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Bzzzt!

Yup, exactly on cue, a text from Caleb.

OK. Officially stuck. Going to the WT.

Loser. Hitting the walkthrough page already? A little brainpower, that's all this needs. Oh, in case you don't know what a walkthrough is, it's like this:

See, if you get stuck and want to wimp out, like Caleb usually does at some point, you click on this link and it takes you to a screen that walks you through the game step by step.

Some kids do it so they can brag about finishing the game. Other kids have just gone crazy and can't figure it out.

It's like cheating to me.

As I've said, I don't need no stinkin' walkthroughs.

I click on the desk for like the millionth time, and this time a new angle pops up and I can get to the underside of a drawer. I click, and it opens to reveal a key, which opens a box that has a phone book in it.

Until now, this game hasn't been all that challenging. This should have been the final step, but the game designer is cleverer than most.

I click on the phone book, assuming it will open and turn to a page with a phone number circled. Then, typically, you'd put the series of numbers (the phone number) into the combination lock on the box on the couch and get the key to the front door and that would be that. I'd win the game.

The problem is that the phone book won't open. It just sits there.

I'm telling you, no matter how I click on it, it won't move.

Think,
I say to myself. It says
Springfield, Mass.
on the cover. Is it an anagram? It has to mean something.

Wait a minute. I look at the painting with “Beware” scrawled on it, which I haven't had to use yet.

I open a new tab and type “Beware, Springfield, Mass.” into Google. Nothing significant. But numbers also come from names and addresses, so I try again, this time with “B. Ware, Springfield, Mass.”

There's a B. Ware Funeral Parlor listed!

I copy down the funeral parlor's phone number and go back to the game and the combination lock. Too many numbers. Maybe just the last four numbers?

I try that. It doesn't work. Wait, of course…

I go back to the Google screen and check out the address: 4351 Parker Road.

Back to the game, type those numbers into the combination, and hear the sweet sound of the box clicking open. Inside the box is a key that matches one I found earlier. I pick up the other key and find that it nests in the one I just got from the box.

I drag the keys to the front door with my mouse. There's a flash of light, an open door, and I win the game—
like a boss.

I'm vaguely aware that a phone is ringing somewhere in our house.

I look at the high scores page and note that, as always, I'm the top scorer, having finished the game faster than anyone else. I think of asking Mom if maybe I can bring the laptop to the hospital tomorrow to show Great-Uncle Ted how I solved the game. I bet he'd like that.

I glance over at the pad with Great-Uncle Ted's writing on it.

You ever heard of Dizzy Dean?

One of the best pitchers in the history of baseball.

When you go home, look up what he said about bragging.

I go back to the Google page and type in “Dizzy Dean” and “bragging.” I can't help smiling when I see the quote on the screen:
“It ain't braggin' if you can do it.”

Pretty cool. Great-Uncle Ted is a pretty cool guy, all right.

Suddenly, I hear my mom make a sound I swear I've never heard before, and I know immediately that something is wrong.

Here are some words and phrases I have heard over the last few days that I am completely sick of:

I guess I'm lucky. No one in my family has died since Mom's father “passed away” when I was a little boy. My dad's parents live in Brooklyn (“I think each is just trying to outlive the other. Spite is all that keeps them going,” my dad likes to say, but I don't think he means it).

It's weird to think that someone I just saw could just…not be there all of a sudden.

Sure, I've had kids in class be absent from school and everyone will talk about how they lost a grandparent or an aunt or something, but it's always been someone else.

This time it's me who is sitting in a car, in an uncomfortable suit and tie, going to some lawyer's office for the reading of the will. The will of the one grown-up who actually seemed to think that the games I play (and am so freaking good at, if I do say so myself) are something more than just a waste of time.

At least there isn't going to be any funeral. Great-Uncle Ted specified that he wanted to be cremated and have his ashes sent back to Hawaii.

It seemed that for most of his life he didn't want to have anything to do with his family here or there. Except for Mom. Of course.

Whenever I would ask about him, all Mom would say was “He's had quite a life and deserves to be left alone in peace.”

With Mom and Dad talking business up front, I take the time to phone Caleb real quick. Things have been so hectic I haven't even had a minute to call.

“Yeah?” He sounds bummed, like he always does at his dad's over the weekends.

“How's it going?”

“You know…the usual. Dad's acting all weird, and Gina wants to be my best friend. I hate it here.”

Gina is Caleb's father's second wife.

“I don't blame you.”

“How's all the stuff with your uncle?”

“On our way to meet with a lawyer about it now.”

“Oh, man, good luck.”

“Thanks, dude, you too. See you Monday?”

“If I survive the weekend.”

It's been so unreal the last few days, any chance to talk with Caleb makes things a little more normal.

My parents are talking softly in the front seat. I hear my dad say something about how Great-Uncle Ted's ashes will be buried “in the punch bowl.” This piques my interest.

Some weird Hawaiian tradition? “Umm…you're burying Great-Uncle Ted in a punch bowl?”

My mom laughs. “That's what they call the national cemetery in Honolulu.”

“You know your Great-Uncle Ted was a hero, right?” my dad asks.

Even from the backseat, I can see my mom's ears turn an interesting shade of red.

“Uncle Ted fought in the big war. He got a medal and everything,” continues Dad.

So that's what he was talking about when he said he killed a lot of men. At least, I hope it was.

I poke my mom in the arm. “Why didn't you ever tell me?”

“He never liked to talk about it. He used to say it was a long time ago and he wasn't really a hero and he just wanted to forget it.”

A silence falls over the car. I look out the window and stare at what could charitably be called “the scenery.” We live in the San Fernando Valley, just over the canyon from what most people think of when they think of “glamorous Los Angeles.”

