CALL OF THE CLAN

By

Patti Wigington

© copyright September 2007 by Patti Wigington

Cover Art by Alex DeShanks, © copyright September 2007

New Concepts Publishing

Lake Park, GA 31636

www.newconceptspublishing.com

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.

Chapter One

Honestly, none of it was my fault. The whole thing began the morning I had my little fender-bender. In a matter of two hours, I had lost my car, my job, and pretty much all prospects for the future. From there, everything just spiraled down and down....

My brother Gil refers to this unlikely and improbable course of events as a Karmic Chain. He says that once a Karmic Chain is complete it will break, and everything will just fall into place the way it is supposed to. According to Gil, a predestined event can’t take place until all the necessary events leading up to it have happened. Not being as philosophical as my brother, I just interpret his Karmic Chain as sort of a giant cosmic grocery list.

My Karmic Chain probably has a lot to do with why a month later, I found myself flying across the Atlantic to claim an inheritance from a father I’d never known.

I wasn’t thinking about my karma or much of anything else the morning my little Toyota crunched into the ass end of an SUV on my way to work. Nor was I thinking about it when I called my boss to explain why I wouldn’t be making my eight o’clock meeting. Chad was a good sport about it, though, and told me not to worry. In fact, in a move that won him the Best Boss Ever Award, he told me to take the whole day off. I should have seen the rain clouds looming over my parade, because in the very next second he told me to take all the time off I needed.

I was fired.

“What? What do you mean, I’m fired?” I screamed into my cell phone. “I can’t be fired, Chad, I’m the office manager. I’m the one who does the firing, remember?”

“I’m sorry, Brynne,” he said. “It’s just not working out. I’ll have Brandi pack up your things for you, and you can pick them up at the front desk.”

“Not working out? I’ve been there for nine years, Chad. Wait a minute. You gave my job to Brandi?” Well, that just figured. Chad had been dating Brandi, one of the receptionists, for several months now, okay, not really dating, just banging. The absurdity of the situation suddenly hit me, and I burst into laughter, because I didn’t know what else to do. A carload of old women stared at me suspiciously as they passed.

I waved to them, and pointed to the phone. “My boss just gave my job to his sex-buddy, the one with the crooked teeth, bad hair, and the out of proportion to the whole rest of her body knockers.”

“Brynne?” Chad squawked. “I’ll need you to come by and sign a few papers. Nondisclosure agreements, some tax stuff. You know, just so there’s no hard feelings.”

Brandi had told me in the past that she’d have my job, but I hadn’t expected her to have it so soon. She’d hated me ever since the day I walked into an exam room unannounced and found the two of them doing the naked mambo in a surgical chair. She might not have disliked me so badly if I hadn’t flung myself back out the door, screaming that my retinas were on fire. That, naturally, generated an audience, which got to see Brandi in all her silicone and collagen enhanced glory.

“Hey, Chad,” I said politely.

“Yes, Brynne?”

“Kiss my ass.” I snapped the phone shut, snarled at it, and then popped it back open to call my brother. After all, I was going to need a ride back home. Or at least to some place with chocolate.

While the tow truck driver was loading up my sad little Toyota, Gil came to collect me. Ever the optimist, he delicately asked when I was going to head out and look for a new job.

I shrugged, and handed the tow truck man my credit card. “I’m not going out today, that’s for sure. This sucks, Gil. Completely sucks. You know, I need a job with no stress. Maybe I could find something easy to do, where I wouldn’t have to deal with people at all.”

“You could feed the fish at the aquarium.”

I giggled. Gil always made me laugh. He patted my hand. “You’ll be fine, sis. We’ll manage.”

“I know.”

The tow truck operator approached us. “Ma’am? Your credit card has been declined.”

Gil pulled out a wad of cash and counted off some tens to the driver. “Sorry, pal. She hasn’t been able to keep track of her finances since she had that plate put in her skull last year,” he quipped.

We waved good-bye to my little silver car as it rolled away, dangling pathetically from the back of Billy Joe’s Towing Service. “So now what?”

