Forty acres of bottomland.
A sacrifice turned into a receipt my father presented whenever anybody questioned what family owed him.
“A Myrick pays,” he said.
His voice cracked slightly on the second word.
For a brief second, I saw something underneath all of it.
A man in a rented tuxedo who had taken out a second lien on his building to impress Gerald Pruitt.
A man who had spent sixty thousand dollars on a wedding venue because status mattered to him more than the arithmetic.
A man who had watched Gerald nod at him from across the courtyard the same way Gerald had nodded at me when he thought I was a server.
“You don’t know what that feels like,” my father said.
“What?”
“To have a man like Gerald Pruitt look at you like you’re the help.”
I held up the hand that had carried Gerald’s empty glass.
“I do, Daddy.”
He blinked.
“I’ve had it all night.”
He looked away.
For half a second, I thought he had heard me.
Then he went straight to what he wanted.
“Ten minutes.”
I stared at him.
“With Gerald.”
He stepped closer.
“That’s all I’m asking. Daniel gives Gerald ten minutes tomorrow. A room, an office, coffee, whatever. Ten minutes.”
“No.”
“You haven’t even asked Daniel.”
“I don’t have to.”
“Wav, listen to me.”
“No.”
He unwound the tie again.
“I can fix the lease.”
There it was.
I said nothing.
“The one you keep sending.”
He pointed toward the building.
“Brooke’s got the latest copy in her purse. I know she does. I’ll sign it tonight.”
The gravel seemed very loud beneath somebody’s shoes far away.
“Tonight?”
“Yes.”
“You ignored three copies.”
“I’ll sign the fourth.”
“For ten minutes with my husband.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“That’s exactly what you said.”
“It’s business.”
“Twelve years ago was business too.”
His face hardened.
“Don’t start with Cole again.”
“You already did.”
“That boy walked away.”
“After giving you forty thousand dollars.”
“He knew the risk.”
“No. He thought he was joining a family.”
My father stared past me toward the glowing windows.
“This is different.”
“It isn’t.”
“Daniel can handle himself.”
“So could Cole.”
“You are going to let pride cost you your pharmacy?”
I let that sentence settle.
The small half of 114 Main had been my pharmacy for ten years.
I knew every uneven floorboard behind the counter.
I knew which front window whistled in January.
I knew which shelf leaned half an inch because the wall itself wasn’t square.
I had sent fourteen hundred dollars on the first of every month for one hundred twenty months.
My name was painted on the glass.
People in Talbot Mills knew where to find me when their child developed a fever at five forty-five on a Saturday or when their insurance rejected something they had taken for ten years.
My father knew exactly what the room meant to me.
That was why he had chosen it.
“Ten minutes,” he repeated. “I sign your lease. You keep your pharmacy. We stop all this nonsense.”
“All what nonsense?”
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
I waited.
He could have said the fountain.
He could have said the jokes.
He could have said humiliating me in front of two hundred people.
He could have said the second lien.
He could have said twelve years of pretending Cole had abandoned me for no reason.
Instead he lifted his chin toward the reception.
“This.”
I nodded slowly.
Then I turned around.
“Waverly.”
I kept walking.
“Wav.”
I didn’t stop.
Daniel was waiting beside the fountain.
Not inside the hall.
Not at Gerald’s table.
At the fountain.
He sat on the stone rim where my father had been standing before he pushed me.
The water continued behind him, unchanged.
He had left his bourbon somewhere.
“How bad?” he asked.
“He didn’t apologize.”
“I didn’t think he would.”
“He offered to sign my lease.”
Daniel’s expression didn’t move.
“What did he ask for?”
“Ten minutes with Gerald.”
Daniel looked down at the fountain.
“Of course.”
I sat beside him.
The stone soaked another dark patch into my already wet dress, but I no longer cared.
Daniel rested his forearms on his knees.
After a moment, he said, “I can make this go away before dessert.”
“I know.”
“Sixty-eight thousand is a rounding error, Waverly.”
“I know.”
“One call.”
I watched the water falling from the upper tier.
“Your pharmacy stays exactly where it is.”
I said nothing.
“Your mother doesn’t have to worry about another copay. Your father gets breathing room. Gerald never gets a meeting with me.”
“I know.”
“Say the word.”
I slipped my hand into the pocket of Marisol’s cardigan.
My fingers touched something small and hard.
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