Shock was an irrational, unpredictable thing. It was the only way Maxi could explain the numbness and the weariness inside her. She'd heard that when someone dear died, getting lost in funeral preparation helped. She wouldn't know. Sam had taken care of everything. The moment she'd told him what had happened, he'd headed out to get a casket, flowers and whatever else was necessary to put his father to rest.

Her only input was that she wanted a closed casket. She never wanted to see Freider again. She'd much rather remember him alive, not a torn, contorted pile of flesh, stuffed with chemicals until he was unrecognizable. Just the thought of his fall made her want to throw up again.

The memorial service itself, much like everything else since she left Saint Agnes, was a blur. Sam had spoken about his father, but she couldn't take in the words. She'd spent the entire time staring at Freider smiling at everyone from a photo Sam had chosen for the occasion, trying to find the moment when everything had changed, when her life had ended into her marriage and her marriage into death. Her children were nothing but a guilt-filled afterthought.

She was still failing as a mother. Instead of taking care of this, protecting her children from the pain, she was nothing but a zombie. Even Grace had been braver, deciding what to do with her son's body. It was how Maxi ended up with the urn on the mantle. It was hard to compute that was Freider now.

"Huh, interesting. I always thought that would be you."

Maxi jumped and turned around, finally enough removed from her own mind to pay attention properly. Bill stood behind her, together with Ron, both of them wearing dark clothes and looking past her, analyzing the urn. It was obvious that Bill hadn't been talking to her because Ron answered.

"Surprisingly, me too. I thought he'd outlive all of us."

"Me too," Bill agreed. "Weeds tend to do that."

"Hey, the man just died," Maxi said, her voice scratchy from lack of use.

"So she speaks," Bill mumbled.

"We know," Ron said to her, his tone gentle. "We were pretty touched at the funeral. Sam's speech was heart-wrenching. Never knew Freider had that much good in him seeing as none of it was ever directed at me."

"God, Ron, can't you give him a break?" As much as she'd had her own problems with Freider, it felt inhumane for his own brothers to criticize him when he was basically a vase of ashes on a mantle.

"He didn't give me a break at Billy's memorial," Bill muttered.

"To be fair, you started that one," Ron said, reasonably.

"Seriously, he was your brother!"

To their credit, both men sombered and sad eyes turned to the photograph placed next to the urn.

"I just never thought..." Bill sighed. "And not even you, Ron. I thought it would be..."

"Me too," Ron muttered. "I thought Freider would win and I'd spend the rest of my life hating him in peace for it."

Maxi swallowed heavily and turned away, her eyes filled with tears. They had no idea that Freider had won after all. He'd left in style, taking her sanity along with him. Taking Snitch Gravel's drive and his will to live.

She couldn't think about that again, about the lie that weigh over her heart like a rock, smothering her. Could she go on like this? Claim that her husband had died a hero? Ron and Bill seemed to smell the lie, but they knew all the parties involved. They knew that the strongest of the three of them had taken the fall.

They had no respect for her. And they shouldn't.

She moved away from her brothers-in-law and walked further into the living room. Sam had taken care of the guest list, so there weren't many people. Just close friends and family. For once, Max was there with his new wife and baby, another reminder that her family was a joke. She hadn't even known until Kyle told her.

Then there was Grace, standing tall and brave, her hands folded over her walking stick, probably drugged out of her mind to make it through the day and not relapse into the madness that had grabbed hold of her when her husband had died. She'd been weak then. Weak when it mattered. Just like Maxi.

She chose to focus on her children. The only thing she'd done right in this world. Jerry and Jimmy had flown in from Texas for their father's funeral, both of them with shorter hair and looking a lot more like soldiers than before.

"Mrs. Grant?"

Maxi turned to her right to see Sarah Schmidt next to her. She frowned, wondering why Sam had decided to invite Doris who worked for her and not Freider, and why the woman thought it a good idea to tag her daughter along. There seemed to be something a bit different about Sarah, and Maxi finally realized her hair had grown out and it was no longer reddish, but a rich chestnut brown, the tips carrying a shade of bright red.

"I'm sorry for your loss," she said, taking Maxi's hand and squeezing. "If you ever need to talk, I'm here."

"That's very sweet of you Sarah," Maxi said, though she wasn't exactly sure why she would talk to a complete stranger about her troubles. "Where's your mother?"

"She's not here," Sarah answered as if it was the most normal thing in the world to be in her house without the one person who linked them. "I'll let her know you said hi." And before Maxi could say another word, she walked away towards her sons. 

