Chapter 9 - The Residual Echoes
The formal divorce was finalized four months later, on a wet Tuesday in March.
Under the terms of the decree entered by Judge Holbrook, Mark Vance walked away with his 2018 Ford truck, his clothing, his four-thousand-dollar share of the joint checking account that had been frozen on the night of the eviction, and twelve thousand dollars in consumer credit card debt that was assigned solely to his name.
He received zero dollars from the condominium.
He received zero dollars from my firm's partnership distribution.
He received zero dollars in spousal maintenance.
Linda Martinez met me in the courthouse cafeteria after the hearing was entered into the digital record. She was eating a blueberry muffin and reviewing a property brief for another client.
"His lawyer tried to slip in a five-thousand-dollar 'relocation assistance' clause during the final chambers conference," Linda said, wiping a crumb from her lip. "Judge Holbrook looked at him like he was a fly in her soup. She told him that if Mr. Vance needed relocation assistance, he could ask his mother for a loan from her floral budget."
I smiled, sipping my tea. "Where are they living?"
"Frank's place in Puyallup," Linda said. "All three of them. Mark is working the night shift at an auto parts warehouse in Kent. Chloe is working the counter at a tanning salon. And Eleanor is currently suing her previous landlord in Tacoma for 'wrongful retention of security deposit'—a case that will be dismissed the second the judge sees the photographs of the kitchen she left behind."
"I hope they have enough room," I said.
"They have eight hundred square feet and one bathroom," Linda said dryly. "They’ll be at each other’s throats before the lilac blooms."
I walked out of the courthouse into the March rain.
It was the same rain that had soaked through my coat four months ago, but it didn't feel cold anymore. It felt clean. It felt like water washing over stone, clearing away the grit, leaving the bedrock exposed and solid beneath the boots.
My phone chimed in my coat pocket.
It was a notification from my bank:
Transfer Confirmation: $12,450.00 applied to Principal Balance (Loan #8812).
Current Remaining Balance: $84,120.00.
Estimated Payoff Date: Fourteen Months.
Fourteen months.
May you like
By this time next year, the brass plaque on the condo door wouldn't just say Sarah Evelyn Vance.
It would say that every single nail, every single copper pipe, every single square foot of hardwood between the floorboards and the cedar ceiling belonged to me, free and clear, without a single lien, without a single mortgage note, and without a single parasite waiting by the door to tell me I was late.
