Chương 3
“We do,” Mark said.
Eleanor’s eyes hardened.
“Mark.”
He stopped.
Rachel looked at the document.
Her finger moved down the page.
“Bennett Family Property Trust.”
Eleanor nodded.
“My husband created it when he got sick. After he died, I became trustee.”
Rachel kept reading.
“And Mark?”
“A beneficiary.”
Rachel looked up.
“Not an owner?”
“Not of this unit.”
Mark said, “That’s not the whole story.”
“No,” Eleanor agreed. “It isn’t.”
He hated how calm she was.
Eleanor returned to the folder.
“Five years ago, after my house was sold, I amended the trust.”
Mark stepped forward.
“Mom.”
She looked at him.
“You knew I was doing it.”
“I knew you were changing things.”
“You signed as a witness.”
Rachel’s head turned toward him.
“You signed it?”
“I didn’t read the whole thing.”
Eleanor’s mouth tightened.
“That may be the most believable thing you’ve said today.”
Rachel looked back at the papers.
“What did she change?”
Eleanor found the amendment.
She placed it on top.
“The apartment remained in trust. Mark and Rachel were given lifetime occupancy rights, provided certain conditions were met.”
Rachel read.
Mark watched her face.
He had read those pages once, years ago, in an attorney’s office after his father’s death. Or perhaps he had skimmed them. There had been too much paper, too many signatures, too much grief. Eleanor had been crying quietly in the waiting room because the receptionist wore the same perfume as Mark’s father’s hospice nurse.
He remembered that.
He did not remember this clause.
Rachel stopped reading.
“What does ‘principal residence of the settlor’ mean?”
Eleanor answered.
“It means my home.”
The rain tapped the windows.
Much softer up here.
Rachel looked toward the hallway leading to Eleanor’s bedroom.
Then back at the document.
“If you permanently remove me from the residence without my written consent,” Eleanor said, “your occupancy rights can be terminated.”
Mark felt the room narrow around him.
Rachel read the sentence again.
“Can be?”
“The successor trustee decides.”
“Who’s the successor trustee?”
Eleanor looked at Mark.
He knew.
His sister.
Rachel saw it.
“Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
“Laura,” Mark said.
Rachel stood so quickly the chair legs scraped the floor.
“Your sister who hasn’t visited in eight months?”
“She lives in Oregon.”
“She has airplanes in Oregon.”
“Rachel.”
“No. No, this is unbelievable.”
Eleanor said, “Laura didn’t write the trust.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should. Your husband signed the document.”
Rachel turned toward him.
“You knew?”
“I told you, I didn’t remember.”
“You didn’t remember that your mother owns the apartment we live in?”
“The trust owns it.”
Rachel stared.
Mark immediately regretted the correction.
“Excellent distinction.”
She walked to the window.
Outside, the storm had swallowed most of the skyline.
For several seconds nobody spoke.
Eleanor folded the amendment carefully.
Her hands were steadier now.
Mark looked at the Cedar Glen envelope.
“I wasn’t trying to steal your home.”
Eleanor did not look up.
“I know.”
The answer surprised him.
He had prepared for accusation.
Not understanding.
“I thought Cedar Glen would be better.”
“For whom?”
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came.
Rachel turned from the window.
“For everyone.”
Eleanor looked at her.
Rachel’s face had lost its fury. What remained was exhaustion.
“I can’t do this anymore,” she said.
Mark looked down.
Rachel continued.
“I can’t come home and wonder whether the kitchen is going to be another argument. I can’t ask you not to go through my mail and then be told you were just sorting it. I can’t have you telling Mark I’m wasting money because I ordered dinner twice in one week.”
“I said three times.”
Rachel stared at her.
Eleanor looked almost embarrassed.
“That wasn’t helpful.”
“No.”
“I shouldn’t have said it.”
Rachel’s expression changed again, as though an apology from Eleanor was somehow more destabilizing than another insult.
Eleanor folded her hands.
“You want me gone.”
“I want my marriage back.”
Mark looked at her.
Rachel’s eyes filled but did not spill.
“I want one room in my own home where I don’t feel like somebody’s grading me.”
Eleanor glanced toward the hall.
“You have a bedroom.”
Rachel gave a tired laugh.
“That right there.”
Eleanor pressed her lips together.
Mark said, “Rachel—”
She raised one hand.
“I’m not asking you to defend me. You’ve done enough defending everyone.”
The sentence landed harder than she intended.
Mark stood.
“I was trying to fix it.”
“You were trying not to have the conversation.”
“I made a decision.”
“Behind both our backs.”
“I did it because every conversation becomes this.”
Rachel shook her head.
“No. Every conversation becomes this because you wait until everyone is furious before you say anything.”
Eleanor watched them.
Mark turned toward her.
“And you don’t make it easy.”
“I didn’t say I did.”
“You criticize everything she does.”
“Not everything.”
“Mom.”
“All right. Too much.”
“You tell me she’s selfish.”
“Sometimes she is.”
Rachel laughed without humor.
“And there we go.”
Eleanor looked at her.
“You think I’m controlling.”
“You are controlling.”
“Sometimes.”
“Most times.”
“Possibly.”
The room became quiet.
A delivery truck backed somewhere below, its warning beeps faint through the storm.
Eleanor removed her glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose.
“I am seventy-nine years old,” she said. “I have buried a husband, a sister, two close friends, and one very good dentist. I have a hip that predicts rain more accurately than the television. I am not going to pretend I’ve become easy company.”
Rachel’s mouth twitched despite herself.
Eleanor noticed.
“So there. We’ve established that.”
Mark sat again.
His mother looked at him.
“What you did is different.”
He nodded.
“I know.”
“No. I don’t think you do.”
She touched the Cedar Glen envelope.
“You took the part of my life that still belongs to me and decided you could manage it because managing me was easier than disagreeing with your wife.”
Rachel said quietly, “Don’t make this his choice between us.”
May you like
“It already was.”
“No. That’s exactly what he tells himself. That he’s trapped between two impossible women.”
