turned them and slid them across.
WAIVER AND RELEASE OF MARITAL PROPERTY CLAIMS AND QUITCLAIM.
I read it standing up, which is how I read everything at that counter.
Page one, recitals. Whereas the parties were married on a date. Whereas a decree of dissolution was entered on the fourth of June.
Whereas certain property, real and personal, acquired during the marriage may not have been fully and finally adjudicated by said decree.
Page two, operative language. She does hereby waive, release, and quitclaim any and all right, title, interest, and claim.
Including, without limitation, proceeds of the sale of the real property commonly known as 118 Delham Street.
Signature block. A notary block underneath it, blank, with a line for a commission expiry.
There is a place on that page for a date. It was empty.
I read the whole thing twice. It took about ninety seconds.
He talked the entire ninety seconds. It was for the bank. For the refinance. The lawyer's office had sent it and he was dropping it in.
He said, “You don't have to read all that.”
I said, “I read four hundred pages a day.”
He stopped talking for a second, and I saw him decide not to ask about that.
Then I asked my question. It was the only one I asked him, and it was procedural.
I said, “The recital says the decree was entered on the fourth of June. Was it entered on the fourth of June, or was it signed on the fourth of June?”
He said, “What?”
I said, “Signed and entered are different dates. Signed is the judge. Entered is the clerk. There's usually a gap.”
He said, “It says the fourth of June.”
I said, “I know what it says. I'm asking what happened.”
He looked at me the way you look at somebody speaking a language you did not know they had.
He said, “Why does that matter?”
I said, “Because a recital that gets a date wrong makes the rest of the document arguable.”
He said, “Cass, it's a form.”
I said, “Everything is a form.”
That is the whole exchange. Twenty-two seconds. He did not understand why I asked. I did not explain, because I could not have.
I did not have a reason. I had a habit.
Then I picked the two pages up by the top corner and slid them back across the counter.
He put his hand down flat on top of them.
Palm down, fingers spread, on the paper, halfway across the counter, stopping it.
The ring was on. Different ring. Wider band.
I put my hand on his wrist, lifted his hand off the document, and set it down to the left of the paper.
I did not squeeze it and I did not throw it. I moved it the way you move a stapler.
He let me. That is worth writing down. Then he looked at his own hand as if somebody else had put it there.
I said, “I'm not signing anything today.”
He said, “It's not a big deal.”
I said, “Then it can wait.”
He said, “Bree said you'd be like this.”
I said nothing at all.
He stood there four or five seconds. Then he pushed the pages an inch toward me with one finger. “Keep it. Read it. Call the office.”
Then he went out and the door closed slowly and then banged.
I watched him cross Kesler Street through the front window with the blind up.
He got into a dark blue estate car parked six spaces down, on the far side, facing away.
On the rear window, lower left, there was a pale rectangle where a university parking sticker had been sun-bleached for eleven years.