IF WE WERE GOING TO buy a house in Southern California as twentysomething high school teachers, then this money was our lifeline. We would be able go into any deal with 25 percent down. We found a great three-bedroom half a mile from St. Jude’s. It was not showy, but Annie loved everything about it. The realtor said several people were looking at the house, so he would not recommend a lowball offer. Annie nearly came unglued. She sat there, clenching and unclenching her jaw and fists. I leaned over to her and whispered, “Hey, he’s just doing his job. Let’s do ours.” Annie straightened up and clicked her pen. She swallowed and nodded her head. I made the offer.
The realtor puckered his lips and lifted his eyebrows. “You’re not playing around, are you?”
“Nope,” I said.
“First home buyers your age don’t usually have finances like this,” he said.
“My husband makes blue meth,” Annie said calmly but with an edge. “We’ve got all the money we need.”
I grabbed her forearm and smiled. “She’s kidding,” I said. “I’m just a history teacher. Heh, heh. Not chemistry.”
The realtor belly-laughed then slapped the desk. “Breaking Bad, right? I love that show. You’re not laundering your money in real estate, are you? Ha, ha. Now I guess you’ll have to kill me.” His jokes didn’t break the tension.
I looked at Annie. She stared at the floor and put her hands on her stomach, which domed like a mixing bowl under her sweater.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll take your offer to the sellers. I’ll text you when we hear back.”
THE NEXT DAY, AS WE were getting ready for school, my mother called to invite us to dinner.
“I know it’s late notice,” she said. “I hope you and Annie can come.”
“That’s fine,” I said. “Is everything okay? You sound weird.”
“I’m not weird, Steven,” she said.
“I didn’t say that. I said you sounded—look, never mind. I think we can. Let me ask Annie and check the calendar. We’ll come unless you hear otherwise.”
“Is there anything Annie can’t eat?” my mother asked.
“She isn’t throwing up anymore,” I said.
“Oh good. You made me throw up all the time, and I couldn’t have chocolate. It was the worst,” she said. When I didn’t respond, she said, “Oh, Stevie. Once you were born, you were fine. Your brother is a different story. I barely noticed he was there until he turned two.”
“All right, then,” I said. “Six thirty?”
“That will be fine, dear. Give Annie my best.”
SHE PREPARED A NICE MEAL for us, which should have been a sign of what was coming. My mother is not an incompetent cook, but she is not a particularly extravagant one either, so this all came as a surprise. She set us in the dining room with the good china, not in the kitchen. Three chairs huddled at one end of the table near the window.
My wife leaned in and kissed my mother’s cheek.
“Oh, Annie, you look gorgeous. Motherhood suits you.” It did. Annie had the halo of a Madonna. Seeing my mother there with my expectant wife gave me a feeling for which I had no words, a feeling I have felt now and then in art museums.
Mother served chicken Kiev, green beans with slivered almonds, and roasted red potatoes. As we ate, I noticed my mother was downing two glasses of wine for every one of mine. We talked about everyday things: the yard, her book group, the presidential candidates, our students, the ultrasound, Annie’s family.
We had carrot cake for dessert, and after we started in, mother set down her fork and said, “Steven, Annie, I have something a bit uncomfortable I’d like to talk about.”
Annie and I tried not to look startled. “Sure, Mother,” I said, “We’re all ears.”
My mother did not speak immediately. She was exerting a lot of energy trying to keep her composure. “It’s about your inheritance.”
A saline wave, like weak adrenaline, rushed through me. We had been through probate. What could possibly be wrong?
“Somehow,” my mother said, “your father’s concern over you and your family and his hope for you to have a home here in Santa Barbara appears to have given him a conservative approach to the way he structured your trust.”
“We’re very grateful, Brenda,” Annie said, “Paul left us a generous gift. It’s a lifeline, really.”
“About that,” my mother said, “Paul was conservative in structuring Steven’s trust in a way that he was not with the rest of our finances.” My mother picked up her fork to have another bite of cake, then set the fork back down.
