Of course, he got food from the kitchen. The kitchen that hasn’t had anything but expired cans of green beans and frozen trays from Meals on Wheels for the last year. I stomp down the hallway, noting with some aggravation that the floorboards no longer creak.
Our dingy kitchen has been scrubbed to within an inch of its life, although that isn’t enough to hide the decades of neglect and wear. But if the new countertops and appliances lining the hallway just waiting to be installed are any indication, an even greater transformation is to come.
And I want to tear my fucking hair out.
Zion comes up behind me, slurping on a can of soda that definitely wasn’t here a few hours ago. “Nice, isn’t it?”
The glare I cast him speaks volumes. The loudest thing it says is that we can’t trust charity from Vin Cortland.
“Let’s just enjoy it while it lasts,” Zion says with a shrug. “There was even a nurse in here earlier giving Grandpa a sponge bath.”
I also hadn’t missed the brand new hospital bed in the living room and a row of oxygen tanks that the insurance usually only paid to replace every other month that Grandpa needed it.
You can look a gift horse in the mouth when it’s attached to more strings than would choke a marionette. Nothing in this world comes for free, especially not from a guy like Vin Cortland.
If Vin is trying to get under my skin, he succeeded.
I hate that.
He isn’t even here overseeing all the work he ordered. I search every inch of the house, ostensibly to catalogue all the invasive changes, but don’t catch so much as a glimpse of his characteristically smug face so I can throw something at it. It’s somehow even more annoying that he would do this and not even give me a chance to refuse it.
Because I realize as I tour the house that not all of this can be taken back. The walls can’t be unpainted, it isn’t possible to un-repair the foundation or replace the wooden stair steps with the broken pieces in that trash container outside. Some of this is permanent, the labor paid for, the work signed, sealed, and delivered.
Which means I’m in Vin Cortland’s debt.
That bastard.
The men wrap up for the day pretty quickly after I get home, although I wonder if they’ve received some kind of signal. None of them will look me in the eye as they file out to their trucks, except for the apparent foreman who holds the clipboard out to me again with a hopeful look on his face. My glare chases him out the door.
To my relief, the crew hasn’t had time to do much upstairs. The long hallway still has the same depressingly dingy wallpaper, little yellow flowers on a green background that have faded so much I can barely make out the pattern. The door of my room is closed, and I push it open slowly, dreading what I might find on the other side.
Everything looks the same. The same cut out pictures on the wall and ratty comforter on the bed. Then my gaze shifts to the far corner, and I let out a weary sigh.
A shiny new iPhone sits on top of my desk with the film still covering its dark glass surface. The thing looks like it came straight off the factory line, but when I pick it up the screen lights up as if it’s already been activated.
I used to have a cell phone, one of those prepaid deals you can buy without needing credit. We sell a few different ones at the Gas and Sip. But I ran out of minutes months ago and couldn’t afford to buy more, so the phone stopped working completely.
But this is the latest model and nothing like what you can buy from a gas station. And I don’t have to guess who is paying for the plan.
As soon as I pick it, the phone pings with a new message that pops up on the screen.
Vin: More where this came from. Just say yes.
My gaze moves to the closed window that looks out onto the scrabbly trees and far off cliffs. The sky here is thick with fog and smog, nothing like the beautiful views up in the Bluffs. Nothing moves out in the distance, and it’s still broad daylight. I just hope it’s a coincidence this message came at the exact same moment I picked up the phone. I tell myself he can’t be out there, only a coincidence.
Vin isn’t out there somewhere watching me right now.
He doesn’t need to see me to know exactly what I’m doing. He has been able to see right through me from the very day we met.
It takes everything I have not to throw the very expensive piece of tech across the room so it shatters against the wall. It’s only my aversion to destroying something so expensive that keeps the thing in my hand and not in the nearest trash can.
I don’t bother to respond and close down the messaging app. Instead, I open up the list of contacts. Vin’s number is the only one that is programmed in, of course. I wouldn’t even be surprised if Vin figured out a way to keep me from calling anyone else with this thing.
This is a Faustian bargain if I ever heard one, except Vin won’t be happy with just my soul.
Fifteen
It takes a day or two of ignoring the elephant in my house before I finally get around to playing with the iPhone. Vin hasn’t approached me at all, no more messages and no following me around at school, almost as if he’s trying to bide his time.
Every so often a new text from the only contact pops up on the screen, always saying the same thing.
Say yes
Say yes
Say yes
But I haven’t so much as laid eyes on him in the hallway. There hasn’t been any sneaking into my room in
