The Walls Keep Secrets
“Well, congratulations, Layla. You’ve officially found the dumbest way to waste money.”
My husband was standing in our kitchen with his arms crossed. He was still wearing his work lanyard. HART — FINANCIAL ANALYST — BRIGHTWATER CAPITAL. He hadn’t even taken his shoes off.
I’d just told him.
I’d been rehearsing it all day. In the car. At my desk. In the bathroom at work, looking at myself in the mirror. I bought Grandma’s house. I used the inheritance. I know it’s a lot. Please just listen.
I didn’t get past the first sentence.
“You did what?” Declan said.
“I bought Grandma Bea’s house,” I said again. “In Saluda. The closing was this morning.”
“With what money?”
“With the money she left me.”
He stared at me.
“All of it?”
“Eighty-seven thousand,” I said. “Out of a hundred and twelve.”
He laughed. Not a real laugh. The kind of laugh people make when they can’t believe what they just heard.
“Eighty-seven thousand dollars,” he said. “For a house nobody’s lived in for eight years. In a town with one stoplight. Two hours from where we live.”
“I know it sounds crazy.”
“It doesn’t sound crazy, Layla. It is crazy.” He threw his keys on the counter. “Do you know what I could’ve done with that money? Do you have any idea? Index funds. A down payment on a rental property in Charlotte. Paying off the car. Twenty years of compound interest. That was our retirement. That was our future.”
“It was my grandmother’s money.”
“And now it’s a pile of rotting wood in the mountains,” Declan said.
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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