Stephanie was next.
I waited until the afternoon because I knew she was usually busy with her children in the morning.
While the phone rang, I watched a car move slowly past our front window.
For a moment, I considered hanging up.
I had already heard Michael's answer.
Perhaps I didn't need to hear another.
But I pressed the phone closer to my ear.
"Mom?"
Stephanie sounded cheerful at first.
Then she heard my voice.
I told her I needed to talk.
I repeated the same story I had given her brother.
The medical bills had taken everything.
The house was being taken away.
I had nowhere left to live.
I tried to keep my voice steady, but I didn't have to pretend very hard.
I was frightened, even if the circumstances weren't real.
Losing Walt had left me feeling more helpless than I wanted anyone to know.
Stephanie began crying almost immediately.
"Oh, Mom."
Her voice broke.
I heard her take a breath.
"How could this happen?"
I sat very still.
I wanted to believe her tears meant she was thinking about me.
I wanted to believe she was already wondering how she could help.
She told me she was so sorry.
She said everything must be terribly difficult.
She said she couldn't imagine what I was going through.
For a few seconds, I felt comforted.
Then she asked how much money I had left.
The question came quietly.
Almost casually.
I looked down at the table.
"Nothing, sweetheart."
There was a pause.
Her crying stopped.
Not slowly.
Not because she had regained control of herself.
It simply ended.
I heard a small noise in the background, perhaps a cupboard closing.
When Stephanie spoke again, her voice was different.
"Have you looked into shelters?"
I blinked.
"What?"
"Some of the community places are quite good now. They help older people who don't have anywhere to stay."
I didn't answer immediately.
She continued explaining that there were services for people who had run out of money.
She spoke as if she had been searching for a practical answer and had finally found one.
I could hear the children moving around somewhere behind her.
Then she remembered something she needed to do.
She had to collect them from tennis practice.
She said she would talk to me later.
Before I could ask when, the call ended.
I kept the phone in my hand.
I wasn't angry yet.
I was too surprised to be angry.
I had raised Stephanie to be considerate.
When she was little, she used to bring me flowers from the garden and place them in a glass beside my bed.
She had once cried because she thought a stray cat had no family.
I remembered those things because I needed them to mean something.
Perhaps she was overwhelmed.
Perhaps she didn't know what to say.
Perhaps the idea of losing our house frightened her so much that she couldn't think clearly.
I gave her every excuse I could find.
Then I realized I was doing exactly what I had done with Michael.
I was trying to make their answers easier for myself to accept.
I put the phone down.
Two calls.
Two children who knew their mother had nowhere to go.
Neither had offered me a place to sleep.
I sat quietly until the afternoon light moved away from the kitchen table.
Then I looked at Danny's name.
My youngest had never been good at explaining himself.
He left school without the qualifications his brother had earned.
He worked long hours in an auto repair shop, often coming home smelling of oil and metal.
His apartment was small.
It sat above a laundromat, where the machines rattled and hummed through much of the day.
He and Kayla had two young boys who seemed to be growing faster every time I visited.
There wasn't much spare space.
I knew that.
I also knew Danny had little money left after rent, groceries, and the ordinary expenses of raising children.
I had watched him count bills at the kitchen counter during one visit.
He had looked embarrassed when he noticed me watching.
I had pretended not to see.
Now I wondered whether he had been counting the money he could afford to spend or the things he could no longer afford to buy.
I had no idea what he would say.
That was the part that frightened me most.
I had already begun to expect disappointment.
I dialed his number.
He answered before the second ring had finished.
"Hey, Mom."
I took a breath.
"Danny, honey, I need to tell you something."
His voice changed immediately.
"What's wrong?"
I began explaining.
I told him about the bills.
I told him the money was gone.
I told him the house was going to be taken away.
I had barely reached the part about not knowing where to live when he interrupted me.
"Come stay with us."
I stopped speaking.
For a moment, I thought I had misunderstood him.
"Danny?"
"Come tonight, Mom."
I looked toward the living room.
"Sweetheart, you don't have room for me."
"We'll make room."
I heard movement on his end, followed by the sound of something being set down.
"Kayla and I can sleep on the couch. You can have our bed."
I tried to imagine it.
His tiny apartment.
Two little boys.
A living room with barely enough space for their toys.
A couch that I knew was already old.
"Danny, I can't give you anything for this."
He laughed softly.
Not because he thought the situation was funny.
Because the idea seemed to surprise him.
"Mom, you don't owe us anything."
I swallowed.
"I don't know how long I'll need."
"Then we'll figure it out when we get there."
He didn't ask about the bank.
He didn't ask what had happened to the money.
He didn't ask whether I could repay him.
He simply told me he was coming.
I heard him say something to someone nearby.
Then he returned to the phone.
"Get a bag ready. I'll be there soon."
The call ended.
I sat at the table with the phone beside Walt's reading glasses.
For the first time that day, I cried.
Not loudly.
I pressed my hands against my face and let the tears come.
Danny had the least space.
He had the least money.
He had the most reasons to say no.
And he had been the only one who didn't wait for me to finish asking.
Click here to continue reading: PART 4: Forty Minutes Later, My Youngest Son Arrived in Work Clothes and Made Room for Me Without Asking What I Could Give Him
The Promise My Husband Made About Money Came Back to Haunt Me When I Needed My Children Most
Part 3 of 20
