PART 4 : THE FIRST THING SHE PAID BACK
“He’s the man Tom introduced to her as his father.”
I looked again at the photograph Peggy had sent.
At the edge of the rehearsal dinner, behind my mother’s shoulder, stood a gray-haired man holding a drink.
He looked ordinary.
That bothered me most.
No sinister expression. No obvious warning.
Just a man who could have asked you to pass the bread.
“What did he say to you?” I asked.
“He told me Tom had been working too hard. That once their deal closed, we should take a proper honeymoon.”
“Their deal?”
“That’s what he said.”
The story had needed another voice, and this man had supplied it.
“Send everything to the investigator,” I said.
“I already did.”
I sat back.
For the first time since Tom disappeared, Peggy had done the necessary thing before calling me.
“Elena wants to speak tomorrow,” she added. “She said she’ll explain what happened to her.”
“Okay.”
“Would you be on the call?”
I looked at my open work calendar.
There it was again—the familiar pull to move something, take over, make sure nobody missed a question.
“No. You can speak to her yourself.”
Peggy took a breath.
“All right.”
She didn’t accuse me of abandoning her.
She didn’t cry harder.
She simply wrote down the time.
After we hung up, I studied the photograph once more.
Mom was laughing.
Dad had his hand on Tom’s shoulder.
And Ray stood close enough to hear everything.
I put the phone down.
There was nothing in that photograph I could change.
Over the next two weeks, the story became less dramatic to hear and harder to live with.
There were no midnight breakthroughs.
No miraculous recovery of the gift money.
There were forms, repeated questions, screenshots, and long periods when nobody had anything new to say.
Peggy spoke with Elena.
Then she gave a fuller account of the rehearsal dinner.
The investigator handling her report contacted the agency listed on Elena’s paperwork.
Peggy told me only what she had actually been told.
“I don’t know yet” became something she could say without immediately inventing a reason to feel better.
My parents called their lender.
They met with someone to review their finances.
Dad canceled the kitchen renovation they had been discussing before the wedding.
Mom stopped sending photographs of flowers and started photographing furniture she wanted to sell.
None of it erased the debt.
It simply meant they had begun.
One Thursday evening, Peggy asked whether we could meet for coffee.
“Just us,” she wrote.
I suggested a place halfway between our apartments.
She arrived ten minutes early.
I could see her through the window, sitting with both hands around a paper cup.
For a moment, she looked like the little girl who used to wait outside my classroom when we had appointments after school.
Then she saw me.
She stood, uncertain whether to hug me.
I sat down.
She sat too.
“I ordered yours,” she said. “Still the same?”
“Yes.”
She slid the cup toward me.
Underneath it was a small white envelope.
I didn’t touch it.
“What’s that?”
“Open it.”
There were two hundred dollars inside.
I looked at her.
“Peggy.”
“It’s part of the apartment deposit.”
For a second, I couldn’t place it.
Then I remembered.
Four years earlier. A Friday afternoon. A landlord who needed the money before five.
Peggy had promised to repay me over three months.
After the second reminder, Mom had said I was embarrassing her.
I had stopped asking.
“You need this money,” I said.
“I needed it then too. That doesn’t mean it became yours to lose.”
I looked back into the envelope.
“I can’t repay everything at once,” she continued. “I made a list. The deposit. The car repair. The flight when I missed Christmas.”
“You don’t owe me for a Christmas present.”
“The flight wasn’t a present. I said I’d pay you back.”
She opened a small notebook.
There were amounts written down, some crossed out and corrected.
One entry was missing.
Another was higher than I remembered.
It wasn’t a perfect accounting.
But she had tried to remember.
“I picked up extra hours,” she said. “I’m setting something aside each payday.”
“Is this why you wanted to meet?”
“No.”
She closed the notebook.
“I wanted to apologize without Mom explaining what I meant.”
I waited.
Peggy stared at her cup.
“I told you that you were jealous because I knew it would hurt enough to make you stop asking.”
The coffee shop seemed to grow louder around us.
A blender.
A chair scraping.
Someone laughing by the door.
“I knew you weren’t jealous,” she said.
I didn’t answer.
“I wanted him to be who he said he was. You were the only person making me look closely.”
“So you got rid of me.”
Her eyes filled.
“Yes.”
I took a slow breath.
“You let me think I’d ruined things by worrying about you.”
“I know.”
“For weeks, I kept going over our conversations.”
She pressed her lips together.
“I’m sorry.”
I looked down at the envelope.
Two hundred dollars would not repair what had happened.
Neither would the right sentence.
But she had finally said something that didn’t require me to comfort her afterward.
“I’m still angry,” I said.
“You can be.”
“I don’t trust you the way I used to.”
She nodded.
“I understand.”
“And I don’t know how long that will take.”
“I’ll keep showing up.”
I looked at her then.
“Don’t promise that because it sounds good.”
She glanced down at her notebook.
“Okay.”
We finished our coffee.
Before leaving, she told me the wedding guests had each received a message from her with the report information and a clear explanation of what had happened.
“I told them I can’t promise they’ll get their money back.”
“How did they respond?”
“Some were kind. Some weren’t.”
“And?”
She put on her coat.
“I answered them anyway.”
Three days later, Dad called.
His name sat on my screen for several rings before I answered.
“We’ve had the house valued,” he said.
I leaned against the counter.
“Okay.”
“We could sell. Move somewhere smaller. Clear the loans.”