They all seemed to know her, and once she wrapped her arms around Jerry's waist and he hugged her against him, it became obvious why. Maxi stared, wondering if she'd gotten it wrong but their body language was clear. Sarah and Jerry were dating and she'd had no idea they even knew each other. 

Her eyes swept the rest of the crowd. There was another blonde woman there, with almond-shaped eyes standing next to Sam, whispering in his ear. They weren't touching, but acted friendly, as if they knew each other well and, after all, he'd brought her to his father's funeral. It was worth meeting her.

"Hello," she said as she approached the group. "I don't believe we've met."

The woman focused on her, and Maxi wasn't sure if she was imagining it, but there seemed to be contempt in her grey-blue eyes.

"Hello," she said, her voice deep and rather sultry. "I'm Skye Brandon. Sam's therapist."

The affirmation shut Maxi up and she just shook Skye's hand without another word, trying to focus on something that didn't show her what a failure she was as a parent. The accusation seemed to come out in every silent breath Skye took.

Maxi's eyes landed on Kyle and Kay instead, and she was happy that they looked as cozy as Sarah and Jerry did, with Kay's arms around Kyle's waist and his draped over her shoulders, as if they were trying to protect each other. Even Angie had decided it was an important enough moment to be next to Tom. Even if they weren't touching, they were talking, and Tom somehow looked more at peace than he had in weeks. Only Jimmy was alone.

Maxi gritted her teeth together, still trying to decide what to do about the truth. Should she tell them what really happened, or let them live with the impression that Snitch Gravel had killed their father?

Before she could make up her mind, Freider's lawyer called for attention.

"Now what?" Maxi muttered.

"I asked him to pull out Dad's will," Sam said from behind her. "I thought we should take care of this while we're all here. Jimmy and Jerry are leaving tomorrow."

"But Jerry said he won't be staying over. I thought they were flying out today."

"He's staying at Sarah's," Sam answered, sounding amused. 

"Is there anywhere the immediate family can retire?" the lawyer asked.

"Let's go to the home office," Jerry suggested.

Everyone agreed and the lawyer led the way. The room filled with Freider's closest family. His children, his mother, his brothers and her. The traitorous wife. The thought twisted her stomach. Reading the will now made everything too real.

"I have here," the lawyer started, "the last will and testament of Freider Jacob Grant, son of Sirius and Grace Grant."

"Yes, we know who he is, get on with it," Grace said, waving her walking stick.

"Mom's fun when she's stoned," Ron mumbled from the back of the room.

"Watch your mouth, Ronald."

"Good to see she was like that with her children as well," Tom muttered, the amusement obvious in his voice.

Why did everyone sound so much more lighthearted than her?

"Okay, then, ma'am, I'll be brief," the lawyer said, his beady eyes scanning the paper he was holding. "Here it is. To my son Jeremy Jason Grant, I leave half of my savings account. The other half is to be inherited by his twin, James Justin Grant. 

"To my son, Samuel Sirius Grant, I leave my business, may he run it with the same passion I did. 

"To my son, Tompshon Theodore Grant, I leave the amounts in my current account together with my collection of old photographs he once admired. I want you to have them, son.

"I want Sam to have the family collection of encyclopedias, and Jerry to inherit our vast library. Jimmy will have my car and every knickknack I was trying to fix in the garage. He'll surely manage to fix them much faster than I ever could."

Maxi's eyes filled with tears as the lawyer kept splitting every useless little thing Freider owned between his four sons in accordance with their hobbies. He'd actually put thought into it, taken the time to think what each of them would want.

"The lands outside Chicago will be split in five equal parts," the lawyer droned on, "between my four sons and my mother."

A shiver of unease crept through Maxi as the omission of her and Kyle became more obvious with every line.

"To my beloved wife Maximilliane Emanuelle Grant," the lawyer finally said and the load on her heart seemed to ease. "I live the family house to live in until her death, moment at which it shall be inherited in equal parts by Sam, Tom, Jerry and Jimmy."

"What the fuck?" Jimmy breathed into the silence.

"My thoughts exactly," Sam mumbled, anger pulsing in his voice.

"I also leave her the use of all the furniture inside our house, since she is the one who decorated it in the first place," the lawyer continued, his voice remarkably even for the tension suddenly filling the room. "To my brother, William Grant, I leave an apology for how I've behaved at his son's funeral. Billy was a good kid and I've always enjoyed having him over. I guess I was in pain, just like you."

