Chapter Three
Ramona Franklin's emotions were almost at as high a peak as her childrens' had been as she drove home from the bank. She'd known this day might come. She'd dreamed that this day might come. But another part of her had dreaded this day coming. It was all tied up with her past, a past she'd tried to leave behind her like a bad dream. She'd gone to college, looking for and hoping to find a man to share her life with so that her life could be normal. Up to that point in time her life had been anything but normal.
Ramona had found a man, whom she had fallen in love with, and who had presented her with two beautiful, normal, happy children. That he had been someone she knew long before she ever stepped upon a college campus was as much a surprise to her as it was to him. They had gone to High School together, but had traveled in different social circles. She tried to fade into the background and he was involved in every extra curricular activity he could fit into his schedule. She had gone home to study each day, doing extra work on the weekends, while he dated all the popular girls.
When they bumped into each other at a Freshman mixer at Welsley College, she was amazed to see him. It was an exclusive school, so small that most people didn't even know it existed. He had been from a blue collar family, with limited means. And he had smiled at her.
"Hey, is it a small world or what?" he said, walking up to her.
She hadn't thought he'd recognize her. "I didn't think you'd even know who I am," she replied.
"Are you kidding? It's great to see a familiar face. I thought I was going to be all alone here," he said.
Their chat had turned into a pledge to study together. He had obtained an academic scholarship and needed to keep high marks to maintain it. He was also the first person in his family to go to college, so a lot of hopes were riding on him. His manner was so easygoing that Ramona had pushed away her fear of letting someone close to her.
By the time they had finished the first semester they were not only study mates, but they were lovers. He never questioned why she had no virginity to make their first time uncomfortable, or that she seemed to know what to do, perhaps even more than he did. She never talked about her past, and he never questioned her about it, seeming to know that she didn't want to that subject broached.
They married while they were seniors, when it became apparent she was going to have his baby despite the precautions they had taken. Both welcomed the marriage and the baby. That was what young people were supposed to do. His family welcomed her into their lives. She had no family to ask questions, and her guardian was happy to see her married so that he could begin to finalize certain arrangements and his task would be complete.
When Richard had taken her back to Nettleton, to show her their new house, a time she should have been overjoyed, she was almost crushed. She couldn't believe it was right next to the house that inhabited her bad dreams, the house in which her parents had been slain, the house that she never wanted to see again in her life. Right next door to the Nettleton mansion.
Her husband didn't know, of course, because she hadn't told him. All he knew was that her parents were dead in a tragic incident. He didn't know she was Elizabeth Nettleton, or that, upon marriage, she would receive her portion of a trust fund that would make them wealthy beyond almost anyone's wildest dreams. He didn't know because Ramona didn't want the money. She wanted a normal life, free from her past. The irony of having to live next to the one place on earth she never wanted to see again was almost palpable, but she didn't say anything. She didn't want him to know. And when she was summoned one last time to her guradian, who handed her the legal letter informing her that an account had been established in her maiden name, which she was now free to draw upon at her will, she burned the letter, and the account number with it.
Her mind drifted, against her will, to the history she wanted to forget.
When Ramona and her brother had first been carried out of the crime scene, there had been chaos for a while. They had been separated at first, having been placed in an orphanage where boys and girls were not allowed to mix, whether they were related or not. Most four-year-olds don't remember much about what happened to them at that age, but the changes in Ramona's life were so tumultuous that they were imprinted in her mind forever.
It had taken six months for her father's will to be found and executed. That will had very specific provisions in it about who would take care of the children, and provided funds from the estate to do so. Ramona's reunion with her brother was joyous, but relatively short-lived. The woman her father had specified as guardian only had charge of them for a year before her tuberculosis wasted her away. The court then gave over their care to another family, a family that the judge classified as "temperate and stable" and which made their living by fostering children such as the two.
Ramona's life had been good with the woman, and her relationship with her brother had been close. Their new guardian sent them to boarding school, paid for by trust funds established in their father's will but they saw each other rarely, in arranged formal "sitting room" meetings, where they were expected to drink tea and have light conversation.
The house and grounds in which they had lived was also put into trust, to be turned over to Robert upon reaching his majority. Money was set aside to ensure that the property was maintained. Other funds were put into trust for the children, but conditions were attached. For Ramona, she would receive access to her trust when she married, or finished college, whichever came first. For Robert, his trust could not be touched until he graduated from a university.
Roger Nettleton had planned well, and his will had been very detailed and specific. But, without an advocate keeping a close eye on things and, people being what they are, things didn't always go as he had planned. The money was guarded by banks and the law, and though people tried to get at it, they failed, for the most part. Their new guardian didn't care about the house. He signed off on authorizations for its upkeep, but didn't actually check to see what was happening. Those funds were skimmed and pocketed most of the time.
The boarding school presented inflated bills and expenses associated with the Nettleton children, and the finite amount of money legally set aside for that purpose, which should have taken care of their education through High School, was depleted by the time they were in the eighth grade.
When their guardian couldn't find a way to extract more money from the estate, he was forced to take them into his own home, where they were, for the most part, unwelcome mouths to feed. The other fosterlings in the house had an established hierarchy of "rank". Ramona and Robert were at the lower end of the scale, getting only hand-me-downs and the last helpings of food.
Their new guardian had had some success in the past at getting money by having the children take his name. It wasn't adoption - that would have ended outside financial compensation - but sometimes a child's trust fund could be penetrated in the legal twists and turns of such a procedure. Ramona, in a vain effort to exorcise the horrors of her past, accepted that suggestion, adopting her middle name and the last name of her guardian.
Robert did not.
While the man's dream of getting access to Ramona's trust failed, she was glad for her name change when they entered the public school system. As they went through school, teachers always perked up when the Nettleton name was called in class. No one paid any attention to Ramona Shanks, though, and she preferred it that way. People knew she lived in the same house, and that there was "another Nettleton child", but never put the two together.
Robert, knowing the travails of bearing the Nettleton name, did not publicly acknowledge that Ramona was his sister. He protected her as best he could at "home", where they shared a room that was big enough for one child. They both tried to keep a low profile, both at home and at school and, for the most part, succeeded.
TBC