“The money?”
“The support payments. Clothes. Weekends.”
I folded my arms.
“Were you?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
Finally, he shook his head.
“Probably not.”
For the first time, I didn’t see him as some rich villain who didn’t care about his son.
I saw a man who had confused providing money with being a parent.
“They’re not the same thing,” I said.
“I know.”
His shoulders dropped.
“I just wish I’d figured that out sooner.”
That afternoon, Christian and Chase sat together in my backyard for nearly an hour.
I stayed inside.
Whatever needed to be said belonged to them.
When Christian finally drove away, Chase knocked on my back door.
“He apologized.”
“How’d that go?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He shrugged.
“But it was the first conversation we’ve had in years that wasn’t about school, grades, schedules, or money.”
“That’s something.”
“I think so.”
A few days later, I decided it was finally time to clean the garage.
Boxes left behind by the previous owner still lined one wall, cobwebs stretched across the rafters, and years of dust covered the floor.
I was sweeping behind an old stack of storage bins when my broom hit something on the wall.
At first, I thought they were scratches.
Then I looked closer.
They were pencil marks.
Names.
Dates.
Heights.
CHASE — AGE 8.
CHASE — AGE 10.
CHASE — AGE 12.
Higher up were older marks belonging to his mother.
And above all of them was another name.
GRANDPA.
I crouched there staring at an entire family’s history written directly onto the garage wall.
Then, as I moved another storage bin, something slid out and landed on the concrete.
A small framed photograph.
The glass was cracked, but the picture itself was still clear.
An older man stood beside a young boy holding a bicycle.
I recognized the boy instantly.
Chase.
And suddenly, I knew why his face had seemed familiar from the first day we’d met.
I’d seen that photograph before.
It had been hanging in the hallway during the open house when I first toured the property. By the time I moved in, the realtor had removed it along with everything else.
The following Saturday, Chase arrived with his mower.
I didn’t explain anything.
I simply opened the garage door.
“Come here.”
He stepped inside.