"Why didn't you tell me face to face?" Bill growled, obviously unimpressed with the late apology.

"I would have settled this in my lifetime," the lawyer continued, showing that Freider had been a bit of a mind reader, "but you never made it easy. I hope that when you sit down and write your own testament, you will realize you've been the worst older brother, abandoning the family when we most needed you."

"No, Freider, that was you." Ron said it like an indubitable fact.

"You've had as big a part in this as any of us." With every word the lawyer spoke, Maxi felt like her husband was speaking to them from beyond the grave. 

The thing was, she agreed. Things would've been so much different if Freider hadn't been left alone to care for the family after his father's death.

"To Ron..." The lawyer paused, raising his eyes and looking around the room as if suddenly aware he was reading to people. "Um, I'm sorry, this is just getting very confusing." He shrugged and continued. "I'm sorry I told you both our parents had died. It was in a panic, easier than explaining. And, in a way, at that moment, our mother was dead. I just hope that one day you will have enough maturity to understand what it was like for me to care for you."

"Care for me?" Ron's voice grew with every word. "Goddamn it Freider, if you weren't dead I'd be punching you in the face, you asshole!"

"Ronald, language," Grace piped in, her voice cheerful and very unfit for the situation.

"I have a good mind to go out there and break that urn."

"Ron, no, come on," Sam said, his voice soothing.

"No!" Ron walked to the front of the room and turned to face them all. "You had no idea what it was like. You weren't even born yet. You--" He pointed at his mother "--were off being crazy. And you two just closed your eyes and let it happen." He pointed at Bill, and then at Maxi.

Maxi flinched, her mind trying to decide between taking the abuse and speaking up. Ron was right, she hadn't done anything to help, but he wasn't her problem. She had a baby and more issues than any of then could ever imagine at the moment.

"This is a sick joke," Ron said, spreading out his hands. "He knew what he was going to do, so he decided to taunt us all since we couldn't do anything about it."

"That's enough." Kyle's voice silenced everyone. The chill in it brought tears to Maxi's eyes. "Are we done here?"

"There's just...um, one more paragraph." The lawyer straightened his glasses and focused on the paper again, his hands shaking. "To Kyle Davyn Grant... I wish I could take your name. But given everything that has happened, I believe that it is as much yours as it is mine. Make your father proud."

There was silence after this. The lawyer lowered the document and placed it carefully on what was once Freider's desk. He even smoothed it out for good measure.

"I will leave this here. I have another copy at my office. If you will have me, I will start preparing the necessary documents for the execution of the will."

"Fine, be done with it," Grace said with a haughty wave of her hand.

The man quickly gathered his briefcase and scurried out the door, leaving behind a messed up family. Maxi took in a shaky breath, trying to calm down and not break Freider's urn herself.

"How dare he?" she whispered.

"I agree with you here," Grace said. "This was completely inappropriate."

All eyes in the room turned to Kyle. The expression on his face gave away nothing. No surprise, no anger, no grief.

"Before everyone starts overreacting," he said, "I really don't care."

"If we're all done here," Sam said, nodding towards the door as a clear indicator that they wanted to be left alone.

The gesture hurt Maxi beyond belief as her children once again chose to shut her out of their lives. But as much as Kyle said he didn't care, she did. And she wouldn't let Freider get away with this. So once everyone else filed out of the room, she stayed. The door closed behind Bill with a silent click and all eyes turned to her.

"Um, Mom..." Jerry said carefully.

She raised her hand to silence him. "I know, you want to be alone and that's fine, but before that, I have to tell you something." She took in a deep breath. "Snitch Gravel didn't kill your father."

"What?" Sam's voice was low, filled with the tinge of betrayal.

"He told me to tell you that, but I can't lie. I'm sick of lying. So..." This was harder than she'd thought. "It's true that your father and I met Snitch Gravel at Saint Agnes. It's also true that it lead to a fight between them, no surprise there, but the reason for his death... We were all careless. In our run around the building, we ended up on the scaffolds. The one Freider and I were on collapsed. Snitch Gravel... He just chose to grab me and let your father fall."

There was silence after her words. She knew that there was so much more to the story, that they were probably yearning to ask. For some reason, they didn't, and she wondered why. Were they prone to not trust her after she lied and blew them off the first time? Or maybe they were just so used to hearing lies, they couldn't be touched anymore.

