William Truman January 1, 20xx

We looked at each other from across the table with a business card and a letter in between us.

The kid looked just as confused as he was pretty; his large blue eyes squinted at the items on the desk and his mouth tilted into a perfect pout.

I resisted the urge to tease a smile out of him and tried my best to look as professional as possible.

It was hard not to laugh when I thought of why I was meeting with a seventeen-year-old kid. The whole case itself was ridiculous. Even the way this meeting became my responsibility was silly.

The voice of my boss, telling me that I was the most suited for the job of reading the will to this child because my name was Will, still rang in my ears.

I mean, all jokes aside, I was personally invested in the case since I'd been tasked with tracking down the kid based on the one or two trails that the scumbags that had tried to erase his existence had left. It was unfathomable that the child of such a powerful person had ended up in the foster care system.

I had only found him last year when he had put in a formal request to the orphanage he had lived at to help him find his parents. The name had popped up in connection to one of the scumbags I was investigating and a little digging had revealed his true identity.

The will had come to light among the possessions of an old man that had died of a heart attack a few months ago. I'd come across it while we were sorting through his things and had looked into it on my own time. When I realized it was a real person's will and not just a piece of writing I'd immediately reported it to my boss.

Apparently what had happened was when Belpheobe Hall had died she had left her will in the hands of a company lawyer who had then collaborated with one of the majority stockholders to take over the company due to the lack of a formal will.

They had hidden almost all records of her kid and were waiting for 20 years to pass before the company officially lost ownership and Belpheobes stocks could be released for sale.*

I could see the kid was getting nervous at my silence so I flashed him my award-winning smile and spoke as gently as possible.

He was around the same age as my younger sister but somehow he looked significantly younger. More fragile. I felt like if I spoke too loudly I would scare him off.

"Finley was it?"

"Yes"

“You’re emancipated?”

“Yes”

He shook his head in response and his long dark hair bounced around his face. He scrunched up his face to show that it bothered him but made no moves to tie it back or even push the few strands that irritated him out of the way.

"No. there was no one to ask so I could only go for complete emancipation."

“Have you read the letter we sent last week?”

“Yeah.”

The one-word responses did somewhat bother me but I couldn't blame him for being reticent. From what I had read he hadn't exactly had an easy time growing up and had probably never had the opportunity to learn how to express himself properly.

My heart went out to the child and I found myself softening my tone even more. Instead of getting annoyed as I usually did.

“I’m William Truman, the lawyer in charge of your case… you’re going into your last year of school, right? In the Business management course?”

“Yes.”

I reshuffled my papers and cut out more than half of the speech I had prepared; which detailed exactly what had happened to him and why we were only getting to him now. All of the criminals involved were already in jail and it was only a matter of time before their shares in the company were either confiscated as mental repayment to the kid, or they were bullied out of the Chairman's board.

“You found out about your mother last year, correct?”

He nodded again but sat up like he had been waiting for me to get to this topic. His eyes sparkled as he looked at me with a million unasked questions but his lips stayed glued shut.

"I'll assume you already know about her passing then."

I put up a sympathetic expression for the kid as I watched him fight against his emotions. His face hardened at the topic and he suddenly broke eye contact with me as he struggled not to ... emote, I guess.

Quickly wanting to change to the topic I pushed forward the card on the table and waited for his eyesight to return to the table.

“Have you ever heard of this company?”

He took a moment to regather himself before finally looking back at the table and narrowing his eyes in faint repulsion. it was a rather garish card but the name it represented was more than enough to make up for it. He answered shortly and cooly once again, only using two words.

"I do."

I was suddenly curious about what he would look like when he found out the big news. I got the feeling that his shocked face would be a lovely sight to see and ended up rushing my words, wanting to hurry up and get a proper reaction out of him.

“Her will was found not too long ago, and this-”

I raised the card once again,

“was one of the belongings listed.”

