“You’re seventy-two.”
“And still able to read.”
“You live alone in a five-bedroom house while your son and his children are packed into a two-bedroom rental. Your grandchildren sleep in a room with a broken window. My mother has nowhere to go. You want to pretend this is about ink on paper?”
“It is about ownership.”
“It is about family.”
Michael pushed away from the table.
“Stop.”
The single word shook the glasses on the table.
Lauren looked at him. For a moment, neither of them moved. The grandchildren were in the living room watching a movie, their voices muffled beyond the archway. A burst of laughter came through the wall, painfully ordinary.
Michael reached for the folder.
Lauren pulled it against her chest.
“What else did I sign?” he asked.
She did not answer.
“Lauren.”
The realtor’s phone began to ring. Nora glanced at the screen, then silenced it.
Michael stood. “Give it to me.”
Lauren rose too, holding the folder between them.
“You’re making a scene in front of the children.”
“You made a fraudulent transfer in front of my father.”
“I was trying to solve a problem.”
“You were trying to sell the house.”
The silence that followed was complete.
Nora looked at me.
“Sell it?” she asked.
I did not take my eyes off Lauren.
“What was the asking price?”
Lauren’s jaw moved once.
Michael answered.
“Eight hundred and forty thousand.”
The number seemed to drain the warmth from the room. The house had never been worth that much when I bought it. It was not just a home to me. It was the walls around every birthday, every fever, every argument, every quiet morning after my wife died.
