Page 151 - Too Much and Never Enough - Mary L. Trump

resembled my parents’ divorce agreement.
For a while, Robert called me every day. Maryanne and Donald had
assigned him to be the point person; Donald didn’t want to be bothered, and Maryanne’s husband, John, had been diagnosed with esophageal cancer, and his prognosis was not good.
“Cash in your chips, Honeybunch,” Rob said repeatedly, as if that would make me forget what was in the will. No matter how many times he said it, though, my brother and I had agreed not to sign anything until we had some idea of what our options were.
Eventually Rob began to lose patience. Fritz and I were holding everything up; the will couldn’t go to probate until all of the beneficiaries had signed off. When I told Rob that Fritz and I weren’t yet willing to take that step, he suggested we get together to discuss it.
At our first meeting, when we asked Rob to explain why my grandfather had done what he had, Rob said, “Listen, your grandfather didn’t give a shit about you. And not just you, he didn’t give a shit about any of his grandchildren.”
“We’re being treated worse because our father died,” I said.
“No, not at all.”
When we pointed out that our cousins would still benefit from what their
parents were getting from my grandfather, Rob said, “Any of them could be disowned at any time. Donny was going to join the army or some bullshit like that, and Donald and Ivana told him if he did, they’d disown him in a second.”
“Our father didn’t have that luxury,” I said.
Rob sat back. I could see him trying to recalibrate. “It’s pretty simple,” he said. “As far as your grandfather was concerned, dead is dead. He only cared about his living children.”
I wanted to point out that my grandfather hadn’t cared about Rob, either, but Fritz intervened. “Rob,” he said, “this just isn’t fair.”
I lost track of how many meetings the three of us had between July and October 1999. There was a brief respite in September while I was in Hawaii for my postponed wedding and honeymoon.
At the very beginning of our discussions, Fritz, Robert, and I agreed that we would leave Gam out of it. I assumed she had no idea how we’d been