Chapter 2 - A Room at the End of the Hall
Daniel drove Elias to a walk-in clinic, where a nurse cleaned the cut and applied three narrow strips of adhesive across his cheek. The doctor said the wound would heal neatly if Elias stopped touching it.
“That’s the easy part,” Elias said.
Daniel sat beside him in the examination room, elbows on his knees. “I’m sorry.”
“You’ve said that.”
“Not enough.”
“Probably not.”
Daniel looked toward the closed door. “Maren has been under pressure.”
“Everybody is under pressure. Not everybody throws dinner.”
“Her mother’s nursing facility raised the monthly rate. Her brother keeps calling. My firm lost the county contract.”
“You didn’t mention the firm.”
“I didn’t want you worrying.”
Elias almost laughed. “You moved me into your house and let me believe the biggest problem was a thermostat.”
“I thought I could handle it.”
“That’s what men say when they’re hoping a problem will handle itself.”
Daniel lowered his head. He had inherited June’s dark hair and Elias’s tendency to retreat when feelings became too large for language.
At home, Maren had cleaned the kitchen. The broken plate was gone, and the wall had been scrubbed. A new photograph stood on the counter: the four of them at Owen’s birthday party, smiling beneath a paper banner.
Elias noticed that June’s picture was missing.
“Where is the frame?” he asked.
Maren was sorting mail at the island. “I put it away.”
“Why?”
“Because the glass was cracked.”
“The glass wasn’t cracked.”
“It is now.”
Daniel closed the door behind them. “Maren, we need to talk.”
“Not in front of the children.”
“They’re at school.”
“You mean about last night?”
“I mean about what happened before last night.”
Maren’s fingers tightened around an envelope. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Dad’s bank account.”
Elias stared at him. “What about it?”
Daniel pulled a folded paper from his jacket. “I found this in the printer tray.”
It was a bank notice. Elias recognized his checking account number, followed by a list of automatic transfers. The amounts were small enough to pass unnoticed: $240 for groceries, $185 for utilities, $96 for a credit card payment, $410 marked household contribution.
Together, they totaled almost $1,000 a month.
“I agreed to pay expenses,” Elias said.
“Not this way.” Daniel looked at Maren. “Why didn’t you tell us you set up recurring withdrawals?”
“He offered to help.”
“He offered to write checks.”
“You weren’t here.”
“I was working.”
“Exactly.”
Maren tossed the envelope onto the counter. “You both act like I’m stealing from him. We are drowning, Daniel. The mortgage is behind. Your business account is overdrawn. Mom needs care every hour of the day, and your father keeps leaving cash around like we’re supposed to pretend it isn’t there.”
Elias felt heat rise in his face, deeper than the cut. “I never asked you to touch my account.”
“You gave me access.”
“For groceries when I was out of town.”
“You said I was family.”
“Family asks.”
Maren looked away first.
Daniel took the paper back. “We’re canceling the withdrawals.”
“Then what?” she asked. “Do we tell the bank we’d rather lose the house politely?”
The silence that followed was so complete Elias could hear the refrigerator motor click on.
He looked at his son. “How far behind are you?”
Daniel’s jaw tightened. “It’s not your problem.”
“I asked a question.”
“Two months on the mortgage. Payroll is late at the firm. There’s a tax bill due Friday.”
Maren laughed once, without humor. “There. Now you know.”
Elias walked to the window. The backyard fence leaned toward the neighbor’s roses. Owen’s soccer ball sat beneath the swing, bright and abandoned.
“I can help,” he said.
“No,” Daniel answered.
“You need help.”
“I said no.”
“Pride is not a payment plan.”
Daniel’s face hardened. “And selling your house doesn’t make you the treasurer of mine.”
Elias turned. “I sold that house because I couldn’t bear sleeping in it alone. I came here because you asked me to.”
“I asked you because you’re my father.”
“Then act like my son, not a man trying to keep two collapsing worlds from touching.”
Daniel looked wounded, but Maren’s expression changed again. Fear crossed it so quickly Elias might have imagined it.
That night, Elias moved into the small guest room at the end of the hall. His suitcase fit beneath the window. June’s blue teapot sat on the dresser beside a stack of folded shirts.
He had just turned off the lamp when he heard footsteps outside the door.
Someone paused there.
“Dad?” Daniel whispered.
“Come in.”
The door opened a few inches. Daniel held a manila folder against his chest.
“I need to show you something.”
Inside the folder was a copy of the contract for Bellwether Road. Elias recognized his signature at the bottom. But beneath it, in a section he had never seen, was a handwritten notation: Transfer of net proceeds pending confirmation of June Mercer Family Trust.
“What is that?” Elias asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Where did you get it?”
“From the closing attorney’s office. They called me tonight.”
Elias took the page. The handwriting looked like June’s, but the ink was too dark and the angle too sharp.
Daniel leaned against the doorframe. “They said part of the sale money was supposed to go somewhere before it reached your account.”
“How much?”
“Forty-two thousand dollars.”
Elias heard June’s voice in memory, calm and teasing as she corrected his pronunciation of French street names. He remembered the blue room in their old house, the room they had kept locked for years after Daniel moved out.
“Did the attorney say why?”
“Only that your wife left instructions.”
From the hallway came a faint creak.
Daniel looked over his shoulder. “Did you know about a family trust?”
Elias folded the paper. “No.”
“Dad, who would know?”
May you like
Elias thought of the unknown message, the missing photograph, and Maren’s frightened eyes.
“Maybe,” he said, “the person who has June’s blue key.”