My brother stared at me suspiciously as I tucked the Master Card in my wallet. “Brynne, how much money do you have?”

“Gil, honey, I’ll pay you back for the tow truck, I promise.”

He shook his head. “That’s not the point. If your credit card was declined you obviously haven’t paid it in a while. What’s the balance on your credit card?”

I stared out the window. He was about to give me the third degree, and not for the first time, either. It was a discussion I was hardly in the mood for. Ever. “It’s maxed out.”

He changed lanes and got onto the interstate. “How much?”

“Fifteen,” I sighed.

Gil lit a cigarette and exhaled slowly through his nostrils, looking artfully philosophical as usual. “Fifteen hundred isn’t so bad. You can pay that off in a month or so, if you start working again soon.”

I didn’t say anything, but I picked up his lighter and began to flick it absently.

“Brynne? It is fifteen hundred, right? Tell me it’s not fifteen thousand.”

I ignored him, waiting a few seconds until....

“Oh, for the love of Zeus, Brynne! What the hell were you thinking? How far in debt are you?” he snapped.

I pondered this for a moment. “Well, let’s see. There’s the car, the other credit card, my student loan....”

Gil was grumbling under his breath.

“...the trip I took last year to Cancun. Remember, when I met that guy Carlos? There's the surround-sound system I got you for your birthday....”

“I can’t believe you.”

“...and my home gym that I’ve been using as a towel rack, but I think that’s all of it.”

“I should hope so!” huffed Gil. “Didn’t you learn anything from Mom? Anything at all?”

I felt like he had slapped me. “Oh, that’s a shitty thing to say.” I turned and stared at a row of dilapidated houses. We were off the highway now, gliding through the neck of Charleston’s peninsula. “Take me home. You suck, Gilbert.”

Gil blew smoke through his nose. “No, Brynne, honey, I am sorry. You’re right, I shouldn’t have said it. It’s just that... you remember how much money she owed when she died?”

Of course I remembered. To be fair, our mom didn’t just die. She went to that great happy hour in the sky after gobbling a big dose of sleeping pills with a vodka chaser, and did it owing a lot of people a lot of money for a lot of bad habits. I dug around in Gil’s shirt pocket and pulled out a cigarette. Normally I don’t smoke, having officially quit years ago, but whenever we start talking about parents.... I lit up and inhaled deeply.

“I just worry about you, Brynne,” he was saying. “I see so much of her when I look at you and the way you behave. You never do anything halfway. You have to have all of it, all at once.”

“Thanks, Gil,” I said dryly. “Maybe you’ve forgotten, but I don’t drink myself into oblivion or shovel cocaine up my nasal cavities.”

“No, no,” he said, “that’s not what I meant. “It’s this... intensity you both have. Had. Whatever.” He paused for a moment, weighing his words carefully. “When the alcohol wasn’t in control, she did love us very much, you know.”

“Not enough to quit drinking or getting high. Not enough to keep Dad alive.”

“I guess not.” Gil was quiet after that. Dad had actually been Gil’s father, but not mine, if we were going to get technical about it. I never knew my real father, so Steve Marlette had been a pretty damn good substitute. I had loved him, and missed him a lot.

We stopped to pick up sandwiches, and took them back to Gil’s shop. He and his partner, Mark, own a new age bookstore on Chalmers Street, just a stone’s throw from the Cooper River. They sell incense, Tarot cards, candles, and books by people with names like Dragonstar and Moonwalker. While I was living paycheck to paycheck, spending my money on nice cars, high-tech toys, high rent and vacations, Gil had opened his shop a few years ago, after the trust fund left by Steve Marlette matured.

I blew my entire share within six months of inheriting it.

When we arrived at the Air Apparent, Gil held the door open for me. The shop smelled of sandalwood and patchouli, and was already occupied by Mark, whom I just adore. It’s like having two brothers. I hope he and Gil never split up, because I’d miss him terribly.

“Oh, lovely Brynne!” he sang, as though he was announcing royalty. “How are you this fine summer day?”

“Well, Mark, I’m pretty shitty. I wrecked my car and lost my job this morning, all before I got any breakfast. You?”

