by Brenda Hill
By the time we pulled into my bank off I-10 and Newberry Avenue, I was feeling fairly relaxed. It would, after all, be straightened out soon. Inside, after the double-key ceremony of extracting the box, the young woman led us to a private room and left us alone.
Stan placed the metal box on a desk. I looked at that box and wondered how such a small container could hold my future.
“Want me to open it?” he asked.
I shook my head and raised the lid—to a file folder holding a sheaf of papers. I rummaged through.
Mortgage papers.
It was all there: a legal description of the property, including sketches by a surveyor; an appraisal report; a disclosure statement from a bank we’d never dealt with; payment coupons. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
“My God.” Suddenly my legs went so weak that I had to sit down. “He did it. He actually did it.”
“Lisa, honey, are you all right?” He poured water from a pitcher on the desk, but I left it untouched.
“Why would Mac do this?” I asked. “And when? He seldom went out by himself the past couple of years, certainly not the last year. You know that. For the past few months he could barely get to the bathroom and back.”
Stan flipped through some pages. “This mortgage was initiated two years ago.”
“That was when he was first diagnosed. How much is it for?”
He picked up the disclosure statement, took out his pen, and jotted down some figures. “Looks like eighty-five percent of the condo’s value.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “Okay. We need to talk to the loan officer as soon as possible. If I can get us in today, can you handle it?”
“Let’s get it over with.”
All I could think of now was how I could ever manage to pay it. Eighty-five percent of what the condo was worth was such a substantial sum that even with all the insurance money, I still wouldn’t be able to manage it.
Stan made a phone call, and I listened numbly to his attorney legalese as he made an appointment for that afternoon.
He drove me home and hovered over me until he began to get on my nerves. I just needed to be alone, to have some time to think—if I could get my numbed brain working, or my frozen limbs moving.
“Want something to drink?” Stan asked for the third time. “Some coffee? Tea?”
I finally shooed him out the door, promising to be ready at three-thirty.
I wrote a quick note to Shanna, keeping it light, but told her I might not get to Minnesota as soon as I’d hoped, that there was some sort of a legal problem having to do with the condo that had come up since her father’s death. No use telling her about the mortgage; I didn’t want to shatter the perfect memories she had of her father. I certainly didn’t want her to go through life with memories like the ones that tormented me.
“Get a good man, Lisa,” my mother had whispered from the hospital bed, her faded gray eyes pleading. I was seventeen. She gripped my hand with her own and, trying not to cry, I studied the red, work-roughened fingers. She’d worked constantly at anything she could get, trying to hold things together and keep a roof over our heads. Her skimpy paychecks never went far. We’d been evicted several times because of non-payment of rent. Where she got the money to move, I’ll never know. My step-father certainly never helped with bills.
“Find someone who’ll take care of you, provide for you,” Mom had said, her voice a struggle, “someone who’ll give you the home I never could. Promise you’ll find someone like that. Promise!”
I promised and she died later that day. The doctors couldn’t find a specific reason. I think she was too tired to keep living.
I had always wished she could have lived long enough to see my home and family, to know her hopes for me had been fulfilled.
Now I wasn’t so sure they had been.
* * *
At three, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror, dismayed by what I saw. My face was an unhealthy, ashen color and my eyes were glassy with fear. One thing for sure. I didn’t look like someone about to attend an important business meeting.
Once, when I was in high school, I was supposed to go to a special meeting for new students. We'd just moved, again, and I didn't want to go. I was sure I'd have poor stamped across my forehead. Mom tried to encourage me, finally taking me to her closet to dig out her one nice dress. She fit it to me and helped me with my hair and makeup.
“Lisa, honey,” she said, “when you walk into that auditorium tonight, hold your head high. No one will think you’re a nobody if you look like a million.”
Even today I believed that. I might feel like hell, but I didn't want anyone to know, so I washed my face, applied drops to my eyes and put light cover-cream around my eyes. I took my time with my cosmetics and hair, adding a fine mist of shine to the few strands of gray at the sides. Then I donned my gray silk pants, a black silk shell, and gray jacket. For the final touch, I added a sterling herringbone necklace and matching earrings.
When I walked into the bank with Stan, no one had to know that underneath, I just wanted to slink in and beg them not to take away my home.
Traffic on I-10 was the normal afternoon terror, and after some zigzagging off Redlands Boulevard, we pulled into the bank’s parking lot. It was a newer building, all reflective glass about thirty-five stories high. At the far end of the lot, sprinklers watered trees set in little squares in the concrete. Everything looked so modern, so pretty, yet I felt as if I were visiting a mortuary about to say the final goodbye to my illusions of a happy marriage.
When Stan shut off the engine, all I wanted to do was run.
He turned to me. “You okay?”
Nodding, I tried to smile.
“It could still be a mistake,” he said.
“Do you really believe it?”
Silently taking my arm, Stan ushered me into the lobby. We were shown to the vice president’s office by his secretary.
“Mr. Hunter will be with you shortly,” the Latino woman said, smiling and leaving the room.
