Chapter 6 - Chloe Finally Asked What Her Mother Had Told Us
Chloe came to collect clothes on a Saturday.
Karen arranged a two-hour window.
Leo stayed.
I planned to remain upstairs.
Then Chloe asked to speak to me.
“Five minutes.”
“About what?”
“Mom.”
I almost refused.
Curiosity won.
We sat in the breakfast room.
Leo remained nearby but not at the table.
Chloe looked smaller without Agnes next to her.
Not innocent.
Smaller.
“Mom says you’re trying to have her arrested.”
“I made a report about being hit with a pan.”
“Same thing.”
“No.”
Chloe looked down.
“She says Leo is making her homeless.”
“He’s paying for her hotel while her move is arranged.”
“She says you forced him.”
I almost laughed.
“Do you hear the pattern?”
Chloe frowned.
“What?”
“Everything she does is somebody else’s decision when it goes badly.”
That angered her.
“Mom has done everything for us.”
“Then why are you here asking me questions instead of her?”
Chloe went quiet.
I waited.
“Did Leo know about the condo?”
“No.”
“Mom said he did.”
“He didn’t.”
“Did he know she was paying some of my bills?”
“Some. Not all.”
Chloe rubbed her forehead.
“She told me you were the one who wanted me out.”
“I wanted privacy back. That is not the same as secretly demanding your eviction.”
“She said you told her I had until January.”
“No.”
“Then why did she push me to sign the Stamford lease so fast?”
That question mattered.
“When did she start pushing?”
“Right before your surgery.”
Chloe had toured the condo Tuesday morning.
I went to the emergency room Tuesday afternoon.
Agnes transferred the ten thousand on Thursday.
“What did she say?”
“That once you came home, you’d make Leo cut us off completely.”
“Why would she think that?”
Chloe looked at me.
“Because of the audit.”
I felt cold.
“What audit?”
She realized immediately that she had said too much.
“Forget it.”
“No.”
“Maya—”
“What audit?”
Leo stepped into the doorway.
Chloe looked at him.
“Mom said Maya was going through the household accounts.”
I stared at her.
I had not been.
“Who told her that?”
Chloe shook her head.
“I thought you did.”
Leo answered:
“I didn’t.”
Three weeks before my surgery, I had asked Agnes one ordinary question.
Why had the household AmEx bill reached $26,000 in a month when Leo and I had been away for twelve days?
Agnes became defensive.
She said annual insurance renewals and home repairs made the month unusual.
I accepted it.
Apparently she did not.
She told Chloe I had begun auditing every dollar.
She told Leo I was stressed from work and “obsessing over household spending.”
He never mentioned it because he thought she was exaggerating.
She told me nothing.
A single question had frightened her enough to accelerate Chloe’s move.
“Did Mom ever say why she was afraid of the accounts?”
I asked.
Chloe shook her head.
“She said you would use numbers to control everyone.”
I almost admired the projection.
“What else?”
Chloe hesitated.
“She said once I moved, she might move with me.”
Leo looked surprised.
“Mom was going to leave?”
“She said this house had become hostile.”
“Then why is she fighting the notice now?”
Chloe gave him a tired look.
“Because you gave her one.”
There it was.
Agnes wanted to leave if leaving remained her choice.
Once told to leave, the same move became humiliation.
Chloe started crying.
“I know taking the recovery money was wrong.”
“Did you know exactly what it was for?”
“Not when Mom first offered it.”
“When did you learn?”
“Thursday night.”
“Before I came home.”
She nodded.
“Why didn’t you give it back?”
“I’d already signed the lease.”
“You could have told Leo.”
“Mom said he’d make me lose the condo.”
“Maybe he would’ve said no.”
Chloe looked at me.
“That’s what everyone keeps saying.”
“Because hearing no is not an injury.”
She wiped her face.
“It feels like one in our family.”
That was the most accurate thing she had said.
Chloe finished packing.
Before leaving, she turned to Leo.
“Mom told me something else.”
“What?”
“She said if Maya ever made you choose, you’d choose us.”
Leo did not look at Chloe.
May you like
He looked at me.
For years, Agnes had treated our marriage like a contest I did not know I was competing in.
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