He waved a hand nonchalantly. “Oh, you know, the usual. It’s all good here. Gilbert, did you bring me food?”

Gil passed over a hoagie and a small tub of coleslaw.

“Mmm. Heavenly.” Mark sighed appreciatively. “So, Brynne, what are you going to do?”

I nibbled my sandwich. Glancing at my brother, I muttered, “Find a new job and pay off my bills, evidently. I suppose that’s what one does when one is fired.”

Gil snorted in response, and I stuck out a tongue full of turkey and mayonnaise at him. “Oh, that’s attractive,” he retorted.

Mark frowned. “Don’t be bitchy, Gilbert. Brynne needs our support now. We should think positive thoughts for her so she can get back on her feet.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, squelching the impulse to add a so there. Gil pointedly ignored us, and went to assist a few college students who were browsing over by the gargoyle statuettes.

“Seriously, Brynne,” whispered Mark through a scoop of coleslaw. “Are you just going to be an unemployed bum for a while? You could do that, you know. It might do you some good. Help you relax, find some inner tranquility. Oh! I know, baby. You could stay at my place on the beach.”

I grinned. “That I could handle. I should take an extended vacation.”

“I heard that,” snipped Gil from across the shop. “Sis, you can’t afford a vacation. Mark, don’t you dare offer Brynne that beach house. She’s a parasite in expensive shoes. Once you invite her in, you’ll never get rid of her.

I rolled my eyes at him and made a snarly face. Don’t get me wrong. I love Gil, but he leans towards the uptight sometimes.

Really, I don’t know what happened to me after that. One day I was a high-energy, type-A, gotta get it done now and fast kind of gal, and the next....

As it turned out, I surrendered the lease on my Isle of Palms condo and spent the next four weeks at Gil’s, cramming my five feet ten inch frame onto the sofa and living out of a duffle bag.

I’m ashamed to say I started to enjoy it.

As soon as I finished college, I’d jumped straight into working full time, and had been efficiently and happily running Chad Dorman’s busy plastic surgery practice ever since, working an average of sixty hours a week. I’d never had a chance to relax, well, other than the jaunt to Cancun, and now I was taking serious advantage of the opportunity.

One morning, Gil confronted me. “Okay, honey, I know I said you needed some time, but you have turned into a couch potato.”

I ignored him, thoroughly immersed in an amusing commercial for Pringles. I giggled at the dancing potato chips while I waited for a talk show to return. Today’s guests, a pair of twin sisters, had nine kids and eleven teeth between them.

Gil clicked the television off, and planted himself firmly in front of me. “You have been on this couch for nearly a month. You sleep on it, you eat on it, you spend the entire damn day on it. I love you, sugar, but I can’t take this any more.”

“Just a little longer,” I protested, slurping a cup of coffee. “Can you turn that back on? I want to see who little Dixieanne’s real father is.”

“Sorry, but your vacation’s over. Time to go back to the old Brynne. Go take a shower.”

“Noooo,” I protested. “Not yet!” I liked my little cocoon in Gilbert’s world. “Can I stay here a few more days? One more week? Please?”

“No,” said Gil promptly. “It’s repulsive. You live in sweatpants, for goodness sake. Mark says you’ve even stopped shaving your legs regularly and frankly, we’re both appalled.”

“Well, no one is going to see me,” I whined. I couldn’t believe I was whining. I never whine, and rarely tolerate people who do.

“Thank the gods for that,” he sniffed. “Go bathe. No more soap operas or talk shows. I’ve taken the time to update your resume for you, and you are going out today to find work, or I swear I will strangle you tonight in your sleep.”

“I love you, Bubba,” I smiled. I hadn’t called him that since we were children.

“Love you too, sis, but you reek. Go.” He shoved me into the bathroom unceremoniously.

I turned on the hot water and stood under the stream for a long time, eyes closed. Maybe Gil was right, as usual. I needed to get my act together. Brynne Murray Marlette, you are thirty-two years old, I thought, and acting like a high school kid. I scrubbed my face vigorously, washed my hair twice, after checking for random gray strands in amongst the brown, and finding none, and then shaved my legs thoroughly. I didn’t want Mark to be offended by stubbly ankles if he stopped in later.