On
that
side of the canyon is Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive.

On our side are dozens of dinky little suburban places, like La Purisma. Not much different from anywhere else, with people going about their boring lives. The only difference is that we have palm trees. Big whoop.

It's kind of like the lunch tables at our middle school. The other side of the canyon is like the cool table, and we're the kids at the other tables, near enough to see them, but we know we'll never be invited to join, if you get my drift.

So La Purisma was named after some famous mission that was here in the early days. It would be cool if it was still here, but it's long gone. Nowadays people joke that “La Purisma” is Spanish for “strip mall.”

But we've left La Purisma miles back.

My dad turns the wheel sharply, and all of a sudden we're turning off into a nasty part of the Valley I've never been in before.

It seems to be made up mostly of manicure salons and gas stations.

My dad steers the car into a small, L-shaped group of buildings. I can see a karate school, a noodle shop, a dusty grocery store, and an old office building.

“Make sure you lock the doors,” Mom mutters to Dad. I look out and see some sleazy-looking guys loitering near the grocery.

I wonder how many kids my age have ever been to a lawyer's office. I haven't. I've always pictured lawyers' offices looking like they do on TV or in the movies. You know, you go up in a sleek elevator in some impressive glass-sheathed towers and then you're ushered into a dark-wood-paneled room with large leather chairs and shelves filled with law books.

Yeah, well, this looks more like the back room where we get our car repaired.

We all carefully pick our way up a rickety flight of stairs and find ourselves in front of a dented door with a plastic nameplate pasted on, the kind you get at a stationery store.

Mom knocks politely. No answer.

We wait, and watch the characters wandering on the street, who look like they escaped from some reality TV show about drug addicts or drunks. My dad knocks this time, a lot louder than my mom. After a little bit, the door opens, and we find ourselves in the offices of Ben Huang, Esq. (don't ask me what “Esq.” stands for. It's on the nameplate).

Mr. Huang matches his office perfectly. A large, sweaty old man, he smells of some funky aftershave—I bet he started wearing one brand in the seventies when it was popular and never changed it.

Mr. Huang is also rocking a pretty sweet diamond ring on his pinky. I am totally impressed by this until I see my dad turn to my mom, raise his eyebrows, and mouth the words “He's wearing a pinky ring,” in response to which Mom puts her hand over her mouth and shakes her head. So maybe it isn't so impressive.

Mr. Huang shakes hands with the family (I know I will continue smelling that aftershave on my hand for days).

“So nice of you all to come,” Mr. Huang wheezes as he settles himself into the chair behind his desk, which is littered with files and papers of all colors and sizes.

We find places to sit and he begins.

“We are gathered here for the purpose of reading the last will and testament of Takateru ‘Ted' Wakabayashi. Dear Uncle was eighty-eight years of age at the time of his passing. There are a few things I need to establish before I get to the actual reading of the will itself.”

Mom pulls a yellow legal pad from her purse.

“I promised the relatives back in Hawaii that I'd write down everything in the will. Let's just hope he gave something to Auntie Tomoko. Otherwise I'll never hear the end of it.”

Mr. Huang looks up from his papers.

“As I call your names, please answer ‘Present.' If anyone listed is not here, under the terms of Dear Uncle's will, I cannot continue.”

It's creeping me out that Mr. Huang insists on saying “Dear Uncle” with the same sympathetic smile every time, but then again, it goes with the rest of the general smarminess that hangs off the old guy like his cheap aftershave.

As Mr. Huang reads our names, we all say “Present.”

“ ‘I, Takateru ‘Ted' Wakabayashi, being of sound mind and body, do hereby grant…' ” And on and on.

I look over and see that Mom is furiously writing down all the amounts the lawyer says, like she's trying to finish a test in the last minutes before time is up.

“Auntie Tomoko will be very happy,” she mutters more than a few times.

Finally, Mr. Huang puts down the paper and wipes his forehead with a grimy handkerchief. He smiles and says, “This is the end of Dear Uncle's will.”

My mom begins to put her pad away when the old guy holds up his hand.

“That
was
the end of Dear Uncle's will until two days ago. I was summoned to his bedside in the hospital. There he dictated to me a codicil to the existing will. For the benefit of our youngest visitor, I will explain what a codicil is.”

Right. Like I'm the only one in the room who doesn't know what a codicil is.

I look at Mom and Dad, and apparently I
am
the only one who doesn't know what a codicil is.

“A codicil is a document that adds to, rather than replaces, a previously executed will,” Mr. Huang says, smiling at me like I'm a moron. “Now, a codicil may add or revoke small provisions, or…”

Here, Mr. Huang looks down and twists the ring on his pinky. He's clearly relishing the moment. “…it may completely change the majority, or all, of the gifts under the will.”

“He better not have taken everything away from Auntie Tomoko. She'd kill him if he weren't already dead,” Mom says grimly.

Mr. Huang smiles again, looking a little nervous. “There are only two provisions to the will as it stands.”

He reads off a single piece of paper. Clearing his throat, Mr. Huang peers down onto the page and begins to read.

“ ‘First codicil to my last will and testament: I hereby award from my estate to Lila Gerson the sum of eighty thousand dollars, to be used to help pay for her education at Harvard University.' ”

Mom gasps, and tears fill her eyes. She grips Dad's hand so hard I thought it was going to fall off. Clearly she didn't expect this.

“ ‘Second codicil: I leave the entire contents of my apartment on 103465 South Alta Vista Avenue in Loca Grande, with all the treasure it contains…to my great-nephew Ted Gerson, who is so good at solving puzzles. Search hard and you will find it.' ”