“I’m not suing your mother,” I told Josh on the steps. “I thought about it. I looked it up. But I’m not putting you through that. And Dad would never forgive me.”
“I know you wouldn’t.”
“But I’m not letting him go deaf again either. He can’t afford it, Josh. He’s on a fixed income. His pension from the co-op is eighteen hundred a month, and his Social Security is about fourteen hundred. His property taxes and his supplement premium alone eat up a big chunk of that. He’d put it on one of those twenty-six percent cards before he’d ask me for help. Or he’d just go without. He went without for ten years before.”
Josh still didn’t say anything.
“The cruise money is ours,” I said. “We saved it. We earned it. And your mother is the reason my dad can’t hear the phone ring.”
Josh set down his beer.
“It was ours to give,” he said finally, still looking at the yard. “Do it.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t known I was holding.
Then he said something that made me love him more than I already did.
“And I’ll tell Mom myself.”
“Josh, you don’t have to…”
“Yes, I do.” He turned and looked at me. His eyes were wet. “She pushed your father into a pond, Kayla. Then she laughed at him. And I stood there with a pair of barbecue tongs and didn’t say a single word to her because forty people were watching.” He shook his head. “I’m thirty-six years old. I’m done being scared of my mother.”
I put my head on his shoulder. We sat there until the fireflies came out over the soybeans.
On Monday morning I called the dental office and took a personal day. Dr. Halverson, my boss, didn’t even ask why. He just said, “Take care of whatever it is, Kayla.”