“I was with the financial planner this week, and apparently your father left quite a large portion of our portfolio in funds that are still climbing out of the recession. He also didn’t leave me much cash. The life insurance is helping with a few of the problems, but he’d borrowed against it for some ventures that didn’t pan out. The planner says I’ll recover a little as the market climbs, but for now I have some immediate concerns.”
“What do you need? We can help.” I looked across the table for Annie’s support. She was carving away bits of her cake and letting them fall to the plate.
“It would be temporary help, Steven.”
We helped my mother clean up, and because she was always with us, Annie and I did not have a chance to talk before we left. I knew that it would not be a good conversation and very probably the first of many not-very-good conversations to come. So I was glad, I guess, for another hour of détente.
The second we were in the car, Annie said, “Steven, we just made an offer.”
“I know.”
“This feels really fishy to me.”
“I know it does.”
“Should it be surprising that she didn’t say anything about your brother?”
“Maybe she’s already gone to him.”
When she declined to answer, I admitted that she probably had not gone to him. Why would she? My brother very likely burned through whatever my father was going to leave him years ago, begging for bailouts and help starting up failed businesses. We all knew to stay away from Michael and his finances.
“I don’t want to lose this house, Steven,” Annie said.
“I don’t want my mother to lose hers.”
“That’s not what I’m saying,” she said, meaner than she meant.
“She said it’s temporary. And really, it’s her money.”
“Just let me be angry,” she said. “Okay. I’ve got to let it work all the way through.”
AS YOU CAN IMAGINE, IT was a house of cards mashed up with a domino effect. Without the cash for the down payment, the maximum loan amount dropped. We readjusted our offer and lost the property. Our first realtor pretty much lost interest in us when it looked like we were not going to be buying in a price range that maximized his opportunity costs. We tried another realtor on the recommendation of one my dad’s golf buddies, Burt Mattson, a loudmouth Texan who was a telecom executive after coming out of the air force. His young fiancée was supposed to be a high-volume agent who worked with people like me and Annie who were just starting out.
Once we lost her dream house, Annie was reluctant to keep trying. I said, “Let’s just meet the woman, okay?” She agreed, and by “agreed” I mean “conceded.”
IT WAS PROBABLY JUST AS bad as Annie thought it would be, but worse than I imagined. The wife of my dad’s buddy looked like a cross between Sarah Palin and a Pilates instructor. She introduced herself as Bonnie McKittrick, and said that Bonnie was short for Bonnie Jo, which was short for Bonnie Josephine. She spoke so quickly I nearly missed the explanation that followed: “But Josephine’s not my middle name—that’s Sherill—spelled with an S, I, double-L and not a C, Y, L—Josephine is a biblical name, so I guess it comes from the Hebrew—supposed to mean ‘he will increase’—don’t know how that got to be a girl’s name—must’ve switched over sometime back when all those French guys were wearing wigs and high heels—but it fits me because I made top closer as of last month—hope t
o do it again so I can keep the parking place—but I’m planning a wedding—it’s my own wedding, so who knows. Anyway, Bonnie comes from the Latin word for ‘good’—my sister told me that in an email—but I looked it up on the internet last year and found out that in Scottish Bonnie means ‘pretty’ and/or ‘charming’—I’ve had people tell me I’m both, but they leave out the ‘or’—but that’s for you to decide—anyway,” she said, extending her hand, “nice to meet you two—what’s your budget?”
Annie and I looked at each other. I shrugged. Annie stabbed this very cross look at me and said softly but firmly, “We’re teachers.”
Bonnie Jo picked up a ballpoint pen with a rubber snowman on the end and scribbled something on a notepad with her face printed on top. I was certain her garish nails would keep her from writing anything, but miraculously they were no problem at all.
