Chapter 8 - The Ghost of the Past
Two months later, the autumn air turned crisp, carrying the scent of impending winter down from the San Gabriel Mountains.
I sat in my corner office on the top floor of the Hale Meridian building, looking out over the sparkling expanse of Los Angeles. The city looked different from up here—less like a trap, more like a canvas.
My assistant, a sharp young woman named Maya whom I had personally recruited from USC’s film program, knocked twice before stepping inside.
"Serena, you have a visitor downstairs," Maya said, holding her tablet tightly. "He insists on seeing you. He says it's about the original copyright archives from your father's estate."
I frowned, turning away from the window. "Who is it?"
"An old associate of your father's," Maya replied, handing me a visitor log. "A man named Marcus Vance."
The name sent a faint chill down my spine. Marcus Vance. Not related to the psychiatrist at Willow Ridge, but an old-school Hollywood producer who had worked alongside our father during the golden era of indie cinema in the late nineties.
"Send him up," I said.
Ten minutes later, the office door opened, and Marcus Vance walked in. He was in his late sixties, leaning heavily on a wooden cane, wearing a weathered trench coat and a fedora that he politely removed upon entering.
"Serena," Marcus said, his voice deep and gravelly with decades of chain-smoking. "You look remarkably like your mother when she first walked onto the backlot at Universal."
"Mr. Vance," I said, gesturing to the leather armchair opposite my desk. "Please, sit down. Maya tells you're here about my father's archives."
Marcus lowered himself into the chair, wincing slightly as his knee popped. He placed his cane against the desk and pulled a worn leather notebook from his coat pocket—a notebook identical to the ones I used to hide under my bed when I was sixteen.
"I didn't come here to talk about business, Serena," Marcus said, setting the notebook down gently on the glass surface. "I came here because I found this in a storage locker in Burbank last week, and I realized nobody else in your family had the sense to look where your father actually kept his secrets."
I leaned forward, my eyes locking onto the notebook. "What is that?"
"That," Marcus sighed, "is your father’s personal journal from the year he fell ill. The year Chloe and her mother moved into the Palisades estate."
My breath hitched. "Read it to me."
Marcus flipped open the yellowed pages, his thumb tracing the familiar, sloping handwriting of our father.
"March 2nd," Marcus read aloud. "Denise thinks she can use the girl to leverage a permanent stake in the estate. She’s threatening to go public with the paternity if I don't sign over the secondary production copyrights to Chloe. But she doesn't understand. The real talent isn't in Chloe. It never was. Chloe has the ambition, but Serena has the soul. I’ve hidden Serena’s true copyright filings in the safety deposit box at the downtown branch, under a trust that only she can unlock upon my passing. If Victor and Leo find out what Chloe is doing, they’ll tear each other apart."
Marcus looked up, meeting my eyes. "Your father knew what Chloe was, Serena. He tried to protect you, but his health gave out before he could file the injunction."
I reached out and touched the cover of the old notebook. The anger I had carried for years didn't flare up; instead, it dissolved into a profound, grounding closure. My father hadn't been completely blind. He had seen the truth, even if he had been too weak to stop the wreckage.
"Thank you, Marcus," I whispered.
"What are you going to do with it?" the old producer asked.
May you like
I smiled, pulling my laptop closer and sliding the notebook into my desk drawer.
"I'm going to finish my story," I said.