Yes, today was the day Brynne Marlette would take on the world. I dressed in my royal blue power suit and my lucky shoes, planning to invade the hospital district. There had to be at least one surgeon looking for a top-notch office manager.

Grabbing my day planner and cell phone, I practically skipped down the stairs to the Air Apparent. I felt like my old purpose-driven self again. Things were looking up.

* * *

By five o’clock, I was thoroughly despondent. No one wanted to talk to me. As if getting me fired wasn’t enough, Brandi had gotten her last little bit of vengeance. Word had been passed through the medical office community, an incestuous little group if ever there was one, that Brynne Marlette had spread malicious lies about poor innocent Brandi. In addition to being branded a bitchy liar, rumor had it that I was hard to work for, bad-tempered, and quite possibly a kleptomaniac. I had been to six different surgical practices, and the most encouragement I had received was a polite acceptance of my updated resume, neatly presented on parchment-style paper in an efficient 11-point Arial font.

I walked along the cobbled side streets of downtown Charleston, not quite ready to face Gil yet. Darling Gil, the eternal optimist. He would be so disappointed in me. I really felt like I had let him down.

I kicked off my stilettos so I wouldn’t break an ankle on the cobblestones, peeled off my pantyhose and stuffed them into my purse, and just walked in my bare feet. It was a balmy afternoon, late summer, and unseasonably breezy. Usually August in Charleston is so muggy you can’t even breathe. I decided to go down to the harbor on my way back to the shop. Admittedly, I needed the exercise. My month on Gil’s couch, not to mention Mark’s gourmet cooking, had taken a bit of a toll on my waistline, so I strolled briskly towards the Battery.

I love Charleston and its beautiful homes and quiet secret gardens. They’ve been there for ages, withstanding earthquakes and hurricanes, and even though the buildings are close together, sometimes you can catch a glimpse of tradition through a wrought-iron gate. I paused to peer down a narrow passage covered in bougainvillea. Beyond lay a small flagstone courtyard, nearly hidden by a tangle of magnolias, and it made me smile, thinking of the centuries of young ladies who might have snuck out of the house to meet a beau in the night.

My mother’s people, the Brynnes, had been in Charleston forever. They were old money and disowned my mother’s branch of the family tree decades ago following the marriage of a young lady to a carpetbagging Yankee. Even though we’d been booted off the respectability map, I still loved the fine old houses along the waterfront. Something about them reminds me that once, a long time ago, my mother’s ancestors were somebody. I stared out at Fort Sumter in the distance, and took in the heady scent of salt water mixed with a faint eau de fish. This was the point, my mother told me once, where the Ashley and Cooper Rivers came together to make the Atlantic Ocean. Gil and I always thought that was funny. Charleston humor.

I checked my watch. Nearly six. If I wasn’t back soon, Gil and Mark would begin to get anxious. It would never occur to them to call my mobile phone, because they wouldn’t want to pester me in the middle of a potential job interview. No, they’d just fret, dreaming up all kinds of terrible scenarios, like maybe I had drowned, gotten kidnapped by terrorist lawn gnomes, or become alligator food, and then scold me later for making them worry. I headed up East Bay, slowly wandering until I got to Chalmers Street. It was a short cobblestone block that ran down to the waterfront, and in centuries gone by had been home to the city’s brothels. Gil found that terribly amusing, and was even in the habit of flipping on a red light in the apartment window at night.

Mark met me at the door. “Where on earth have you been?”

I blinked, giving him that deer in the headlights look, waiting for the tirade to begin. “Um, looking for a job? Why are you whispering?”

Mark glanced toward the back of the shop. “You have a letter. A certified letter. Go open it.” He pinched my cheeks and swiped some cappuccino-flavored lip balm across my mouth. I felt like I had my own personal Mammy, just like Scarlett O’Hara. Of course, my Mammy was a gay Chinese-American guy, but the methods were the same. Next thing I knew, Mark would be telling me not to eat too much at the barbecue. His behavior was much weirder than usual.

