There it was. The old family reflex. The one that had nearly ruined Claire more than once and had now arrived at my parents’ oceanfront door wearing loafers and talking about occupancy rates.
“Helpful to whom?” I asked.
He still didn’t answer.
The real trouble started the winter Daniel’s newest business collapsed.
I only learned the shape of it later, but the outlines appeared in pieces. Claire borrowed money from my mother “until a transfer cleared.” Daniel stopped making eye contact with me at dinners and compensated by talking too much. Their SUV got traded in suddenly for something smaller. Claire began wearing tension in her mouth like she had started biting the inside of her cheek raw. Daniel’s language around the cottage became more aggressive. Not openly. Just more proprietary. “If you structure it right…” “What people don’t understand is cash flow…” “An oceanfront place like this should be working…”
Should be working.
The first time he said that, my father was on the porch scraping old paint from a bench he did not need to repair but wanted to. He looked up, confused.
“Working?” he said.