"So, Snitch Gravel actually saved you," Sam finally said, his voice even. "He could've let both of you fall."

He had no idea. She just nodded, afraid that opening her mouth would let out everything.

"Why did you lie?" Jerry asked.

Maxi shrugged. "He told me to. Said it was easier. And he's right. No matter the worms inside our family.... Well, the apple needs to look shiny from the outside. I think you've had enough attention form the press lately."

They weren't satisfied, she could see it on their faces, but they didn't challenge her words. They nodded and she knew that was her cue to leave. Go back out alone, where she belonged.

♠️

Jerry was a little unsettled by how his mother leaving made him feel safer and in control. The world had gone to hell in a handbasket, and the latest news only managed to reinforce his opinion. Snitch Gravel could have left both his parents to die in a convenient accident and chose to save their mother instead.

Silence fell between them as they were finally left alone. To what, Jerry wasn't sure.

"God, we need to make a list," Jimmy said, as if reading his mind.

"A list of what?" Kyle asked. To his credit, he really did sound calm, so maybe he didn't care that his father had basically cut him off from his inheritance.

"All the fucked up shit going on lately," Jimmy answered.

"Oh, let me start." Always a master of mayhem, Tom actually managed to look excited. "I won't go back into ancient history because no one wants to relieve that. But let's start with Mom and Dad suddenly deciding to divorce and Dad punching Mom in the face and disappearing. Then our house was almost blown up, Mom, Dad and Snitch Gravel had a reunion and Dad turns up dead. And now, in his will, he leaves all of us a bunch of shit but decides that Kyle should be cut out because reasons? And let's not forget that apparently Snitch Gravel decided not to leave us orphaned because reasons again?"

"I'm sick of reasons," Sam mumbled. He moved behind the desk, got to his knees and started rummaging inside. "I'm so sick of secrets and lies. I'm even more sick of half-truths."

"What are you looking for?" Jerry asked, trying to smother the sense of dread inside him. They weren't allowed to snoop through their father's desk. Of course, the rule no longer applied since Freider was too dead to hand out any punishment, but he still hadn't computed it properly.

"Answers," Sam said, his head buried in a drawer. "Because this makes no freaking sense." He resurface and slammed an old folder on the desk. He rummaged through it and pulled out a bunch of documents, laying them out.

They all stepped closer to the desk and Jerry realized Sam had found their birth certificates. Jimmy and Tom's were noticeably newer, but Sam seemed more interested in Kyle's.

"See," he said, pushing it towards them. "Same parents, same last name. What the hell was Dad's problem?"

Jerry picked up Kyle's birth certificate, but Sam was right. His parents were Freider and Maxi, just like theirs. It had crossed his mind for a moment that Kyle could be illegitimate when Freider had cut him off. But the document was obviously an original, and it was issued a few days after Kyle was born, as was normal.

"I don't think his problem was document related, Sam," Kyle said, not even looking at the thing. "And I meant it. I don't care. After I threatened to beat the shit out of him, this was pretty predictable."

"It doesn't explain anything," Sam insisted. "His original problem with you. He was a rational man." And just like that he disappeared under the desk again.

"Rational?" Tom asked. "The guy went to face off Snitch Gravel with Mom for company. Though who know how many half truths are in what she just told us."

"I agree with Kyle," Jimmy said. "It doesn't matter anymore. And Mom's story is probably eighty percent bullshisit."

"He left very little to her as well," Jerry whispered. It just didn't feel right. As far as he was concerned, she should've inherited everything. And he didn't care how much was bullshit. It at least gave him the possibility to believe what he wanted until the truth came out.

"Mom still has her own stuff, though," Tom pointed out. He rubbed his chin, deep in thought. "I can't believe I actually inherited something. I have no idea what to do with it. I'm not used to having stuff I don't need."

"Just hoard it, I'm guessing," Jimmy said with a shrug. "They obviously have no clue how much money we make on our own."

"It's not like his assets would disappear into that urn with him," Jerry said. "Of course he would leave them to his kids. But... Sam, what are you going to do about Dad's agency?"

"Burn it to the ground." Sam resurfaced again, a stack of worn-out documents in his arms. "Look, I don't care right now. I want some answers, something to make at least a bit of all of this make sens."

"I'm not sure you're going to find clues about Freider and Snitch Gravel in there," Kyle said.

