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Her lower lip trembled. “What are we going to do?”
I thought back to the lawyer. To the doctor. The brochures and numbers they’d handed out for me. I knew they’d help me if I called them. I knew they’d talk me through this. Get me set up with resources. But I wasn’t sure they’d help Cecilia. As far as I was concerned, we were a package deal at this point. Nothing happened to me without knowing there was a plan in place for Cecilia.
Because she was just as much a victim, too.
“Come on, we should get inside.”
Cecilia stood her ground. “I want to rip that sign down.”
I steered her toward the house. “We can’t act irrationally any longer. We have to think this through.”
“There’s nothing to think through. Your father’s about to sell this house out from underneath us and leave us homeless.”
“Which means we should go inside and figure out a plan.”
I guided her up onto the porch. Then I turned my head and looked down the road, toward the high school, where another day would be skipped. At least, the morning would be. My grades would slip. I might not be able to graduate. I’d be pigeon-holed into getting a GED or something and being the scum of the earth for the rest of my life. But seeing Cecilia cry was hell on earth. I couldn't leave her like this. If my teachers wanted to know what the fuck was up with me, they could call the house and I’d explain it all.
Maybe they’d let me repeat my senior year instead of expelling me for absences, if I begged them.
“That’s it. Inside. One foot in front of the other.”
Cecilia sniffled. “I’m sorry. Just—just give me a second to—”
I closed the door behind us. “You don’t need to be sorry. You’ve been the strong one throughout this whole thing. You’re owed a moment, at least.”
“Holy Hann
ah, what are we going to do?”
She broke down and I wrapped my arms around her. I patted her hair down and held her close as she cried into my chest. I kept telling her it would be all right. That we’d find a way out of this. That my father couldn’t possibly legally do this. Not like he thought, anyway. But I wasn’t sure who I was trying to comfort, her or me.
I wasn’t sure which one of us would cave and not come back from it.
Her or me.
Get on the phone with your bank.
Figure out the status of your trust fund.
Figure out how much control your father has over that money.
Start stowing things away to sell.
My mind ran away from me the louder Cecilia cried. I felt her collapse and I scooped her close to me, refusing to let her fall to the floor. She was better than that. She was stronger than this. So I held her steady as I laid out a plan of action for my day. I clenched my jaw as she cried until she practically made herself sick. I walked her down the hallway and ushered her into the bathroom downstairs only seconds before she started puking.
I stood there with my back to her, giving her privacy but not leaving her alone. And as I listened to her sounds, I resigned myself to the plan. First, I needed to call my bank. Ask them questions about my trust fund and its contingencies. If I had any access to that money, I needed to transfer it into an account my father couldn’t touch. Or see. Or dip into, if he had to. And if I didn’t have control of it, I needed to start stockpiling things from around this house. Selling things off, right out from under my father’s nose. I mean, if he wasn’t going to come home, how the hell would he know I was selling his shit?
I could put the money into an account he couldn’t touch. And since my father didn’t make it a habit of keeping receipts, there was no way for him to prove this stuff wasn’t my stuff to sell anyway.
I didn't know. That required more research from a legal perspective.
I could call that lawyer and ask.
I felt my stepmother’s hand touch down between my shoulder blades. She pushed me softly, moving me out of the way. I turned around, watching as she wiped her mouth off with a washcloth. She tossed it into the sink. “We’ll figure this out,” she said.
And—just like I’d questioned earlier—I had no idea who she was really talking to.
10
