It’s easy to feel happy when I’m with Colin. It’s a lot harder when he’s not around.
I know I should go back to school, but the thought of everyone looking at me with those sad faces is more than I can stand.
Instead, for the last couple of days, I’ve just hung out at home in my sweatpants and glasses, waiting for Colin to show up. Food nauseates me. Movies bore me, and tv depresses me. Exercise is beyond me. Mostly I just sit and “read.” I’ve been on page 27 for three days now.
I throw my book across the room.
I’m ashamed of myself. Dad didn’t raise me to be some helpless damsel who just waits around to get rescued.
I stand up straight and take a big breath. I’m going to start working on some of those assignments Ms. van de Wetering has been sending home. Tomorrow I go back to class.
I sit at the kitchen counter and turn on my laptop. A math test Tuesday. A chemistry lab that I’ll have to borrow somebody’s notes for. A 500-word essay for Global Affairs: Using printed and online sources, explain how China’s growing economy is impacting our global environment.
Okay. I can do that.
I remember a tv documentary about water pollution in China. This sudden image of Dad’s plane slamming into the water flashes in my brain, but I shake it away.
I’m a Patterson. Up and at it.
I google China, environmental impact. I scroll down. I don’t see what I’m looking for, but after a while I notice something. I’m feeling good. For the first time since Dad went missing, I’m me again. Just a seventeen-year-old girl, cramming to get her homework done. It’s comforting.
I find a listing for the documentary, or at least one like it.
I click, and a website opens for an all-news station. The link to the documentary is on the left. I should just open it, but I don’t. I scan the news headlines instead. I realize I’ve been in a bubble since the accident. I hadn’t heard anything about the earthquake in Central America or the scandal over the Best Actress Oscar or the psycho in Montreal who hijacked a bus full of tourists.
I also hadn’t heard the news about my
father.
Millionaire’s Death Suspected Suicide In life, Steve Patterson projected the perfect glossy image of the self-made man—brilliant, charming, athletic, generous. Rising from an impoverished childhood, he became the darling of the investment industry, often earning 20 and 30 percent returns for his clients, even during recessions.
Now, eight days after his presumed death in a plane crash, a different picture is emerging. Reports are beginning to stream in of investors finding their bank accounts drained and their financial portfolios worthless. Mr. Patterson may have defrauded his clients of up to $100 million.
Shaken employees at S.J. Patterson Financial Holdings have been unwilling to respond to reporters’ questions.
Police now suspect that Saturday’s plane crash was not accidental. “Suicide is definitely one of the motives we’re pursuing,” said Sergeant Jo Yuen. “Our preliminary investigation suggests Mr. Patterson was aware that authorities were closing in on him. He must have known that financial ruin was all but certain for both him and his clients.”
The Halifax Hospital, the Steamfitter’s Union and Chebucto Community College are just some of the major institutions likely to have lost millions through their investments with S.J. Patterson Ltd.
Sadder, though, is the fate of the countless smaller investors—the pensioners and independent business owners—for whom Mr. Patterson had once been a hero.