My Future Self Called to Save My Ruined Life novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Lobby

At the bank Lindsay stops the transfer while Ryan calls her a thief in front of the line, and that night his tearful video about his stolen savings hits forty thousand views with her tutoring families tagged.

I tried to cancel it on the app.

The app told me I'd been logged out on this device.

I tried my password.

"Incorrect password."

I tried it again, slower.

"Too many attempts. Your account is locked for your protection. Please visit a branch."

I sat on the edge of the bed with the phone in both hands.

Ryan had changed my password.

Last spring I'd paid his phone bill from his laptop, sitting on his couch.

He'd said, just stay logged in, babe, it's easier.

I'd never logged out.

The branch opened at nine.

I was at the door at 8:40 in yesterday's clothes.

When the guard unlocked it, I was the first one to the counter.

The teller was a young man with a careful haircut and a tie with little ducks on it.

"I need to stop a transfer," I said. "Twenty thousand dollars. I didn't set it up."

He took my license and typed.

He frowned at the screen.

"I see it. It was scheduled at 5:48 this morning. From a laptop that's been used on this account before."

"It's my ex-boyfriend's laptop."

He looked up at the word ex.

He didn't say anything. He just started typing faster.

"I can cancel it and lock online access," he said. "Then we'll open you a new account with a new login, and move the balance."

"Please."

Behind me, the door opened.

I knew it was Ryan before I turned around.

He always pushed doors too hard, so they banged.

He had Kendall with him.

She'd changed out of my sweater into a white puffer coat. Her hair was done. She had coffee.

They'd come to watch it clear.

Ryan saw me at the counter and his whole face lit up with a smile for the room.

"There she is." He came across the lobby with his arms out. "Babe, I've been calling you."

"Don't."

He stopped a few feet away.

There were five people in line behind me now.

A woman in scrubs. An old man with a deposit bag. A dad holding a toddler on his hip.

Ryan looked at them, and I saw him decide.

He lowered his voice, but not by much.

"Linds, I know you're upset. But you can't take the money back. We agreed on it."

"I didn't agree to anything."

"You told me it was for us." He turned to the teller. "Sorry, man. We've been together three years."

"She promised me that money for our business, and now she's having a breakdown."

The teller's fingers stopped on the keys.

"Keep going," I told him.

"Ma'am, I need to confirm. You're the only name on this account?"

"The only name."

"Then he has no access to it."

"I had the login," Ryan said. "She gave me the login."

"And you used it at 5:48 this morning," I said, "to send yourself twenty thousand dollars while I was asleep."

The woman in scrubs turned her head to look at him.

Kendall stepped up beside Ryan and put her hand on his back.

"Linds, you're making a scene," she said softly. "Just talk to him outside."

"You're holding his coffee," I said. "You don't even like coffee."

She took her hand off his back.

The teller printed something and slid it to me.

"Transfer canceled," he said, loud enough for the line. "New account opened."

"Only your login, only your card. Online access for the old account is closed."

"Thank you."

I put the paper in my coat and turned around.

Ryan's smile was gone.

"So that's it? You're just stealing it?"

"It's my grandmother's house, Ryan. You met her twice."

"I was there for you when she died!"

"You were at the gym when she died. I called you four times."

The old man with the deposit bag made a small noise in his throat.

Ryan heard it.

He stepped closer to me and pitched his voice so the whole lobby got it.

"I paid for your dinners for three years. I drove you everywhere."

"I gave up everything to be with a girl with no family, and the second she gets money, she robs me."

"Remember my face, everybody. This is what she does."

"Sir," the guard said from the door. "Take it outside."

"I'm going."

He walked backward toward the door, pointing at me.

"You're a thief, Linds. Everybody's gonna know it."

Kendall followed him out without looking at me.

The dad with the toddler shifted her to his other hip.

"You okay?" he asked.

I nodded.

My legs weren't okay. I held the counter until they were.

I went home, showered, and tutored a sophomore in algebra at the public library from one to three.

I didn't look at my phone.

At nine that night, I was eating cereal standing up when it started buzzing and didn't stop.

Twelve texts. Twenty. Thirty.

Most of them were one link.

It was a video on Ryan's account.

He was sitting in his car at night, in the dark, lit by his phone.

His eyes were red.

"I don't usually do this," he said to the camera. "But I have to warn people."

"My girlfriend of three years just stole our savings. Twenty thousand dollars. Everything we built together."

"She walked into the bank today and took it all and left me with nothing."

He wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

"If she tutors your kids, you should know who she really is."

Under the video, he'd tagged my tutoring page.

And under that, he'd tagged four of the mothers who paid me every week.

It had forty thousand views.

The number went up while I watched.

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