Jerry stared at him, as did everyone else. He'd never heard Kyle calling their father by his given name, but apparently the will did have an effect after all. It had sounded so natural coming from his mouth, not that he was forcing himself to be disdainful.

Sam shook out of his stupor and dumped the content on the desk. "Doesn't hurt to look." He shuffled through the folders, discarding them one by one. "It's just so stupid, it has to be justified by something I'm missing."

"Not sure what you're talking about right now," Tom said.

"Everything." Sam suddenly stopped and emptied a folder filled with black and white photographs on the desk. He picked one up and stared at it for a second. "Look!" She tossed it to the edge, towards the others.

Jerry came closer and his breath caught in his throat. The photograph was old and worn out and showed two smiling people, a man and a woman.

"This is creepy," Tom mumbled.

Jerry picked up the photograph and turned it over. It was taken over forty years ago and it depicted his grandparents. Except his grandfather... "He looks so much like you," he said, passing the photo to Kyle.

"You mean I look like him," he corrected. "Whoa, grandma was a babe."

"Kyle!" Jerry said, outraged.

"Don't you see what this means?" Sam said, shuffling through the rest of the photos. "It's obvious that Dad had absolutely no reason to believe you weren't part of the family."

"Sam, there's also the very real possibility that he just didn't like me."

"That makes no sens. You were his first born son," Sam mumbled, browsing through the old photographs. He stopped again, picking one up and frowning on it. "Um, what?"

Jerry came closer and recognized their grandmother in the photograph. There were two kids next to her one a little taller than the other, looking around nine or ten, while Grace held a bundled up baby in her arms and smiled at the camera.

"What? It's a picture of grandma with Bill, Dad and Ron," he said.

"No. The ages don't fit," Sam said. "Dad was thirteen when Ron was born, which made Bill fifteen. Neither of them look that old."

Sam was right, so Jerry turned the photograph over. Someone seemed to have sucked the air out of the room. Grace with Billy, Freider and Baby D. There was also a time frame next to the mysterious baby's name, indicated that he had died twenty-five years ago.

"They had another brother?" he whispered, handing the photograph to Tom.

"One who died, apparently," Tom mumbled, passing it along. "How many skeletons does this family have?"

"Too many to count." Sam looked at the photographs, his shoulders sagging. "Why didn't anyone ever tell us?"

"To be fair, this is a bit of a sore subject," Jimmy said. "I don't see why anyone would voluntarily bring up a dead kid. No wonder grandma went coo coo. Isn't this the same year that our grandfather died in a car crash?"

Jerry's skin crawled as his grandmother's sudden spell of madness made a lot more sense. "Yes. They must have been in the car together when it happened." This explained everything. Maybe even their father's deep dislike for Ron. Maybe he'd liked his other brother a lot more and was resentful that Ron was the one who survived.

"I wonder if Mom ever got to know him," Sam said, his voice filled with sadness.

"Don't think so," Jerry said. "She and Dad got married the following year, and if what they've told us is true, it was a very short courtship."

"I love it when you use ancient words," Kyle said with a smirk, passing the photo back to Sam. "There's a lot of old crap in here."

"Yeah," Sam mumbled. "And I don't think I have the nerve to go through it right now. I'm drained."

"I think we all are," Jimmy said. "Honestly, it's very hard to process what happened."

Jerry couldn't agree more, it had all been so sudden and so violent. Like someone pulling ten thousand band-aids off when he didn't even knew he had any. He needed comfort and warmth. He needed Sarah. Someone to make him feel like less of a freak for not crying, not grieving. But the truth was, he had no idea how to feel about this. A part of him was in agony, but another relieved. He'd loved his father, but this man he'd come to know over the past few years, the man who had hit their mother, not so much.

"Is it okay if we go?" he whispered.

"Yes." Sam sighed deeply. "I need a crash therapy session after today anyway."

"I think we should all get home," Kyle said, and Jerry was relieved. He and Kay needed each other at the moment, and Jerry had thought he might offer to stay behind with their mother. Though that did mean they were leaving Maxi alone.

"I'll be here with Mom," Tom said as if reading his mind. "You can go to Sarah's."

Jerry smiled. There was nothing in this world he wanted more at the moment.

♠️♠️♠️

Another late update, but I'm running out of backlog.

So, you get a lot more information in this one. Maybe some of the last on this subject. And wow, is the Grant family full of skeletons. Death everywhere and so many secrets.

What do you think? About Freider's will, about family history and about everyone's reactions.

Thanks for reading and don't forget to vote and comment for support.