My advantages.
I had a steady job.
Therefore my money was communal.
Brooke struggled to maintain one project after another.
Therefore her money was private.
I had become stable by denying myself things.
That stability was then used as evidence that I needed less.
“What advantage?” I asked.
“The apartment with the broken radiator? The dental work I postponed? The vacations I never took?”
Dad sighed.
“Don’t become theatrical.”
I looked at the gap where my molar had been.
“I’m going to send you a list of every payment I made after the deed was transferred.”
“Leah—”
“And then I want a written explanation of what each payment funded.”
“You do not audit your parents.”
“No,” I said.
“Apparently I finance them.”
He hung up.
Within twenty minutes, Mom called.
She cried before I finished saying hello.
“How could you do this to your father?”
I closed my eyes.
Not how could we take your money.
Not why didn’t we tell you.
How could you do this to your father.
“Mom, did you know the house was transferred to Brooke?”
She sniffed.
“We were trying to protect the property.”
“From what?”
“From complications.”
“What complications?”
“Life, Leah.
Taxes.
Aging.
Things responsible adults think about.”
“And I wasn’t told because?”
“You would have made it difficult.”
That answer was so clean that I wrote it down.
You would have made it difficult.
In other words, information was withheld because information might have caused me to stop paying.
Mom’s crying sharpened when I did not rescue her from the silence.
“We always intended for you to enjoy the house.”
“You changed the locks this morning.”
“Because of your attitude.”
“My attitude happened after the locks.”
“You know what I mean.”
I did.
She meant that boundaries could be retroactively presented as the reason for punishment that had already occurred.
I asked whether Brooke knew I was still sending two thousand dollars a month.
Mom stopped crying.
That was my answer.
Later that evening, Brooke called.
Unlike my parents, she skipped the emotional setup.
“You need to stop attacking Mom and Dad.”
“I asked them questions.”
