“Name that someone right now.”
The silence that followed Grandpa’s demand felt like it lasted forever. I could hear the clock ticking on the wall, the hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen, even the sound of my own breathing. My mother covered her face with her hands, her shoulders shaking.
My father, Gerald, stared at Grandpa for a moment, then looked down at the table.
I am 32 years old.
I work as an accountant at a midsized firm in Columbus, Ohio. For the past three years, I have been saving every extra dollar I could find, cutting back on everything.
Living in a cramped one-bedroom apartment with walls so thin, I could hear my neighbors arguing at 2 in the morning. I did all of this because I wanted something I had never had before.
A home.
A place that was mine.
Two months ago, I found it. A small three-bedroom house in a quiet neighborhood with good schools, even though I do not have kids yet. It had a front porch, a backyard with an old oak tree and windows that let in the morning light.
The moment I walked through the door, I knew it was the one.
I got pre-approved for a mortgage, did all the paperwork, and everything came down to one thing—the down payment, $30,000. I had been saving, but I was still short.
That is when I remembered the college fund.
My parents had opened it for me when I was born, adding to it every birthday, every Christmas, every time they got a bonus at work. By the time I turned 18, there was $50,000 in that account.
I got a partial scholarship to Ohio State, and tuition, room, and board cost me about $25,000 over 4 years.
My parents told me the rest was mine, that I had earned it by working hard and not squandering the opportunity they gave me. I had not thought about that money in years. I assumed it was still sitting there quietly growing interest.
So, two weeks ago, when I needed that down payment, I called my parents and asked if I could access what was left.
I figured with interest it would be somewhere around $32,000, enough to secure the house and still have a little cushion.
That is when my father told me to come over for dinner. He said we needed to talk in person.
Now here I was standing in their dining room, and my father had just told me the money was gone.
Grandpa took a step closer to my father, his hands clenched into fists at his sides.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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