Chapter 18. The Heir

Saturday came along, and with it came the nerves associated with having to tell the Man in Black about his decision—what he had been thinking about all week. The point of no return.

That morning, he got ready, looked through his closet, through clothes he bought himself and the ones the Man in Black’s estate had prepared for him. He dressed in what he felt was fitting for the occasion. Happy to be free of button-downs and suits at least for a day out, he put on a leather jacket over a white tee and a pair of washed, ripped jeans. The shoes he wore were worth almost six months of his earnings back when he slaved for pennies, and he reminded himself that he had been through that hell and deserved this reprieve.

He spent over thirty minutes looking for the picture of his mother to take with him, but he couldn’t find it. He was sure he had put it in his bedside drawer while he contemplated whether to frame it or not because if he chose not to frame it, then he could always