The Eight Year Ledger novel · Chapter 3 of 32

Chapter 3: The Group Chat

Kristen walks into school past whispering parents and moves Todd out, and Gabe comes home repeating what his teacher said about her.

I didn't answer the question in the group chat.

I muted it, put my phone face down, and made Gabe's lunch.

Todd's mother dropped him at the curb at seven-fifteen, waved from her car, and drove off to her water aerobics.

She didn't know yet.

I could tell by the wave.

Gabe came in with his backpack hanging off one shoulder and a rock in his fist.

"Grandma's driveway has granite," he announced. "Pink granite. She said I could have one."

"Just one?"

"Two." He opened his other hand. "Where's Dad?"

"Sleeping," I said.

It was true.

Todd was asleep in our bed with his mouth open.

I walked Gabe to school, because I wanted to be seen walking him.

At the Brookside doors, the drop-off line went quiet.

A dad by the bike rack stopped buckling his kid's helmet.

Two mothers in matching vests leaned their heads together.

One of them was the woman who'd asked if I was the treasurer.

I said good morning to her by name.

She went red and said good morning back.

Gabe didn't notice any of it. He was explaining pink granite to a kindergartner who hadn't asked.

Ms. Talley was standing at the door of 3B in a yellow dress, greeting each child with a high five.

When she saw me, she smiled.

It wasn't an embarrassed smile.

It was the smile of a woman who'd been up late with someone, and wanted me to know.

"Good morning, Mrs. Whitford," she said. "Gabe, buddy! High five!"

Gabe high-fived her.

She held my eyes over his head for one long second.

Then she turned to the next kid.

I walked back to the car.

I sat in it with both hands on the wheel and counted the cars in the staff lot until I could breathe normally.

Fourteen.

Then I drove to the Lakeview Inn to get my own car.

It was where I'd left it, with a parking ticket from the motel office tucked under the wiper.

The night clerk from the evening before was just coming off his shift, still in the fleece vest.

He saw me and stopped with his keys in his hand.

"I'm sorry about last night," he said.

"You didn't do anything."

"I mean I'm sorry it happened." He pulled the ticket off my windshield and tore it in half. "Forget that."

"Can I ask you something?"

He looked toward the office like it might be listening.

"I'm not supposed to talk about guests."

"I know." I took a business card out of my wallet. "If that ever changes."

He looked at the card.

Kristen Whitford, Bookkeeping. My cell number.

He put it in his vest pocket without a word.

At ten I called a family lawyer my dentist clients used.

Her assistant said the first open appointment was in two weeks.

I said I would pay for the first hour in cash if she'd see me at noon.

She saw me at noon.

The lawyer was in her sixties and wore running shoes with her suit.

She read the statement, and the ledger pages, and the forms list, and took off her glasses.

"Has he moved out?"

"Not yet."

"Is the house in both names?"

"Yes. My father's money made the down payment. Sixty thousand. I have the transfer."

"Of course you do."

She almost smiled.

"Don't move out of that house. Don't let him keep the boy overnight without telling me. And don't discuss the fund at that school."

"He threatened me with the fund last night."

"Write that down."

"I already did."

She looked at the ledger again, at the date on the spine.

"Eight years?"

"Every day."

"Bring them all," she said. "Every one."

I went home at one.

Todd's car was gone, which meant he'd borrowed someone's again, or walked.

I went to our closet with a box of garbage bags.

I took his suits down first, on their hangers, and laid them in the back of the Tahoe.

Then his quarter-zips, all eleven of them, each with the Whitford Insurance logo.

Then the shoes, the golf bag, the ugly recliner from his bachelor apartment that I'd lived with for eight years.

I put it all in the garage.

I lined the bags up against the wall where he parked.

Then I wrote him a text.

Your things are in the garage. You can sleep above your office on State Street. The code on the garage door changes at six.

He answered in four minutes.

You're making a huge mistake.

I changed the code at six.

At three-thirty I picked Gabe up from the bus stop at the corner.

He was quiet, which was new.

He kicked a rock all the way down Hillcrest Drive.

When it went in the gutter, he didn't pick it up.

He never left a rock behind.

At the porch steps he stopped.

"Mom?"

"Yeah, bud."

"Ms. Talley kept me in at recess. To talk."

I set my keys down on the rail very carefully.

"What did she want to talk about?"

He looked at his sneakers.

"She said if I'm sad at home, it's okay. She said sometimes moms get confused when they're stressed, and say things that aren't true."

He looked up.

"Why did she say you're confused?"

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