I Sent Him to Prison, Now I'm Falling for His Brother novel · Chapter 8 of 24

Chapter 8: Nine Years of Checks

"Sit down, Nadine," my mother said, as if I had walked into the wrong house.

I stayed in the doorway.

"Why is she in your kitchen?"

"Cornelia stops by now and then." My mother set the teapot down. "She's been very kind."

"Kind."

"Don't use that voice with me, baby."

Cornelia folded her napkin with small neat movements and smiled up at me.

"Your mother and I have known each other a long time," she said. "Haven't we, Myrna? Nine years of friendship."

"Mom," I said.

My mother's eyes slid to the window.

"Ask her what pays for this roof," Cornelia said gently. "Ask her what paid for your second year at the community college. And the books. And the dentist."

"I got a scholarship."

"A scholarship from the Stafford Foundation Hardship Fund."

The kitchen was very quiet.

A clock ticked over the stove.

"Mom."

"It wasn't what you think," my mother said, and her voice cracked in the middle. "Nadine, listen to me."

"How much?"

"After the verdict a lawyer came to the cafeteria," she said. "He said Cornelia wanted to help. No papers. No promises. Just help, because you were a young girl who'd been through so much."

"How much, Mom?"

"Fifteen hundred a month."

I heard the number and thought I'd misheard it.

"Fifteen hundred dollars."

"I never spent it on myself."

"Fifteen hundred dollars a month, for nine years."

"Your therapist was ninety dollars a session and the insurance wouldn't cover it. Then the deposit on your apartment. Then the thing with my back. I told myself I'd pay it all back someday."

"You took their money."

"I tore up nothing," my mother said, and now she was crying. "You tore it up. I was the one who had to eat dinner the next week."

Cornelia reached over and patted my mother's wrist.

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