He slid the card off the table and brought it uncomfortably close to his face, reading the fancy script on the card with an adorably confused expression on his face. He was probably a bit far-sighted.

“Is there someone at this company that she wants me to meet?”

Ah, this would be wonderful.

I brought out the other forms I had brought with me and laid them all out as he took a sip of his drink. Most of the sheets were copies and for the sake of being user friendly, I had summarized everything into bold at the top of one of the sheets. I knew he would be surprised but I wasn't expecting as big of a reaction as I got.

He choked on his drink as he registered the words on the page and I had to hurry around the table to pat him on the back as he cleared his throat.

I somewhat felt bad at the moment but I couldn't deny how satisfying it had been to watch his stone-cold facade blossom into the one of total bewilderment that he now carried.

His eyes were as wide as they could be and his eyebrows bounced up and down as he internally processed this information. His lips tugged upwards into a smile and then down into a frown.

"Are you okay?"

I asked once he stopped coughing. He nodded in response but this time I didn't begrudge him for doing so. He took another sip to clear his throat while I read off the official list of belongings that he would inherit but he seemed to wilt more and more rapidly the longer the list went on.

It was good though. Kids should wear all their emotions on their sleeves like this. They shouldn't just sit there like blocks of ice.

I took pity on the kid and stopped halfway on the list to ask if he was okay.

“It’s a bit much to process at once, isn't it? Do you want to take a break?”

He loosened the necktie on his shirt and nodded in response, panting heavily like he had just run a marathon. I mean, I guess he was still on an emotional rollercoaster.

“Thankfully you’re old enough to inherit these without too many complications; you being emancipated helps as well.”

I paused once again to make sure he was still breathing before continuing. In hindsight, I should probably have eased him into it.

“As for the signing of the contracts and documents you'll have to go down to city hall with your official lawyer. You'll also need one to sort out the shares that are owned in the company.”

I introduced him to a few of my colleagues who had been foaming at the mouth to take the case. To be honest, I kind of wanted it too.

The goodwill one would get from the public would be enough of an incentive to take it on but if it wasn't, then the commission would sway even the most saint-like of lawyers.

It would be a lot of work though, and I wasn't sure if I could support that and still be there for my younger sister. She was entering her final year of high school, and whether she would admit it or not she would need my help and support in certain things.

I tried to be as honest in my evaluations as possible, not wanting to sway the kid into a decision but was pleasantly surprised when he suddenly asked.

“Have you handled everything so far?”

I confirmed that I had. although I'd gotten help from others, there wasn't anyone that knew more about this case than I did.

“May I ask you to continue then? I would like to make this as quick and stress less as possible and it looks like you are the most informed on this case”

From the pleading look on his face alone I would have agreed but I took a step back from myself and tried to speak as calmly as possible.

“I wouldn't mind, but you shouldn’t make your decision because I’m the first lawyer you've met, I would suggest meeting with the other-”

I was interrupted.

“With what's gone on so far I have no problems entrusting this to you.”

Watching him try his best to speak professionally was just too endearing and I had all but accepted it in my heart, but I couldn't let him win so easily. Not because I was so competitive but because I was enjoying bantering with him. It seemed to be the only time he let himself enjoy talking.

“I don't particularly mind working under a guy younger than my younger sister, but I will mind if you start talking down to me, can you assure me that it won't happen?”

“As long as I can have the same assurance, we have a deal.”

That broke me and I dissolved into a chuckle, barely able to form words. I barely managed to calm down enough to speak properly and choked out another sentence.

While seeing the kid annoyed at me for treating him like the kid he was would be a sight to see, now wasn't the time.

“As the instigator of the contract are you sure you’re in the position to be making demands?”

He suddenly burst out into a smile. It wasn't as bright as mine, or as solemn as I had expected it to be but it was enough to light up the room.

“As your employer, I think I'm perfectly in that position.”

Ah, maybe it won't feel like such hard work after all