I slept badly that night.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the three credit cards on the kitchen table.
I also saw Pam looking at me as if she had discovered two different husbands.
One was the man she had married.
The other was the man Jordan had described to her.
I didn't know which part hurt more.
By breakfast, I had decided not to make any promises about what would happen next.
I needed facts.
Not excuses.
Not another conversation in which Jordan explained what he intended to do someday.
Facts.
Pam was already in the kitchen when I came downstairs.
She had made coffee, but her cup sat untouched beside the sink.
The house smelled like yesterday's beans.
Neither of us mentioned supper.
I took a seat at the table.
"Do you still have the records for those payments?"
Pam nodded.
"They're in my financial papers."
"Can you get them for me?"
She looked down at her cup.
"Yes."
I waited.
She didn't move right away.
Then she went upstairs and returned with a thick envelope and several folded statements.
She set them in front of me.
The envelope was worn at the corners.
I opened it carefully.
There were bank records, withdrawal slips, and notes written in Pam's handwriting.
Some amounts had been circled.
Others had small marks beside them.
I recognized the way she wrote the number seven.
She had always crossed it with a short line.
I had seen that little habit on grocery lists and birthday cards for eight years.
Now it appeared beside withdrawals from her retirement savings.
I started sorting the papers by date.
Pam sat opposite me.
She watched without speaking.
The records showed that the payments had continued for a long time.
Month after month, money had left her accounts.
Some of it had been taken from her 401k.
Some had gone toward payments she believed were necessary to protect me from creditors.
I stopped at one of the older statements.
"Did Jordan tell you I asked him to handle this?"
Pam shook her head.
"He said you were too ashamed to talk about it."
I looked up.
"And you believed him?"
She pressed her lips together.
"I didn't know what else to think."
That answer stayed with me.
She hadn't seen me gamble.
She hadn't watched me spend money recklessly.
She had no statement showing casino losses from my accounts.
But Jordan had given her an explanation, and she had accepted it without asking me.
I wanted to understand why.
I also wanted to know why she had never sat down with me and said she was worried.
Instead, she had paid.
She had hidden the withdrawals.
She had allowed me to believe our finances were ordinary.
And she had carried the secret until it became part of her daily life.
"I thought I was helping you," she said.
I folded the statement and put it back in the envelope.
"I understand what you thought."
She looked relieved for a moment.
Then I continued.
"But I never asked you to do any of this."
Her expression changed.
I wasn't trying to punish her with those words.
They were simply true.
I had spent my life believing that problems became easier when people spoke plainly.
Our own problem had grown because we had done the opposite.
Pam wiped her eyes.
"Jordan said the cards would be paid off soon."
"Did he show you any payments he'd made himself?"
She shook her head.
I asked whether she knew the total amount outstanding.
She didn't.
She knew the monthly payment.
She knew how much she had withdrawn.
But she had never put all the figures together.
I did.
I spread the statements across the table and worked through them one by one.
The money she had paid over nearly three years added up to more than twenty-four thousand dollars.
I checked the figures twice.
Then I sat back.
Pam covered her face.
"That's my retirement, Gary."
"I know."
"I kept thinking it would stop."
I looked at the papers.
"So did I, in a way."
She lowered her hands.
I explained that I had kept my own accounts separate and paid my own bills.
I had never given Jordan permission to use my information.
I had never asked him to deal with creditors.
And I had never gambled.
Pam listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she asked me something I hadn't expected.
"Do you think he meant to hurt us?"
I couldn't answer that honestly.
I knew what he had done.
I knew he had used my identity and allowed her to pay debts connected to it.
I knew he had made her believe the debts were mine.
But I couldn't tell her what he had intended when he first opened the accounts.
I wasn't going to pretend I could read his mind.
"I think he made choices he knew he shouldn't make," I said.
She stared at the envelope.
That was all I could give her.
Later that morning, I went to the storage office.
I unlocked the door and switched on the window unit.
The familiar rattle filled the room.
I made coffee and sat at the desk.
For years, that office had been the place where I could think clearly.
Customers came and went.
Rent checks arrived.
A gate needed fixing, or a light needed replacing.
Problems had names and solutions.
I could usually tell where I stood.
Family was different.
I took the folder from my briefcase and placed it beside the computer.
Inside were the papers I had collected since discovering the accounts.
The credit report was on top.
Behind it were the details I had kept from everyone about the sale of my properties.
I didn't need to open those pages to remember the amount.
Nineteen point eight million dollars.
A week earlier, that figure had represented the end of a long working life.
I had thought about buying Pam something special.
I had imagined telling her the news over supper.
I had pictured the surprise on her face.
Now I wasn't sure what the announcement would accomplish.
If I told her about the sale, would she hear the rest of what I said?
Or would the money become the only thing that mattered?
I didn't know.
I closed the folder.
For the first time since signing the sale documents, I felt no excitement about the money.
I felt cautious.
And I realized that caution was something I should have practiced years earlier.
Click here to continue reading: PART 6: Jordan Had Always Judged My Old Truck and Small Office, but I Began to Wonder What He Would Say If He Knew the Truth
The Man Everyone Thought Was Broke Came Home Early, and One Ordinary Conversation Changed What He Believed About His Marriage
Part 5 of 24
