Inside the back of the frame, taped between the cardboard and the photo, was a folded bank envelope with my name written in my grandpa’s shaky handwriting. My hands were honestly shaking so bad I ripped part of it opening it.
There wasn’t cash like some movie.
It was a storage unit key and one short note telling me not to let my mother or brother know about Unit 214 until I talked to a man named Russell at the hardware store outside Terre Haute.
I almost didn’t go because it sounded crazy, but Grandpa practically lived at that hardware store after Grandma died. The owner recognized me immediately and just sighed when I mentioned my grandpa’s name.
He said my grandpa had been paying for that storage unit every month for almost twelve years.
Inside were photo albums, tax records, old birthday cards I made him as a kid, and three binders full of receipts. Mostly money he spent raising me. School clothes. Dentist visits. My asthma medication. Summer camps.
At the very bottom was paperwork showing Grandpa had taken a second mortgage on his house years ago.
The signatures on the loan papers were his.
But the withdrawals from the account all went to my mother’s name.