“Oh, it’s more of a personal call. He, uh…he owes me money.” I sucked at lying on the spot.
Overhearing the conversation, Cash closed his eyes and shook his head with a smirk tugging at his lips.
“I can send you through to his voicemail if you’d like?”
“Please. That’d be great.” I made sure to stop talking before doing any more damage.
A few beeps resounded seconds before his screen lit up in his hand. It rang in my ear as well as in the room. I disconnected the call, satisfied at the uncertainty of his job being cleared up. While I sat there with my phone in my hand, he waited me out patiently, sensing there was more I needed to say or ask.
I bit my lip, steadied my focus on the corner of the baseboard leading into his bathroom, and took a breath. “Do you talk to your parents? Like…are you close with them?”
“Of course. I mean, I’m as close to them as I can be with them living in another state and me being gone so much. We talk, though. And I see them every Christmas. What would you like to know about them?”
This just seemed silly and made me look paranoid. And unless I planned to call all his relatives to verify what he told me, there was no use in bringing it up. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.” I didn’t even get my rear end to the edge of the mattress when he carefully halted my movement with a gentle hand around my upper arm.
“It does matter, Jade. Whatever you’re thinking, it means something to you. I have no problem answering any questions you have about my job or my family or how I grew up. Don’t be embarrassed or worried about how it’ll sound.” He must’ve noticed the burning in my cheeks, and I wished I could’ve blamed it on the sun.
Realizing I needed to get this over with, my posture slumped with a rushed sigh, and I closed my eyes, bracing myself to just lay it all out there for him. “I just never hear you talk about them other than in stories about when you were younger, and it caused me to question things.” It suddenly dawned on me that I was a hypocrite, considering I never talked about mine, either. “Plus, you said you’re lonely, so I guess that made me think you were estranged from your family, which led me to wonder why.”
“That makes sense, and I can see why you felt that way. But my parents still live in Georgia, and I’m all the way down here. It’s not like I can just stop over at their house for dinner. They call when they have something to tell me, and I do the same, but my dad’s not the kind of guy who likes to talk on the phone, and my mom stays busy in her community.”
“Then I guess my question would be…when you left your wife, why didn’t you move closer to them? Why here where you don’t have anyone, instead of with your family who could help you through the divorce?”
“Because I had this house already, so there was no point in getting another one. And I wasn’t about to move in with my parents at my age. I love them and all, but I’ve been on my own for the last twelve years. It’d be one thing if I needed their help, but I didn’t.”
God, I both loved and hated how all his answers made sense.
“That brings me to this house.” I glanced around his room, avoiding him completely. “Why’d your grandfather give it to you, and why didn’t you ever live here when you were married?”
“Well, I used to spend summers with him here when I was a kid, so I assume that’s why he chose me. But honestly, I have no idea why he had his will the way he did. I was informed about it by my dad, who was the executor of the estate. No one had any gripes about me taking it, so I did. As for why I didn’t live here when I was married…I was twenty-one when I was given the deed to this house. I’d just started my job and traveled a lot. The house is old, and it hadn’t been taken care of very well in Granddad’s later years, so it needed a lot of work. I didn’t have the time to put into it, nor did I have the money. The property taxes were about all I could afford that first year.
“I’d met Colleen when I was twenty-two, and married her a year later. She already owned a home, and when I mentioned this place, she said she had no desire to relocate. She had friends in town, and if we came here, she wouldn’t have anyone—plus, she’d have to spend a lot of time updating the place. She wasn’t interested in it, and we never spoke about it again. So I moved in with her and continued to let this house sit empty.”
“When did you fix it up?”
He drew my attention when he shifted on the bed, turning his entire body to face me with his leg pulled up between us, his foot hanging off the edge of the mattress. “Over the years, I’d do things here and there, but nothing major since no one ever stayed here. It started after someone had vandalized the outside. They used spray paint on the walls and smashed the front window. Obviously, I had to get that taken care of, and then after repainting the outside and replacing all the doors and windows, I just kept it up—one thing at a time. There was a leak in the ceiling in the back bedroom, so I had to get a new roof. The carpets smelled because the electricity had been off for so long that the moisture in the house from the humidity soaked into them, so I ripped it up and put down wood. After that, I couldn’t leave it empty without running the air conditioner, so I replaced that.”
“And your wife had no clue where all this money was going?”
It was his turn to drop his gaze, but I wasn’t sure if it was because of embarrassment or a need to contemplate his answer. But while he studied the fabric of his comforter, he said, “Before we got married, but after I’d proposed, I learned of her spending habits. She’d accumulated quite a bit of debt and had several maxed-out credit cards. She lived well above her means. I spoke to my parents about it, because they’d raised me to be financially conscious, and they suggested I protect my assets. It wasn’t that I believed we’d get divorced and sought to keep her from gaining anything. My worry was that she’d blow through my savings, and I’d be left scrambling to pick up the pieces. At that time, I was making decent money, but not enough to last too long if she had unlimited access to it. And as far as this house, my dad was concerned a bank could put a lien on it because of marital property.”
“So what’d you do?” I found myself enthralled with his every word.