Page 119 of Still Love You

My dad has always been good at covering up whatever is bothering him. When something bad happens, he's always the rock of our family. He's steady and calm and one of those people who can convince you things will be okay, even when they're not. Silas is that way too. It was one of the reasons I was drawn to him, even when we were kids. I've always been anxious and high-strung and he's always been relaxed and laid-back. That's why I crave being around him. We balance each other out.

"Let's go talk in the other room," my dad says.

The three of us go to the living room and sit down. My parents sit on one end of the couch and I sit on the other. My dad has his arm around my mom and she's holding his hand. Just seeing them together like that makes me feel better. Sometimes stressful situations tear people apart, but my parents are still as strong as ever. And that makes me feel better. More secure. Like maybe we can get through this.

"Do you want to ask us questions?" my dad asks. "Or should I just start from the beginning?"

"How did this happen?"

He looks at my mom, then back at me. "It started a year ago, after your mom had surgery."

Last year, my mom had back surgery. She had back pain for years, but my parents try to avoid going to doctors, choosing to rely on alternative treatments, like chiropractors or massage therapy or herbal remedies. None of those treatments worked so my mom had to have surgery.

"Our insurance didn't cover all the medical costs," he says. "The hospital bill wiped us out. It cleared out our savings and we had to take money out of the business. That put us behind on our bills. Then material costs went up at the farm, labor costs went up, sales went down and..." He continues to list all the things that led us to this point.

It sounds like everything happened at once and they just couldn't keep up. And they didn't have enough money in savings to cover their bills. They give a lot of their money away to charity or families who need it. It's great that they do that but I wish they'd saved more of it for when something like this happens. In fact, it angers me that they didn't. They own a business that's unpredictable. A bad storm or insects or disease could wipe out their entire crop at any time, so they should always be prepared. They should've saved more of their money, putting some away for medical expenses and other emergencies.

This is why I am the way I am. Always worried about the future, always planning ahead. It's because my parents aren't that way and it drives me crazy. When I was twelve I watched a show on TV about farmers and it showed all these farm families living in poverty because some plant disease wiped out their crop that year. It totally freaked me out. I thought for sure that would happen to us. I told my parents about it that night at dinner and they told me to relax and stop worrying. I was so mad they didn't take it seriously that I left the table and ran off to my room. For weeks, I had nightmares that we were one of those homeless families without any food to eat. My parents refused to take my concerns seriously and that's when I went into my obsessive planning stage, which I'm still in.

Now my nightmares have come true. My parents didn't plan for this and now we'll lose the farm and maybe the house. We'll be just like those families on TV.

"Are you selling the house?" I ask.

"We hope it won't come to that," my mom says.

"You don't know if you'll have to sell the house? How could you not know that?" I'm yelling because I'm angry. I'm angry they didn't plan better and that they still don't seem to have a plan. "Haven't you run the numbers? Calculated how much money you need to save the business? Run different scenarios?" I shoot up from the couch. "How do you plan to fix this if you don't have the information to make the right decisions?"

"Ron already ran the numbers," my mom says. Ron is their accountant but he looks like a stoned-out hippie from the Sixties so I have zero confidence in him. "We've gone over everything with him but we're waiting to see how we do this summer. So far, sales are up and my job is bringing in enough extra income to cover the household expenses."

I throw my hands up. "Ron is an idiot! You need a real accountant. You can't trust some hippie friend of yours to save the business."

"Hey," my dad says in a stern tone. "Don't talk that way about Ron. He graduated with honors from UC-Berkeley. He may not dress in suits, but that doesn't mean he's not intelligent."

"If he was so great, then how did you get to this point? He should've seen it coming! He should've had a plan in place!"

"Honey, it's not his fault." My mom reaches for me but I step back.

"What's his plan? What does he think we should do?"

"Let your mom and I worry about that," my dad says. "This isn't for you to worry about."

"Are you kidding me? Of course I'm worried about it! I'm completely panicked! We're selling the house, we have no money, and I have to drop out of school!"

My dad stands up. "You are NOT dropping out of school."

"There's no way I'm going back to school, knowing how much we need the money."

"Which is why we didn't want you to know," my dad says. "We knew you would react this way. But we are still your parents and you are going to school, even if we have to drag you there and drop you off."

"Why would you do that? You need that money and you need it now! It's an emergency. College can wait."

"If you wait, you may never go back."

"You know that's not true. If I want to do something, I do it."

"Yes, but not if we can't afford it. If we use your college money, we may not be able to replace it."

"Then I'll get a scholarship or financial aid. I'll find a way. But you're taking that money."

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