Then:
*She didn’t mean it like that.*
I stood among the handmade ornaments, staring at his message.
She had told me exactly what she meant.
And suddenly I thought about the gas card in Julian’s wallet.
Then their phone plan.
The roadside assistance. The subscriptions.
All those little favors I had agreed to cover temporarily.
That night, after everyone went to bed, I sat at Richard’s desk and opened my banking records.
I wrote down each payment.
Then I added them up.
I checked the total again.
The next morning, I folded the list in half as Julian’s footsteps approached.
“Julian. Sit down.”
I rested my hand on the paper.
“If you can afford a new house, why am I still paying for the life you already have?”
Julian’s hand stopped on the back of the chair.
His eyes went to the folded paper, then to the banking statements beside my elbow. Beyond the window, pale morning light caught the empty branches. Upstairs, somebody opened a drawer.
“Can we do this later?”
“No.”
He pulled out the chair without sitting in it.
“It’s Christmas Eve, Mom.”
“I know what day it is.”
I unfolded the list and turned it toward him. He finally sat, leaning forward as though the handwriting might change if he looked closely enough.
Gas. Phones. Roadside assistance. Subscriptions. Memberships. The vehicle service plan.
Beside each item I had written the current payment and how long I had been covering it. At the bottom was a monthly total: $684.27.
Julian rubbed his thumb along the edge of the paper.
“I didn’t realize it was that much.”
“Neither did I.”
“Some of those are things you offered.”
“Yes. And some you said you’d take over after a month or two.”
He reached the vehicle plan and stopped reading.
That one had begun with a repair estimate and a worried telephone call. He had promised to straighten everything out after his next bonus. I remembered being relieved that I could help. I could not remember him mentioning it again.
“I’m ending these payments,” I said.
His head came up.
“I’ll cover what I’ve already committed to through the end of January. That gives you time to arrange your own services.”
“All of them?”
“All the ones that belong to your household.”
He looked toward the hall.
I had watched him do that before, checking whether Brooke was close enough to hear something uncomfortable. Usually, I lowered my voice for him.
