Chapter 7: The Hidden Stash

"No, no, no!" Lulu immediately protested. 'Important points must be repeated three times!'

Henry looked slightly embarrassed, knowing that it was a bit much to ask, but he still held firm. "Lulu, this is my one wish. I will never be able to speak to or hold my daughter again. Delivering it to her in person will be the closest I could hope to come to speaking to her one last time. I know it's a lot to ask, but please…" he trailed off with a pleading expression.

Lulu groaned, dragging her hands down her face. "I guess, but—ugh! Does she even live around here?"

Henry hesitated, and Lulu narrowed her eyes.

"Oh my god, you don't even know where she is, do you?"

"No, I do. I think…," he trailed off uncertainly, rubbing the back of his neck. "I did hire a private investigator years ago."

Lulu stared. "You what?"

"Back when I first wanted to get in contact with her," he clarified. "I got her address, but in the end, I never went through with it, so I can't confirm if she still lives there."

Lulu went silent at his admission.

"Why did you not contact her if you knew where she was?"

Henry sighed. "A mix of cowardice and thinking I had more time. I kept telling myself, 'I'll reach out next month.' Then next month turned into next year, and then… well." He gestured vaguely at himself. "Here we are."

Lulu frowned, crossing her arms again. "And where is she, then? To the best of your knowledge."

Henry smiled. "Oh, she isn't that far away."

Lulu started to exhale in relief—

"Just a couple of states over."

Lulu choked on air.

"Just a couple of states over?! Henry, do I look like someone who has 'road trip money'?"

Henry tilted his head. "I assumed you had a car."

Lulu scoffed. "Oh yeah, totally. A nice, sleek, invisible car that runs on my hopes and dreams—in which case it is definitely empty and unusable."

"…So, no car, then."

"No car! No money either! I spent the last of it at Marguerite's, and I can't afford my own rent right now, much less some multi-city travel adventure!"

Henry hummed in thought, then shrugged. "Well, that's not a problem. There's cash under my mattress."

Lulu blinked. "…Excuse me?"

"I kept a stash under my mattress," Henry repeated. "You can use that."

She stared at him in silence for a long moment.

"You are just a walking cliché of where not to hide your valuables," She muttered as she trudged toward the hallway. "I swear, if you only have, like, twenty bucks under there, I will lose my mind."

Henry only smiled mysteriously as she entered what was once his bedroom.

The room had a lived-in coziness, though a layer of dust had begun creeping in and settling over everything. The bed was neatly made—almost to military precision— and a nightstand stood beside it with an old alarm clock and a lamp a picture frame of a young married couple on their wedding day—a young Henry and who Lulu assumed was his deceased wife.

Lulu hesitated before stepping forward, feeling suddenly awkward about entering a practical stranger's bedroom. "This is practically grave robbing…" she muttered under her breath.

"Hardly," Henry said, overhearing from behind her. "It's not like I need it anymore."

Still feeling weird about it, Lulu lifted the edge of the mattress and peered underneath.

And blinked.

Then blinked again in shock as her breathing began to pick up.

She expected a couple of crumpled twenties. Maybe a few hundred if Henry had been particularly paranoid about banks.

What she did not expect were thick wads of hundred-dollar bills, bound together in stacks. Several of them.

Lulu's mouth went dry as she slowly—carefully—reached in and pulled out one of the stacks. It was heavy in her hands, crisp bills tightly pressed together by the weight of the mattress. She flipped through it in disbelief.

"Henry," she said in a strangled voice.

"Yes?"

"This isn't drug money or anything like that, right?"

"Of course not," he replied. Looking surprised and offended that she would even suggest that. "I owned a hardware store for decades, for god's sake!"

Lulu grabbed another stack, waving both in the air. "You have thousands under here! This is more than my rent for a year!"

Henry shrugged. "I don't trust banks."

"Yeah…" Lulu responded absentmindedly while making mental calculations of what was under the mattress 'If one stack had this much… and there were at least ten under here… holy sh—'

Henry, clearly amused, said, "You can keep it."

Lulu choked on air. "What? No! No, this is too much! Your daughter should inherit it!"

Henry shook his head. "Elise is an accomplished doctor. She doesn't need the money." He smiled. "Consider it a commission for helping me with my last wish."

Lulu stared at the stacks in her hands and what remained under the bed. The moral part of her said it was too much, that she should refuse.

The other part of her—the one that currently had pennies to her name and a landlord breathing down her neck—wanted to shove the whole stash into her purse immediately.

'I mean if they really reeeaaaalllyyy don't need it… who am I to refuse his good intentions? It'd practically be an insult if I refuse again!'

She coughed, struggling to maintain some dignity.

Slowly, deliberately, she set the cash aside, clearing her throat.

Demure, demure… she mentally chanted while trying to give the illusion of composure and resisting the urge to snatch and stash.

Henry smirked, clearly seeing through her.

Lulu coughed again and adjusted her posture, clasping her hands primly. "Well. I suppose I could take some of it for travel expenses…and my time of course."

Henry gave her a knowing look. "Of course."

Lulu carefully tucked the stacks she held into her purse before reaching for the third, the fourth…

Then, with a calm expression, she turned and asked "do you happen to have a briefcase around here?—a thick one."