15 Days Before I Left Him novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The House Fund

Clara finds the July clinic payment and moves her half of the savings, then Roscoe's brother Raylan shows up at midnight asking whether she really gave her blessing.

The bank opened at nine on Saturday, and I was the first person through the door.

I told the woman at the desk I wanted a copy of the statements for the house fund.

Roscoe and I had been saving for the lake house on Aspen Road for three years.

She slid the pages across to me, and I read down the column to July.

On July ninth, twenty-four thousand dollars had left the account.

The line next to it said Lakeshore Fertility Partners.

"Is that a transfer you authorized, Ms. Lehman?" the woman asked.

"No," I said. "But I'm allowed to see it, right? Both names are on the account."

"Yes. Either holder can see everything and withdraw anything."

I looked at the balance that was left.

Thirty-seven thousand dollars.

"Then I'd like half of that moved into a new account, in my name only."

She didn't ask me why.

I watched her type eighteen thousand five hundred dollars into a form, and I signed where she pointed.

It was not revenge, and it was not stealing.

It was my half, and I wanted it where nobody could explain it away.

Bea was waiting at the coffee shop on Fulton with two oat lattes and her phone face down on the table.

She was my best friend, my coworker down the hall at school, and the only person I had ever called at three in the morning.

I told her everything in the order it happened.

She did not interrupt once.

When I got to Judith's yellow cardigan, she put her cup down so hard that foam jumped out of the lid.

"He told his mother you said yes," Bea said. "In July."

"Yes."

"And you're sitting here drinking a latte."

"I'm sitting here with eighteen thousand dollars of my own money in a new account," I said. "And I'm not going to marry him."

Bea stared at me for a long moment.

Then she reached across the table and grabbed my hand, the right one, and held it tight.

"Okay," she said. "How much time do we have?"

"Fifteen days. Fourteen, now."

"Then he's going to get the nicest dinner of his life," Bea said, "and not one clue."

That was exactly what I did.

When I got home, Roscoe had cleared the whole afternoon.

He made salmon and lemon rice, which he only did when he was sorry, and he lit the candles we never used.

"I owe you," he said, pouring my wine. "I know I handled it badly."

"Mm," I said.

"But I handled it, Clara. That's what matters. Faye gets her baby, you and I get our life, and nobody has to feel guilty."

I cut a piece of salmon.

It was perfect.

"I need one thing from you," he said. "The seating."

"The seating."

"My mother wants Faye at the family table at the lodge, not off in a corner with the church group." He reached for my hand across the tablecloth. "She's family now. You understand."

She was already at the head table, beside him.

He didn't know I had seen the text.

"Send me the chart," I said. "I'll fix it."

His whole face loosened, and he squeezed my fingers.

"I knew you'd be gracious about this. That's why I love you."

At nine his phone rang, and he took it on the balcony the way he always did.

When he came back, he already had his keys.

"Faye's prescription is ready, and she can't drive. Don't wait up."

"Of course," I said.

He kissed the top of my head and went out.

I washed both plates, dried them, and put them in the cupboard in the order I always did.

Then I sat on the sofa with my laptop and made a list of every vendor on our wedding invoice.

There were eleven.

I decided which ones would be told, and which ones would only be told when it was too late for them to tell him.

I was on the florist when somebody knocked at the front door.

It was ten to midnight.

I looked through the peephole and saw a tall man in a dark coat with a duffel bag over one shoulder.

He had a small scar through his left eyebrow.

It had been three years since I'd seen him, but I knew that scar.

I opened the door.

"Raylan," I said.

Roscoe's older brother looked past me into the empty apartment.

"Where is he?"

"Out. Faye needed a ride." I hadn't known it was true until I said it. "You're early. The wedding is two weeks away."

"My flight got moved up." He set the bag down on the mat and looked at me, and he didn't smile.

His eyes were grey-green and very tired.

"I landed an hour ago and went to my mother's first."

He waited a moment before he went on.

"She told me you gave Roscoe your blessing about the baby."

"Did she."

"She did." He held my gaze and kept his voice flat. "So I came here to ask you, and I'd like the real answer."

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