Part 3 — The Back of the Tag
The second voice note started with a creak, the unmistakable sound of Beau settling into his rocker.
“Noreen, this one is only for you. Remy, you can step out on the lawn or you can stay. It is all one to me.”
Remy stayed. He stood by the porch rail with his arms folded, and then he unfolded them.
“Turn the tag over, Noreen. The back says, Scoot over, Noreen. Let me sit by my girl. That is what I will say to you when you come through the gate, and I want you to hear it in my voice.”
I turned the tag over. There it was in his square pencil. I read it aloud and could not finish.
Paige put her hand on Remys back, and he looked down at the porch boards.
“Remy, son, I forgive you. I did that before I recorded this. But I am not leaving this house to you, and I am not leaving it to the first buyer who flatters you.”
“Noreen has the right to live here for life. When she goes, it goes to you and your sister equal halves, and not a day sooner. I made it plain with the lawyer in Gonzales.”
The man had written his son a door and left it open, but only if he walked through it honestly.
Pete the realtor set his card on the rail and left quietly. Remy asked, in a rough voice, whether the twelve thousand dollars could be settled quietly and without the sheriff.
I told him the bank statements were in my drawer, and the lawyer in Gonzales would draw up a plain repayment schedule, and that was the end of it. He would pay me back each month. And he would build me a swing.
He laughed at that, a short broken laugh, and wiped his face with the back of his wrist.
The next Saturday he showed up with two cypress boards that Beau had set aside in the barn for the day he would need a replacement. They were stamped on the end in the same square pencil.
Paige brought sweet tea. I held the level. Remy hung the chain on the hook with the tag link still wired to it.
It took him till six in the evening. When he stepped back, the swing hung level and gleaming, and nobody said a word.
I sat down on the left side and patted the cypress beside me.
“Scoot over, Remy,” I said. “Let me sit by my boy.”