Chapter 3 - The Job He Had Been Pretending to Have
“Where did the deposit come from?” I asked.
Daniel pushed his chair back.
“We’re not doing an audit.”
Rachel kept her eyes on him.
“It came from the renovation savings.”
“Rachel—”
“The account we built when we sold the condo.”
He said nothing.
She unfolded the receipt again, as if the answer might be hidden beneath a crease.
“We had thirty-eight thousand in that account.”
My son looked toward the window.
The kitchen became very quiet.
“Daniel,” she said. “How much is left?”
“Can we talk privately?”
“You brought my house into this,” I said. “We’re past private.”
He leaned forward, elbows on the table, hands clasped so tightly his knuckles whitened.
“About nineteen hundred.”
Rachel stared at him.
“That’s not possible.”
“There were expenses.”
“What expenses?”
“The mortgage. Insurance. The car.”
“We pay those from checking.”
“I’ve been transferring money.”
“For how long?”
He didn’t answer.
I watched the pulse jump beside his jaw.
“Daniel,” I said carefully. “Are you still working at the warehouse?”
Rachel turned toward me.
“What?”
My son closed his eyes.
That was the answer before he spoke.
“I was laid off in November.”
It was March.
For four months, he had left home dressed for work.
For four months, Rachel and I had adjusted our days around a job that no longer existed.
Rachel’s voice came out thin.
“Where have you been going?”
“The library. Coffee shops. Interviews.”
“Every day?”
“Most days.”
“And the Saturdays I paid your mother back with groceries because you said you had mandatory overtime?”
His shoulders sagged.
“I was trying to fix it before you found out.”
I thought of Ben’s fever. My canceled dentist appointment. The birthday lunch I had left before dessert.
During some of those hours, Daniel had been sitting somewhere with a laptop, letting me believe he couldn’t leave a warehouse floor.
“You could have watched your children,” I said.
“I was applying for jobs.”
“Then you could have asked for help honestly.”
He looked at me, desperate.
“I didn’t want you to think I was a failure.”
Rachel stood so suddenly the chair struck the cabinet.
“So you made me think your mother had agreed to give us ninety thousand dollars?”
“I thought if we had a plan—”
“You were going to spend her house covering a problem I didn’t know existed.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“What was it like?”
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
Rachel began gathering the documents with shaking hands.
“Give me your phone.”
“What?”
“I want to see the accounts.”
“I can show you at home.”
“Then we’re going home.”
She turned to me.
“I’m sorry.”
The apology was small, exhausted, and unfinished.
I nodded.
“We’ll speak tomorrow.”
Daniel remained seated after she went into the hallway.
“Mom.”
I looked at the boy I remembered inside the man in front of me. He had once broken a neighbor’s window and hidden the baseball glove because he thought that would erase the evidence.
I had made him knock on their door.
Thomas had stood at the curb while Daniel apologized.
We thought we had taught him what honesty required.
“I could have helped you look for work,” I said.
His eyes filled.
“I know.”
“I could have listened.”
“I know.”
“But you didn’t want help. You wanted me to remain useful without being informed.”
He wiped his face.
“That’s harsh.”
“It’s what happened.”
He left without the flowers.
I spent the night awake.
At two, I nearly called him.
At three, I drafted a message saying we would figure everything out together.
At four, I deleted it.
Together could not mean handing him my future so he could avoid explaining his present.
The next morning, I called Marianne.
“I missed most of your workshop.”
“You did,” she said kindly.
“I’d like to come back, if there’s another class.”
“There’s one starting next month. Meanwhile, come Wednesday. Bring your notebook.”
I looked at the empty page on my kitchen table.
“What should I write?”
“Start with what you haven’t been able to say.”
At eleven, Rachel called.
There was no anger in her voice now.
Only disbelief.
“I checked everything.”
I sat down.
“And?”
“He canceled the after-school program in January.”
My chest tightened.
“He told me there wasn’t a place available.”
“There was,” she said. “He withdrew the children.”
May you like
Then her voice broke.
“He even accepted the refund.”
