“Are you really going to make us destroy it?”
“I’m not forcing you to do anything. The court gave you a choice.”
He looked genuinely angry then, but underneath him I saw something else. Confusion. He still didn’t understand why he wouldn’t negotiate. In his world, everything had a price if you found the right number. In mine, some of the numbers were insults because they assumed the wrong thing was for sale.
Twenty-one days came and went.
Nothing changed.
Worse than nothing. They folded.
The landscapers planted more ornamental pastures. The dock was finished. A stone fire pit appeared near the bench. I went by for a night and saw Laurel sitting on the dock with her feet on the water, a glass of wine in her hand, watching the sunset be reflected in a lake that existed because she and her husband had decided that my limit was no future.