His office looked inviting with a dark cherry executive desk in front of wall-to-wall matching bookcases. Books and family pictures filled the shelves, and more pictures sat on his desk next to a computer and telephone. Good, I thought. Maybe this guy would be human, someone I could talk to.
Mr. Hunter entered the room at a brisk pace. "Sorry to keep you waiting.” Younger than I expected, probably in his early forties, he was a rather severe looking man with thinning brown hair. He wore sturdy black-framed glasses.
Stan made the introductions and we all shook hands. I hoped mine weren’t wet. We did the polite chit-chat thing like the civilized people we were supposed to be, then Stan explained the problem and gave the paperwork to Mr. Hunter.
Silently checking the pages, Mr. Hunter then turned to his computer and entered some figures. He studied the screen, then opened a file on his desk, doing all of this without glancing at me. The air in the room was thick and my hands felt clammy.
Finally, after an eternity, Mr. Hunter looked at me.
“Mrs. Montgomery, if I interpret this correctly, your husband, or someone else by that name, took out an equity loan two years ago on the property listed on this purchase agreement. Your property.”
“Evidently so.”
“Without your knowledge.”
"Yes." I needed water for my dry throat.
"I’ll need a certified copy of the death certificate,” he said, rummaging through some papers. “But first let’s make sure we have the correct Mr. Montgomery.”
He pulled out some official-looking pages clipped together and asked me to verify Mac’s social security number. After I nodded, he checked off some other facts, including what I knew of Mac's military record. Finally he turned the computer monitor around so that I could see the screen.
"Would you please verify your husband's signature?"
I glanced at his face, seeing the mixture of confidence and, what? Pity? Oh God, please don't let me pass out ri
ght here in front of everyone.
I looked.
It was Mac's signature; I'd know it anywhere. Unable to speak, I simply nodded.
"You're sure?" Stan asked.
I couldn't look at him. I nodded again.
"Well." All efficiency now, Mr. Hunter turned the monitor around. "Mr. Montgomery stated he was divorced and that the property was his in the settlement. It's standard procedure to verify the information, but somehow, it must have slipped through the system." He shook his head. "It’s unfortunate and highly irregular—”
"In that case—” Stan interjected.
"But perfectly legal." Mr. Hunter turned back to the computer. "In November, two years ago, Mr. Montgomery applied for an equity loan for eighty-five percent of the condo's value. Payments were made regularly until four months ago." He turned to Stan. "Since they were legally married at that time, Mrs. Montgomery is responsible for the entire debt. While this situation is regrettable, foreclosure proceedings have already begun.”
Chapter Six
Sometime later, I found myself in the car with Stan, crawling east on I-10 in bumper-to-bumper traffic. The last few moments in the bank had been a blur and I hadn’t been able to focus on what the two men were saying. I’d felt wobbly, as if the very foundation of my life had suddenly been whisked away.
Now, in the car with Stan, I realized it had.
He must have made out a check as I vaguely remember protesting, but he’d said something about paying it back later, and so I had relented. I didn’t want to crumple in that nice, sterile bank.
Besides, what could I do? My thoughts were a confusing jumble, but two questions kept repeating over and over: when had my husband done this to me? And why?
I looked at Stan now, at his dear, sweet face. He was such a rock.
“Thank you so much,” I finally managed to say, swallowing the tears, the sheer panic, “for the money, for the moral support. For coming with me this morning. Most of all, for being my friend. I don’t know what I would’ve done.”
“It’s okay, doll. No sweat.”
“Keep an account of everything, and I’ll pay you back as soon—”
“Let’s worry about that later, okay? Maggie and I are all right financially. We can afford to help you.”
Pressure in my throat choked me. I couldn’t speak.
“I caught up the back payments and paid three months in advance,” he went on, “time enough to get everything settled and to decide what to do.”
What to do....
The mortgage changed everything. I certainly couldn’t move to Minnesota now, and it was doubtful I could at any time in the near future. There was only one solution. I’d have to go back to work full-time.
Later, when I could think rationally, I’d have Stan help me figure just how much was owed on the condo and see whether I should make payments or sell it. But if I sold it, I’d have so little equity that I’d just have to make payments someplace else. I might as well keep it—unless something else unforeseen slapped me in the face.
“Why would Mac do this? And if he mortgaged the condo, where’s the money?”
Stan’s mouth tightened but he said nothing, jamming on the brakes when some jerk cut in front of him.
I had the strangest feeing that something was very wrong, something besides the money, and that he knew more about it than he was telling me.
“Do you have any idea what he did with all that money?” I asked, watching his face closely.
Stan kept his eyes on the road. “Beats me. He never mentioned anything about it to me.”
He answered so quickly that I wasn’t sure I believed him. Would he lie to protect his brother?
I studied his profile, noting the familiar strong jaw and the firm, sure grip he had on the wheel. Those steady hands guided us safely through traffic in much the same way he’d guided his family and mine through the small and larger happenings in our lives. He’d always been so dependable, so supportive, that I’d grown to rely on him almost as much as I had Mac. Yet he had a soft side as well, a loving side such as when he’d picked me up and whirled me around on the day of the barbecue. He and Maggie had been my strength during Mac’s illness and death.
