Diane’s hands folded on the table pressed harder into each other. Kevin looked up from the floor. His jaw was tight. Nora did not move. “I lied because your mother died fourteen months before I moved into that trailer and in those fourteen months I learned something about my children that I didn’t want to believe. So I tested it.”
“You tested us,” Marcus said. His voice was even, controlled. The voice he used in negotiations. But Raymond could hear the steel beneath it. “I told each of you that I had lost everything. And then I waited to see what you would do.”
Raymond picked up the notebook. He had carried it for nine months. Written in it after every visit, every phone call, every silence. It was full now. The pages soft from handling. The leather cover worn at the corners.
“Marcus.” He opened to the first section. “You came once. November 12th. You drove down from Des Moines and walked the property for forty-five minutes. You calculated the acreage, suggested I should have diversified and asked about the equity in the land. You left in two hours. You did not eat. You did not ask how I was sleeping or whether the trailer had heat. You called four more times over nine months. Every call was about money, property or mineral rights. On the day you found out I had pneumonia you learned about it mid-conversation while asking about a land deal. You did not offer to come.”
Marcus’s face was rigid. He stared at the wall behind Raymond’s head. “Diane.” Raymond turned the pages. “You called three times in nine months. Seven minutes, eleven minutes and seven minutes. You suggested senior housing. You sent a Christmas card that arrived three days late and a birthday card that arrived eleven days late. You did not visit once.”
Diane’s eyes were fixed on her folded hands. A flush crept up her neck. “Kevin.” Raymond’s voice softened because Kevin’s section was the one that hurt him most to read. “You came once. You asked about hidden accounts, life insurance, savings bonds. When I told you there was nothing you left. You did not call on Christmas. You did not call when I was sick. Tammy called Nora, but you did not call.”
Kevin’s chin dropped to his chest. “Nora.” Raymond closed the notebook. He did not need it for this part. “Nora drove three hours every Saturday for nine months. She brought groceries she paid for out of a teacher’s salary. She brought curtains she sewed at her kitchen table. She fixed the steps, the hinges, the faucet, the window latch. When I got pneumonia in January, she took unpaid leave from her classroom and slept on my couch for four nights. Her husband drove down to insulate the trailer. She cooked your mother’s recipes. She taped Sam’s drawings to the refrigerator. She asked me to come live with her family. She never asked me for money. She never asked about the will. She never asked about the property. She asked if I was eating. She asked if I was lonely.”