I peeked through the drapes that separated the shop from the office area, and found Gil hopping up and down excitedly. “It’s a letter!” he exclaimed. “From Scotland. Open it!”

It was indeed an envelope. A rather large, thick one, as a matter of fact. I had never been to Scotland, so it was unlikely that there was anything interesting in it. I tossed it back on the desk. “I’m not in the mood right now, Gil. I’ve had a shitty day.”

“Did you find a job?” he demanded.

“Well, no, but that’s because....”

“I thought not. Open the letter, Brynne.” He blinked at me, all wide-eyed, and for a moment he was still the awkward adolescent who’d held my hand at two funerals too many. “Please?”

Damn it. I could never say no to Gilbert without feeling like I was kicking a puppy. “Okay,” I cautioned, “but you’ve got to give me some space. Let me read it without you hovering over me, would you?”

He grinned. “How about I fix you some tea? I’ve got a nice chamomile and comfrey blend.”

I flopped down on the office futon. “Lovely. Bring me some chocolate too, if you’re feeling subservient.”

The return address was in Glasgow, from someone whose name began with an E. Rain had smeared the rest of it, either on their side of the Atlantic or mine. With a sigh, I slid Gil’s sword-shaped letter opener underneath the fold.

Most of the papers looked like official legalese. I skipped over those and tossed them on Gil’s desk, although I did pause for a moment to note the fancy letterhead of Dawlish, Soames and Muncaster, Solicitors. A smaller envelope tumbled out, sealed with a glob of red wax. I popped the seal, partly because my curiosity was getting the better of me, and partly because Gil and Mark would hound me to no end if I didn’t tell them what was in the letter.

August 12, 2005

To: Ms. Brynne Murray Marlette

From: Evan Muncaster, Solicitor

Number 15, Derwentwater Place, Glasgow

Dear Ms. Marlette,

You will, I hope, forgive the intrusion of this letter by way of introduction. My firm, that of Dawlish, Soames and Muncaster, has been entrusted to locate you and advise you that you are the sole recipient of a familial inheritance left to you by your father, one James Murray.

This bequest consists primarily of some land in Scotland, the specifics of which are contained and described in Attachment B. The land, a holding known as Kilgraeme, includes a home with several outbuildings, and several plots of land presently being farmed by tenants. The village of Kilgraeme itself, while not precisely owned by the Murray family, is located nearby and does include several properties which are within the boundaries of Kilgraeme.

In order to claim what is your birthright, you must abide by two conditions. The first is that you personally come to Scotland and live on the property for a period of no less than one year. The second is that you may not sell Kilgraeme nor turn it into a commercial enterprise such as hotel or inn. Should you opt to waive your claim to Kilgraeme following your twelve-month residence, you will be offered a small cash stipend equivalent to three months of the property’s income.

I apologize for being presumptuous, but my researchers advise me that you are presently without income, so I have taken the liberty of booking you a flight to Glasgow next month. This should allow you time to wrap up any pressing personal business you may need to tend to. I look forward to meeting you soon.

Yours sincerely,

Evan Muncaster

For a brief moment I thought about tossing the letter in the trash. After all, Charleston was my home.

How did I know this wasn’t some elaborate hoax? Maybe it was like that Nigerian thing I kept getting emails about, telling me that Uncle Mbwata had died and left some money. Or maybe this Muncaster was some weird creepy pervert who lured women off to a moldy castle and did unspeakable things to them.

A single plane ticket slipped out of the papers and landed in my lap.

If it was a scam, it was an elaborate one. If Muncaster was a serial killer, he was one who was going to a lot of trouble to get an unemployed and somewhat snarky American to visit him overseas.

And then common sense prevailed. I had no job, no home, no car, and no money. With an inheritance, even a small one, I could pay off my bills, maybe go back to school, and start my life over again.

I had nothing left to lose.

“Gilbert!” I called. “I’m gonna need a ride to the airport. I’m going to Scotland!”

Thus the first link was forged in my Karmic Chain.