Chapter 2 - Twenty Years of “Just This Once”
Rosa wanted Diane to call the police.
Diane refused.
Not because she thought Natalie’s behavior was acceptable.
Because she still couldn’t make her mind place the words my daughter assaulted me into the same sentence.
Instead, Rosa photographed Diane’s cheek and shoulder.
“You may not want these tonight,” she said quietly. “You may want them later.”
Diane let her.
Natalie had already left.
She had stormed out after demanding to know whether Diane planned to “turn everyone against her.”
That sentence stayed with Diane.
Everyone.
There weren’t many people left.
Natalie’s husband, Evan, had moved out four months earlier.
Most of Natalie’s close friends had gradually disappeared.
Her employer, a commercial interior-design firm in Oak Brook, had cut her hours after she repeatedly missed deadlines.
And yet Natalie still drove a luxury SUV, ordered expensive takeout, and lived in the four-bedroom Naperville house she and Evan had bought when both were earning well.
Diane had helped preserve that illusion.
The binder proved it.
The first section began seventeen years earlier with a $2,600 personal loan after Natalie lost her first corporate job.
Then $5,000 for credit-card debt.
Then $8,400 after what Natalie described as a “temporary cash-flow problem.”
There were checks for veterinary emergencies, tax bills, plumbing repairs, insurance deductibles and one spectacularly expensive destination wedding Natalie insisted she couldn’t miss without damaging her career.
Each rescue had been reasonable when considered alone.
Together, they looked different.
Rosa sat across from Diane at the kitchen island.
“How much?”
“I stopped adding.”
“That bad?”
Diane closed the binder.
“I thought helping kept her from falling.”
Rosa looked toward the foyer Natalie had disappeared through.
“Maybe it kept her from learning how to stand.”
The next morning, Diane received a text.
I’m sorry things got physical. But I still need those pension documents by Wednesday.
Diane read it three times.
Natalie had apologized for “things.”
Not for shoving her.
May you like
Not for slapping her.
And somehow, after everything, she still expected the money.
