Chương 3
Logan looked past me into the room as if he expected to find evidence of a secret life scattered across the carpet.
“You found me,” I said.
He rubbed a hand over his mouth.
“Can I come in?”
I stepped aside.
He entered slowly, taking in the narrow kitchenette, the sagging couch, the two grocery bags I had not yet folded and put away.
His eyes stopped on the single framed photograph beside my laptop.
It was Margaret standing on a pier in Galveston, laughing because the wind had ruined her hair.
“You’re living here?”
“For now.”
“Dad, this place is—”
He stopped himself.
“Small?”
“I was going to say depressing.”
“The refrigerator has personality.”
He stared at me.
“It knocks.”
That almost earned a smile, but his face tightened again.
He dropped into the chair beside the table without being invited.
I remained standing.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
Outside, somebody pushed a cart of laundry across the parking lot, one bad wheel squeaking every few feet.
Finally Logan said, “Chelsea thinks you hired someone to follow us.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“She thinks that’s how you knew when to send everything.”
“I knew when to send everything because Fiona and I picked a date.”
“So you weren’t watching the house?”
“I happened to be nearby this morning.”
His eyebrows rose.
“That sounds like watching the house.”
“I wanted to know the notices arrived.”
“You could’ve tracked the delivery.”
“I could have.”
He looked away.
There it was again, the old habit between us.
He asked a question that was really an accusation.
I answered only the words he used.
Margaret used to say Logan and I could turn ordering lunch into a diplomatic standoff.
He leaned forward with both elbows on his knees.
“Do you understand what those letters did?”
“Yes.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
I pulled out the other chair and sat across from him.
“Then tell me.”
“The credit union called Chelsea before she even finished reading the notices.”
“That quickly?”
“Yes, that quickly.”
His voice sharpened.
“They said your guarantee is being withdrawn and we need to submit updated financials.”
“That sounds correct.”
“And the renovation loan?”
“You and Chelsea are borrowers.”
“With you as additional security.”
“Yes.”
“They’re reviewing the rate.”
“That possibility is in the agreement.”
He stared at me as if the calmness of my answers offended him more than the answers themselves.
“You memorized all this?”
“I read it.”
“Four years ago.”
“I read things before I sign them, Logan.”
He stood suddenly and walked toward the window.
His shoulders were high and rigid.
“You know what Chelsea said?”
“I can imagine several possibilities.”
“She said you’ve been planning to hurt us.”
I let that sit between us.
“Do you believe her?”
He did not answer.
I looked at the back of his shirt and noticed a small dark stain near the collar.
Coffee, probably.
He had rushed over without changing.
That detail softened something in me, which was irritating.
Love rarely had the decency to disappear when it became inconvenient.
“You left without saying anything,” he said.
“You told me you needed space.”
“I didn’t tell you to disappear.”
“No.”
He turned around.
“Then why?”
“Because I was tired of being asked to.”
His jaw shifted.
“That’s not fair.”
“Which part?”
“You’re taking everything from that one night and making it sound like we treated you like garbage for six years.”
I felt my fingers tighten against my knee.
One night would have been easier.
One night could have been forgiven before breakfast.
“Do you want a list?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“I know what you mean.”
“Then stop doing that.”
“Doing what?”
“Talking like I’m one of your employees who screwed up an expense report.”
The words landed harder than he intended.
Maybe harder because they were partly true.
I sat back.
“All right.”
He waited for more.
I gave him none.
His anger seemed to lose its footing.
He returned to the chair but did not sit.
“Dad, we have Sophie to think about.”
“I have been thinking about Sophie.”
“She lives in that house.”
“Yes.”
“She goes to school from that house.”
“Yes.”
“She has friends there.”
“Yes.”
“So when you start pulling out financial support, you’re not just teaching Chelsea and me some lesson.”
“I am not teaching anybody a lesson.”
“What would you call it?”
“Ending arrangements that should have ended years ago.”
He laughed once, with no humor in it.
“That sounds exactly like something you’d say to make it seem technical.”
“It is technical.”
“It’s our life.”
“Those things are not mutually exclusive.”
His hand struck the back of the chair.
Not hard enough to damage it.
Hard enough to make us both look at his hand.
He sat down.
“I’m sorry.”
I nodded.
For a while, the laundromat cart squeaked outside again.
Logan stared at the floor.
“The mortgage isn’t the problem,” he said.
I waited.
“The house is.”
“What does that mean?”
He scratched at his thumb.
“We took out more against it.”
I felt something inside me go still.
“How much more?”
He looked at the window.
“Logan.”
“One hundred and forty.”
“Thousand?”
His eyes flashed.
“Yes, thousand.”
“For what?”
“Things.”
I nearly said that was not an answer.
Instead I waited.
He hated silence when he had something to hide.
“Some credit cards,” he said.
“How much?”
“Dad.”
“How much?”
“About forty.”
I kept my face still.
“And the other hundred?”
He pressed his lips together.
“Chelsea started a business.”
I had heard her talk about businesses for years.
A home staging company.
An online boutique.
A consulting service whose purpose I never quite understood.
Usually the ideas disappeared after a month.
“What business?”
“Interior design.”
“She’s not an interior designer.”
“She hired people.”
“With whose money?”
“Ours.”
The answer came too quickly.
I knew that tone.
May you like
It was the sound people made when they had rehearsed a technically defensible sentence.
I said, “How much did you put into it?”
