The following morning, I decided to work outside.
The gardenias needed attention.
One branch had been bent during the moving day, and I wanted to check whether it was recovering.
I brought out my gardening gloves and a small pair of shears.
The air was warm.
The Gulf was bright.
I spent nearly an hour trimming dead leaves and clearing away small weeds.
It was ordinary work.
The kind I had always enjoyed.
When I finished, I washed my hands and sat on the porch swing.
I looked at the white oak.
The wood had aged.
The edges weren't as smooth as they had been when I first finished building it.
But the swing remained strong.
I thought about Arthur.
He had always wanted a place near the water.
We had talked about it during the years before he died.
He imagined a porch where we could sit together in the evenings.
He imagined a garden.
He imagined having enough room for family visits.
We never got to build it together.
After he died, I thought about that dream often.
The cottage had given me something to work toward.
I could have sold it.
I could have bought something smaller.
I could have left the money in the bank.
But I wanted to build the place we had talked about.
And I did.
The porch was my work.
The cabinets were my work.
The bedrooms were my work.
The gardenias were my work.
Arthur's memory was part of all of it.
That was why the call from Derek had hurt so much.
He hadn't simply told me to leave a building.
He had dismissed something that carried twenty years of my life.
I sat there for a while.
Then I heard a car approaching.
It was Tommy.
He parked near the driveway and walked toward the porch.
"Morning, Vivien."
I smiled.
"Good morning."
He looked at the gardenias.
"They're doing well."
I told him about the bent branch.
He examined it and said it should recover.
We talked about the weather.
Then he asked whether there had been any further problems.
I said there hadn't.
He sat in the chair beside the swing.
For a few minutes, neither of us said much.
Then he mentioned the first summer we had worked on the cottage.
He remembered how badly the porch had sagged.
I laughed.
"I remember being afraid to stand on half of it."
He said he had been surprised I bought the place.
I told him I had seen something worth saving.
He nodded.
"That's what you did."
I looked toward the Gulf.
"I suppose I did."
Tommy asked whether I regretted buying it.
I answered immediately.
"No."
That surprised me.
Even after everything, I didn't regret it.
I regretted trusting Derek with the wrong document.
I regretted not asking more questions.
I regretted the things he had done afterward.
But I didn't regret building the villa.
It had given me a life after Arthur.
It had given me something to be proud of.
It had given me twenty years of mornings and evenings near the water.
And it was still my home.
Tommy left after a little while.
I stayed on the porch.
I thought about the promise I had made to Arthur.
I had wanted to keep the house safe.
I had done that.
The trust was in place.
The records were secure.
The attorney knew what had happened.
I didn't need to spend every hour worrying about Derek's next decision.
I could still live.
I could still enjoy the gardenias.
I could still drink sweet tea on the porch.
I could still sit in the swing.
That afternoon, I opened the windows and let the breeze move through the house.
The curtains shifted gently.
I looked at the coral bedroom.
I looked at the cypress cabinets.
I looked at the white oak outside.
For a moment, everything felt familiar again.
Not because the family problem had disappeared.
It hadn't.
But because I was beginning to separate the home from the people who had tried to take it.
The house was still there.
And I was still here.
Click here to continue reading: PART 20: When Derek Asked Whether I Would Ever Trust Him Again, I Realized That an Apology Could Not Undo What He Had Already Done
The Afternoon My Son Told Me I Had Lost the Right to Enter the House I Had Spent Twenty Years Building
Part 19 of 24