He sounded older.
For a moment, I pictured him taking the pencil-marked pantry door off its hinges.
I hated that picture.
Then he said, “There may be another way.”
I closed my eyes.
“What way?”
“If you signed with us on a new loan, we might qualify for better terms.”
I opened my eyes again.
“No.”
“You wouldn’t be giving us money.”
“I’d still be taking responsibility for the debt.”
“We’d make every payment.”
“No, Dad.”
His breathing grew heavier.
“Could you at least come over? We should discuss this as a family.”
I almost refused.
Then I thought about all the conversations that had ended with someone insisting I hadn’t understood.
“I can come Sunday,” I said. “But my answer is already no.”
On Sunday, the house smelled like Mom’s lasagna.
For a moment, standing in the hallway, I could almost believe nothing had happened.
Then I saw the pale rectangles on the living-room wall where two paintings had been taken down.
Peggy sat at the dining table.
She looked surprised to see me.
“Mom said you were coming for dinner.”
“Dad said we were discussing a loan.”
Her expression changed.
Mom appeared from the kitchen carrying a dish towel.
“Let’s eat first.”
“No,” I said.
She stopped.
“I want to be clear before anyone serves anything. I’m not signing.”
Dad stood beside his chair.
“We heard you on the phone.”
“Then why am I here?”
“Because this is a major family decision.”
I put my bag on an empty chair.
“It’s your decision. I’m not one of the borrowers.”
Mom sat down slowly.
“If we sell, we may not find anything we like.”
“I know.”
“We’ve been here almost thirty years.”
“I know that too.”
Dad gestured around the room.
“Everything we did was for our children.”
Peggy looked up.
“Dad.”
He kept looking at me.
“We gave you a home. An education. We supported you.”
“And I’m grateful,” I said. “But I’m not signing a loan.”
His face hardened.
“So gratitude means nothing?”
Peggy pushed back her chair.
“Stop.”
The word was quiet, but all three of us turned.
She stood with her hands resting on the table.
“She already answered.”
Dad frowned.
“Stay out of this.”
“It was my wedding.”
“And now we’re trying to keep our house.”
“I know.”
“Then sit down.”
She didn’t.
“I let you believe Tom would pay you back. I saw that email, and I kept quiet. Kate tried to warn us. You don’t get to put this in front of her like it’s something she owes.”
Mom’s eyes filled.
“Peggy, nobody is saying—”
“You are.”
Peggy’s voice shook.
I had heard her defend Tom with more confidence.
This was harder for her.
She continued anyway.
“You’re telling her she has to prove she loves us by risking her money. That’s what you’re saying.”
Dad looked toward the kitchen.
Nobody moved.
Then he said, “And what are you going to do?”
Peggy swallowed.
“I’ve asked my landlord about ending my lease. There’s a fee. After that, if you’ll let me move back for a while, I can put more toward what I owe you.”
Mom immediately shook her head.
“You can’t give up your apartment.”
“We may have to give up this house,” Peggy said. “Why am I the only one who shouldn’t have to change anything?”
I looked at her.
She was crying now.
But she stayed standing.
“I’m selling the things I can sell. I’m working more. It won’t fix it quickly.”
“No,” Dad said bitterly. “It won’t.”
“I know. But asking Kate again won’t make it her debt.”
The room went silent.
For years, I had imagined what it might feel like if somebody interrupted on my behalf.
I thought it would feel satisfying.
Instead, my throat hurt.
Mom reached for her napkin.
Dad slowly sat down.
I picked up my bag.
“Kate,” Peggy said.
“I need to go.”
She nodded, although her face fell.
At the front door, she caught up with me.
“I didn’t know about the loan conversation.”
“I believe you.”
She wiped her cheek.
“I should have said all of that before Mexico.”
“Yes,” I said.
She looked down.
Then I added, “Thank you for saying it today.”
I left before either of us could turn it into more than it was.
Four weeks passed.
My parents put the house on the market.
The first time I saw the listing, I cried.
Then I called Mom and asked whether I could have the photograph of Peggy and me sitting on the back steps with our missing front teeth.
She said she would set it aside.
She didn’t ask me for money.
Peggy moved into her old bedroom.
Another payment arrived in my account, followed by a message.
Apartment deposit. Second installment.
I wrote:
Received. Thank you.
That was enough.
Then, on a rainy Tuesday evening, Peggy called.
“Are you home?”
“Yes.”
“The investigator contacted me.”
I sat down.
Her voice was different.
Steady, almost careful.
“The reports were connected. They’ve confirmed Tom’s identity.”
I looked out at the rain sliding down my kitchen window.
“Do they know where he is?”
“They arrested him this morning.”
I put my hand flat against the table.
For months, he had existed in photographs and unanswered questions.
Now, suddenly, there was a place he couldn’t simply walk away from.
“Peggy?”
“I’m here.”
“What do you need?”
She took a breath.
That question had once been dangerous between us.
Money.
A signature.
A problem handed across the table.
This time, my sister said, “They need me to give a formal statement about what happened before the wedding. The email. What he told me. What I hid.”
“Okay.”
“I’m going to tell them everything.”
I waited.
“Even the part where I chose him over you.”
I closed my eyes.
Then she asked, “Would you sit outside while I do it?”
For the first time since Mexico, helping her would mean letting her face what she had done.
I looked at the calendar beside my refrigerator.
“What time?”
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