“What conditions?”
“Respect. Honesty. And clarity about who is responsible for what.”
Darren nodded slowly.
I stood.
He rose to walk me to the door.
Thalia remained seated.
When I reached the entryway, she called after me.
“Eileene?”
I turned.
She was holding the crooked fork.
“Why did you bring this tonight?”
I looked at the scratched handle.
“I didn’t. It was part of the things Harold and I gave Darren when he first moved here.”
Her expression changed.
She’d apparently assumed the mismatched place setting was something inexpensive she’d brought out for me.
I smiled faintly.
“Harold loved that fork. He used it whenever we went camping because he said it had character.”
Thalia looked down.
She placed it carefully beside the other silverware.
I collected my coat and went outside.
I didn’t sleep much that night.
I sat at my apartment’s small kitchen table with a cup of tea and a photograph of Harold.
He was standing beside the house on the day we purchased it for Darren.
Seven years earlier, Darren was renting a cramped apartment while saving for a down payment.
He was working long hours and often complained that he’d never be able to afford a home in the neighborhood where he’d grown up.
Harold had recently recovered from a serious illness.
We began talking about what we wanted to do with the money we’d accumulated.
Neither of us wanted our son to struggle unnecessarily.
So we decided to provide him with housing.
The purchase was made through our revocable family trust, using funds from investments we’d built together.
