…as a co-owner. They want proof you’ve given up your half.”
My half.
Eight years ago, when my son, Derek, bought that house, he couldn’t qualify for the mortgage alone. I’d paid half the down payment and signed on as a co-owner. I’d forgotten. They hadn’t.
The real estate agent, Ms. Ward, explained. Derek had signed a sale contract two months ago, alone, and told the buyers that his mother had “transferred her share years ago.” The buyers’ lawyer had discovered my name still on the title. The closing had been on hold ever since.
“So there’s no sale,” I said slowly, “unless I sign.”
“Exactly,” Ms. Ward said. “That’s why they need the fifty thousand. I think they’re going to use it to pay the buyers’ penalty for the delay. And then ask you to sign.”
I didn’t give them the money. I asked my own lawyer to send a letter to the buyers’ lawyer confirming that I had not agreed to any sale.
Then I invited Derek over. Alone. I played him the voice message. He’d known about the move. He hadn’t known his wife planned to use the children against me.
“Mom, she said you’d help us start over,” he said.
“I would have,” I said. “If you’d asked me instead of threatening me.”
The sale fell through. They didn’t move across the country. Derek and his wife went to counseling. I still pick up my grandchildren every Tuesday and Thursday. I’m on their school’s emergency contact list. My son put me there himself.