She took a moment and sized us up. “Teachers are the best.” Tapping on a map of town with her nail, she said, “But that’s going to eliminate anything here, here, or here.” She paused, making a dramatic thinking face, then continued. “Or here, here, or here.” She could tell we were crestfallen, so she said, “Don’t get me wrong. There’s plenty of bustling cute neighborhoods full of young immigrant families. I think it would be great if we could get those houses back to single-family dwellings, if you know what I mean.”
While we were deciding if we did know what she meant, Bonnie Jo’s phone buzzed. She turned it over and checked the screen. “I really should take this. Getting married tomorrow, and there are a million loose ends,” she said, then stepped out of the small office and started talking. Even though she was trying to hush herself, we could hear everything.
“I know the rehearsal is tonight. I wouldn’t normally meet clients on this tight a schedule, but these people are friends of yours—okay, kids of a friend, same difference.” Annie looked at me and shrugged. “Fine, but remember you asked me to do this.” She paced back and forth a little then said, “I won’t be late … It’s on the calendar, that’s why. I’ve got nails today and hair tomorrow … For crying out loud, it will be a waste of money if I try to sleep on it, Burt.”
Bonnie Jo’s heels tapped out a regular gait on the floor as we listened to her listening. “What do you mean Doyle just showed up? Do you mean justjust, or like just in the last hour? … I wouldn’t know. He was supposed to be here yesterday, so I can’t help anybody with that question.” She poked her head in, and placed her phone on her shoulder. “I’ll be quick,” she whispered. She got back on the phone and paced back and forth a couple more times and said, “How am I supposed to know how he got blood all over his car? You’ll have to ask him … I also have no idea how something like that would happen. Well, if he brought along some floozy, we’ll have to redo the seating arrangements, won’t we?”
Bonnie Jo didn’t come right back. After a minute or so of silence in the office, Annie and I wondered if we should try to find her, but she popped back in. “Super sorry about the interruption,” she said. “I wouldn’t normally do it, but …”
“You’re getting married?” Annie asked. “That’s fantastic.”
“He’s an older gentleman with grown kids. Distinguished. Retired, you know. Used to live in Texas. Widowed. I’m not wearing white to this thing, so you’d think I’d be cool as a cucumber, but I’m not. I am all out of sorts. So, I apologize if my mind drifts in and out a little today. So, where were we?”
“You were going through all the places we couldn’t afford,” I said.
Bonnie Jo winced. “I’m sorry. You can’t have any secrets in real estate.”
“Apparently,” I said.
“Why don’t we look at a couple of listings, just to get a feel.”
I looked at Annie, and she shrugged. I knew what a shrug from Annie meant, but even more, I knew what that particular shrug meant. And I was not ready to embrace it.
“We’ll follow you,” I said.
We walked to our car, Annie looking like some poor soul in a cartoon with a rain cloud scribbled above her head. It should have felt like a victory for her that this agent was a nonstarter, but it did not. Not in the moment or after a fruitless afternoon of finding nothing again and again and again.
LATER THAT NIGHT, I COULD not find my wife. Our apartment is tiny, so it seemed strange to find her missing. I thought maybe she had gone out. I went to the window and looked down in the parking lot. The car was still there. I sent her a text, and a second or two later, I saw a blue light flash in the car. I sent a quick follow-up and waited. A second flash. I put some shoes on and went down to see what was happening.
I bent down and knocked on the window. She spooked a little and then turned away. I went around to the passenger’s side, and while I was going, I heard the locks clunk. “Hey,” I said. “Come on.”
“I need some time,” she said.
“Okay, but you can go up to the apartment. I’ll go running or something.”
“No,” she snapped. “I don’t want to be up there. And a pregnant lady can’t go to a bar.”
I stood there without saying anything, then I took out my phone. I typed: I’m sorry about the house.
The car lit up, and in a few seconds she sent: I know I’m not being rational. You don’t have to be rational if you’re sad.
She sent: >:(
I sent: 0:)
I walked around to the other side of the car and motioned that I was going back up. I waited for her approval and she looked at me like someone who knows they are being left.
