The Letter That Tried To Turn My Wife Against Me

The letter arrived by email at 8:42 the next morning.

Miriam sent it to both of us. Beneath the attachment, she wrote that the board wanted our response before its meeting.

I read it standing beside the kitchen counter in my work shirt.

It said I owed Diane money. It said I wanted the grant sent to her company to settle that debt. It asked her to tell Lena that the fund had turned us down.

At the bottom was the same short signature: C. Mercer.

"She thinks I'll believe you did this," Lena said.

I stared at her.

"Do you?"

She turned the phone so I could see the date.

"You asked me to marry you with a ring you paid for in six installments. You showed me every receipt because you were afraid I'd think you spent the rent. No."

I sat down.

For a few seconds, I couldn't speak.

Then Lena pointed to the address at the top of the letter. It was an old apartment address of mine.

"Where would she have that?"

"An estimate," I said.

Two years earlier, before I took my current job, I had done repair work on weekends. Diane had asked me to price a cooler replacement at her rental house.

I had given her a one-page estimate with my old address and a short signature at the bottom.

The job never went ahead. She had chosen to patch the old unit.

I found my saved estimate in a folder on our laptop.

The signature looked exactly like the one on the letter. A small black mark sat beside the C on both pages.

I wanted to call that proof.

Lena shook her head.

"We can show where she had a copy. We can't tell them how that letter was made."

We sent the estimate to Miriam and wrote a plain statement: I had not written the letter, owed Diane no loan, and had not agreed to repay her with grant money.

I attached the bank statements for the months Diane claimed she had lent me cash. They showed my wages, our rent, groceries, and smaller sums that made me feel oddly exposed.

"They don't prove nobody handed me money," I said.

"Then let her show the loan," Lena answered.

That afternoon, Diane came to our apartment.

Owen was still at school. Lena was resting in the bedroom with the door open. I stayed on the porch.

My sister carried a white envelope.

"Rent," she said. "No strings."

"Put it through the board."

"They'll make this bigger than it needs to be."

"You made it public at supper."

She looked past me toward our bare living room wall, where we had moved a chair to make space for a crib.

"You have no idea what I have to pay every month."

"I know what my son thinks we cost people."

Her mouth tightened.

"I was going to replace it."

I heard Lena's footsteps behind me.

"Replace what?" my wife asked.

Diane pushed the envelope toward me.

I kept my hands at my sides.

"Answer her."

"I'm trying to help you."

"Then tell the board the truth."

She put the envelope back in her bag and left. Neither of us tried to stop her.

We wrote down what she had said while it was fresh. I signed my note. Lena signed hers. We sent them separately to Miriam.

That night, I couldn't sleep. At two, I got up and found Lena at the table, looking at the bill from the hospital.

"I keep adding it," she said.

"It won't get smaller."

"I know."

I pulled up a chair and took half the stack. We listed what we could pay from my next check. We left the rest on the page instead of pretending it would work.

The special meeting was set for Thursday at seven. Miriam invited the supper guests and the fund's donors to hear a correction, with our consent. Private medical details would stay out of it.

Inez offered to stay home with Owen. He chose a puzzle for them to do and asked us to bring back any leftover rolls.

At six thirty, Lena put on her loose blue dress. I changed out of my work boots.

"Ready?" I asked.

"Enough to go."

At the hall, every chair in the front row was taken.

Diane stood beside a man carrying a brown document case. She introduced him as her lawyer.

Then Miriam placed an empty chair at the witness table and said the accountant was bringing one more record.