I Chose a New Life novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: Past September

Cliff read the text over my shoulder, and I felt him go still against my back.

"Every box?" he said.

"My mother's photographs were in those boxes. Her recipe cards. Her good scissors, the stupid ones with the gold handles."

"We'll get them."

"With what?"

I pulled on my leggings with my hands shaking.

"I have no money, Cliff. I have no lawyer. I have eighteen dollars an hour on Fridays and an aunt who feeds me.

"Bennett took everything I could use to stand on my own, and he did it in one phone call."

I stopped with my shirt half over my head.

"I need you," I said into the cotton.

It came out small and angry.

"I told you what I wanted from you was one summer. I said it so I'd never have to say this.

"I need you to lend me gas money to drive to Duluth. I need you at the storage unit, because they won't hand me anything alone.

"I need you past September, and I hate it."

I pulled the shirt down.

He was standing by the counter with his jeans on and his chest bare and a look I could not read.

"Say that again," he said.

"I hate it."

"The part before."

"I need you past September."

"Then stay past the summer."

He said it softly, almost as a question.

"Don't," I said.

"Della."

"Don't make it a proposal. I just got my accounts frozen."

"It's not a proposal. It's a boat, a house, a dock and a man who's offering."

"The man who's offering has a note he can't pay and a house in hock."

"That's my business."

"It's my business now, which is the problem."

I was crying and furious.

He rubbed his jaw and then did something I hadn't expected.

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