THE NEXT DAY I TOLD my friend Roger about the whole thing. Roger Reed is the varsity baseball coach at my school. He also teaches health and keyboarding. Besides teaching at St. Jude’s, we have nothing in common. I have literally never seen him not wearing maroon wind pants and a St. Jude’s Wildcats golf shirt, tucked in. He is fit, but he’s balding, and his forearms look like they were built out of the bridge over the River Kwai. His voice is not just loud, it booms. And he likes to slap people on the back.
I guess you can say Roger is my best friend. Besides Annie, he really is the only person I actually talk to about anything. Sometimes that is a mistake.
“It’s your money, Brougham,” Roger said.
“Brougham?”
Roger’s attention snapped to something happening a couple of tables down, but it did not escalate into anything worth following up on.
“Roger,” I said. “She really wanted that house.”
“You need a house, Stevie.”
“I hate it when you call me Stevie.”
Roger gave me a quick “pow” with his forefinger and thumb. “Gotcha,” he said, but he said it weird, winking like somebody’s pervert uncle.
I could not look at him, so I turned away and concentrated on a sophomore just as he was folding something into a freshman’s mashed potatoes. I should have stopped it, but I did not.
“Renting is expensive, and if you two are bringing some offspring into the world, you need to have a place of your own. Nobody’s American Dream is to be under a landlord their whole life. So, they didn’t take your first offer. So what?”
“She liked that house.”
“A house is a house. You turn it into what you want.”
“I’ll try telling that to Annie.”
“Are you going with a realtor?” Roger asked.
“We’ve tried two already. It’s depressing.”
“Skip the realtors. Don’t inhale. They. Will. Rob. You. Blind,” he said. “The title guy handles everything that matters. And you’re already paying him. You shouldn’t be on the open market anyway. It’s a screw job.”
Roger loved saying “screw job,” and he would concoct situations that would lead him to that punch line.
“You should be looking into short sales, my man. Realtors hate ’em—doesn’t take an Einstein to figure that out.”
“Listen, Roger. I need a house, not a seminar.”
“Look. You got some stiff who got roped into a bad loan
. Balloon payments hit. Wife loses her job. He wants out before the crap hits the fan, and he goes into foreclosure. Bank takes the loss, doesn’t want to fill out all the loan mod paperwork. If he sells the house, he can maybe walk with clean credit. Or maybe he bought too high in the market and now he’s underwater a hundred grand, can’t refinance, wants out. You can profit from that. You can get that eight grand from out of Obama’s welfare sack, and boom, you’re in business. Jeez, man, don’t just lay down in the road and let the stimulus drive back and forth across your face. You’re a teacher. This country owes you, man.”
“Roger, you know Annie. She’s not going to be cool with any of this.”
“At least come to a foreclosure auction with me, see how it works,” he said. “Six percent of anything you can buy around here is twenty-five grand.”
WHEN I GOT BACK TO my classroom, I sent Annie a text: Roger’s going to show me a house, then he’ll bring me home.
An hour later she wrote: I think I found another realtor. I’ll call her after school. I know Roger is your friend, but I’d rather take real estate advice from a hamster. P.S. Remember, you’re making dinner. No takeout. It makes the baby crazy.
I taught my two afternoon classes then met with the student government kids for forty-five minutes, helping them plan a service project. After that I puttered around my room, reading some Alexis de Tocqueville and waiting for Roger to show up. At quarter to five, he knocked on the window in my door with a tape measure and then motioned for me to come out. I closed my book and shuffled to the door.
“Shake a leg, Walsh. You know what they say—sloth is the Devil’s mattress,” Roger said, swinging a small plastic cooler.
“Who says that?”
“Old-timers,” he said, then he eyed me suspiciously, turned, and shot past the office, zooming through the front doors. I followed him to the truck, and as soon as we drove off school property, he opened the cooler and offered me a beer. “Go ahead,” he said, grinning. “We’re gonna be house hunting. It’s not right to be sober.”
It Needs to Look Like We Tried Page 4