10
“Wait, you mean these boxes could be hidden anywhere in the entire USA?” says Gabriella, her face falling. “Why didn’t you say that before?”
We are all slightly embarrassed for her. She is the only one of us who didn’t opt for transportation. She’ll have to walk or hitchhike.
“Listen, you and I are basically in the same boat,” says Alistair. “I got a motorcycle. I don’t know how to ride a motorcycle. In fact, you’re in better shape than me. You still have a life, whereas I wasted one of mine on this motorcycle I can’t ride. Do any of you know how to ride a motorcycle? Can we trade?”
Bernard snorts.
“Certainly not,” I say.
“So there you go,” says Alistair.
We all stare at Angelo Marino as he finishes writing out the contract, hunched over our father’s desk. He calls in an assistant and asks him to type up the contract and print out eighteen copies, three for everyone.
“Tell us about the superpowers now,” I say, once the assistant is gone.
“I don’t know much about them,” acknowledges Angelo Marino. “All I know is that you must spend another life to get them.”
“No way,” says Bernard. “Then I’ll only have one life left.”
“I might as well,” says Gabriella. “Since all the rest of you are down to two lives already.”
“Me too,” says Alistair. “The motorcycle certainly isn’t helping me.”
“I love throwing lives away,” says Henley. “Sign me up.”
The assistant returns quickly with the stack of contracts. He hands one to each of us and then leaves, shutting the door behind him. We take seats around the conference table and read over the contract, which simply says that whoever wins agrees to share the fortune five ways.
“Five equal ways?” says Alistair dubiously.
“It’s only fair,” says Henley, grinning.
“Works for me,” says Gabriella.
“Look, if I win, I will make sure everybody is taken care of,” says Alistair. “But I won’t split things equally. I will split things in a way that makes sure that we stay in business. We’ll all be compensated according to how valuable we are to the company.”
At this point, all of my siblings turn to look at me. I take a long sip of bourbon and stare at my hands.
“I’m not signing this as is,” says Alistair. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t split the fortune. I just want to do it on my terms.”
“I agree,” says Bernard, his eyes flashing. “I’m not signing either. For the same reason.”
“Oh, bullshit,” says Henley. “I trust Alistair to do the right thing, but not you. If you win, you’ll just keep all the money. Or else you’ll take it all to Macau and burn it all at the craps table.”
“Craps isn’t my game,” says Bernard. “I play poker, as you well know. And I don’t lose money.”
“Yeah, right,” says Henley.
“If I win, I will split it between the three of us who are worth a damn,” retorts Bernard. “You can get a small stipend, Henley. But the real money will go to me, Alistair, and Caitlyn.”
“Oh, fuck off,” says Henley.
“Listen,” I chime in. “The point of money in the first place is control. That is what we are really arguing about here. Control. I don’t care who gets the fortune, as long as you all agree to leave me in charge of Nylo. Do any of you seriously think you would do a better job running the company than me?”
Only Bernard seems to twitch at my question. Gabriella looks down at the table and Henley looks up at the ceiling.
“The contract benefits some of us more than it does others,” I say. “Some of us are better at games than others here and that’s what this is: a game.”
“I’m not signing,” says Bernard.
“Well, me neither,” says Alistair. “But for different reasons.”
Bernard and Alistair are my real competition, and so if they aren’t signing, the contract is essentially meaningless. We all know this, even though none of us explicitly wants to say it out loud. Henley sighs loudly and makes a big show of taking the contract and signing it with a flourish. He passes it to Gabriella, who signs right under him. They begin working their way through all eighteen copies as Angelo Marino smiles sympathetically at me. The contracts pile up in front of me and I sit there with my pen in my hand, unsure. The contract was my idea. But now?
“Look,” I say, capping the pen. “I am not signing, but I am as good as my word. If I win, Alistair and I will make sure that all of you are well compensated and that you will never have to come crawling to us for money ever again in your lives. But we will also make sure that the company is not damaged by bad publicity as a result of the insane parameters of Dad’s will leaking out to the press. The shareholders would shit themselves if we suddenly revealed that we were giving Henley four billion dollars. No offense, Henley.”
“None taken,” he says.
“So I’m not signing either,” I say. “But that doesn’t mean this contest has to be some brutal family blood sport, like a game of Sea Farmers.”
“I think Dad would want us to take care of each other,” says Gabriella. “He never wanted us to stop being a family, especially because of money.”
“Very true,” says Henley.
Angelo Marino collects the unsigned contracts.
“Shall we move on to superpowers?” he asks.
We all look down at our character-creation screens. I know that this is a trick. Our father always used to tell us that we didn’t need superpowers, that our superpower was the family itself. He hated comic books and adolescent power fantasies that relied on brute strength. I wonder if anybody else remembers how often he said this. I open my mouth to remind them all, but something bad in me makes me shut it again. I click “no” on the character screen and watch as the others make their decisions.
“I got ‘invisibility,’” says