How could I doubt him how? How could I think that this man, my friend as well as my brother in law, would lie to me? But Mac had lied, another side of me reasoned. Not in so many words, but by not telling me something I had every right to know.
Maybe Mac had, but I refused to think that Stan, who knew what I had lived through, who supported me during the funeral and tenderly tucked me into bed afterward, would deliberately lie to me now.
“Before he got sick,” I said, shoving the doubts aside, “we always made the bills out together. We did everything together. Or so I thought.”
“Now don’t go jumping to conclusions. You know he must've had a good reason to do that.”
“What good reason? What would possibly justify something like this? And without telling me. I thought I knew him so well.” I stared out the window. We had passed the city outskirts and begun to climb Crafton Hills toward the Yucaipa exit. I gazed absently at the homes nestled on the hillside, shaded by a multitude of palm trees, each of them like a safe haven above the congested freeway. I wondered if I would ever feel safe or secure again.
“I know I’m asking a lot,” I said, “but could you check with David Greyfoot at the plant? He’s still office manager and Mac’s pension checks should be starting. That’ll help until I can get a few commissions going.”
When Stan pulled into my driveway, I sat unmoving, gazing at my home, at what I’d thought was my sanctuary. Even now, I still couldn’t quite comprehend that it wasn’t mine, that it belonged to the bank, and unless I made regular payments, it would be taken away from me.
Stan opened the car door. “Come on, doll. Let’s get you inside.”
When I stepped onto the pavement, my legs buckled. Stan grabbed me and walked me inside.
In the kitchen, he rummaged through the cupboards and pulled out an old bottle of wine. After pulling the cork, he took a whiff, then poured two glasses, one about half full. He took a sip from his, then offered the smaller one to me.
“Don’t want it.”
“Take a drink. It’ll settle your nerves.”
“My stomach’s already rolling. Besides, you know I don’t drink.”
“If anyone needs to start, it’s you. Now drink the damn wine.”
Reluctantly, I took a tiny sip, set the glass down, and pushed it away.
He pushed it back toward me. “Bottoms up. It’s only a few sips.”
I ignored it. “Thank you for today, but go home now. I’m exhausted and just want to lie down.”
“Finish the glass and I’ll go home.”
“You’re a bully, you know.” Ready to do battle, I looked up at the mountain that was Stan, but when he smiled at me with such compassion in his eyes, I caved. Had he deliberately baited me to get my mind working again? “You’re a bully, Stan Montgomery, but a loveable one,” I told him softly.
“The wine really will help,” he told me, his voice gentle. “And it’s much better than a tranquillizer.”
I picked up the glass and drained it.
A couple of hours later, I woke from a nap and felt better. At least I was steadier. After a light snack of cheese and crackers, I tore through the house, going through all the cupboards and drawers, looking for anything that would tell me why Mac had needed that much money.
When he’d become so ill, he’d talked about me moving near Shanna and her family, and I kept shushing him up because I couldn’t bear to think of a future without him. But he kept insisting I face the inevitable.
If he’d been so concerned about my future, why did he jeopardize it with a hidden loan? And where was the money? He knew I’d need it to move.
Could there be another safety deposit box somewhere? But that didn’t make sense. Why borrow money just to put it in a box in a bank? I pulled out all the kit
chen drawers, looking for any kind of clue, all the time pushing down a very real sense of betrayal, betrayal by the only man I had ever loved.
***
Later that evening, Terry called.
“We going house hunting?” he asked.
“Good heavens. Don’t you understand plain English? I’m not going to work with you and that’s final.”
“I’m not going to let a little thing like that bother me,” he answered jovially. “I go after what I want. And I want you.”
I slammed down the phone.
When it rang again. I ignored it, hoping he’d get the hint. Finally, after several rings, I picked up. “Really, Mr. O’Neal—”
“Just wanted to tell you I think you’re special.” His voice was soft, and I suddenly thought of silky bed sheets on a hot night. Horrified, I stared at the phone. Where had that image come from? He hung up.
It rang again. This had gone far enough. I picked up so violently the base went flying. “I told you—”
“Hey doll, it’s Stan.”
“Oh.” I felt deflated. And embarrassed. “I’m sorry. Some jerk has been calling.”
His voice hardened. “Who? That same guy?”
I hesitated. I didn’t want to sic Stan on Terry. He wasn’t dangerous; he was just a pest. “No,” I said. “Just kids.”
Stan was silent a moment. Then, “Lisa, I’d like to stop by.” His voice had a slight edge.
Something was wrong; he seldom called me by name. I gripped the phone, waiting for him to explain. “What is it?”
“Let’s talk when I get there.”
“Now? Is it Maggie? Is something wrong?”
“She’s okay.”
“It’s not Shanna, is it? Or the baby?” Please, God, please, God....
“It’s nothing like that.”
After we hung up, I noticed my hands were shaking and I couldn’t seem to draw a deep breath. Even though I prefer Diet Coke as a beverage, I headed for the kitchen, took out the wine, then bypassed it for Mac’s Scotch. I drained an entire shot glass in one gulp. If this kind of thing kept up, I’d turn into a drunk.
