One hundred and twenty thousand dollars.
I asked Rachel to repeat the amount.
Mom covered her mouth.
I stepped into the backyard because suddenly I could not breathe in that kitchen.
Six years of work flashed through my mind: overnight flights, missed holidays, conference rooms, lonely hotel breakfasts, every month I moved money into an account labeled MOM HOUSE.
Vanessa had turned it all into collateral.
When I returned inside, she stood at the bottom of the stairs with a suitcase.
“I’m leaving,” she said.
Rachel, still on speakerphone, told me not to interfere.
I didn’t.
Vanessa pulled the suitcase toward the front door, then stopped beside Mom.
“You’re really choosing Clara?”
Mom looked up.
“No,” she said. “I’m choosing myself.”
Vanessa gave a bitter laugh.
“You think she’s better than me because she paid for everything?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
Mom answered quietly.
“She never made me afraid to answer my own phone.”
