Chapter 4
Jason was still in the driveway. I could see him through the open door next to Tyler, leaning against the dark SUV with his hands in his jacket pockets, not coming closer but not leaving either. Eli hadn't moved from the foyer. The keys were in his palm, not in his pocket anymore, his fingers closed around them.
I didn't want to keep arguing about who I'd promised what. My chest felt tight and I needed something solid to look at.
"Let me just check the paperwork," I said. My voice came out smaller than I wanted it to.
Eli glanced at me. "Mara."
"I know," I said. "I just want to see it."
I left them in the foyer. The black duffel bag was still where it had been by the base of the staircase, untouched, its zipper half-closed. I walked past it into the kitchen and pulled open the junk drawer where we kept the accordion folder. It was the one with the elastic strap, stuffed with the house stuff — water bill receipts, Eli's pay stubs, the warranty for the fridge.
My hands were shaking a little as I carried it back to the kitchen table. Eli followed. Tyler stayed by the doorway, but he turned enough that he could see us.
I undid the strap and thumbed past tabs until I found VEHICLES. There were two titles inside in plastic sleeves. I pulled out the one for the spare car — the gray sedan, not Eli's truck. The paper was creased from when we'd filed it last year.
Eli laid it flat. Both our names were typed on the front under Owner. Mara L. Keller and Eli J. Keller, with the little AND between them, not OR. Joint tenants.
I stared at that word. AND.
"Both of us," Eli said quietly. He wasn't trying to win. He just tapped the line with his fingertip. "We signed it like that at the courthouse so either of us couldn't sell it without the other."
I remembered now, standing at the county clerk's window together, the woman asking if we wanted AND or OR and Eli saying AND felt safer. I'd nodded without really thinking about what it meant.
"Okay," I whispered. My throat was dry.
Eli slid the next sleeve over. The insurance card. He'd kept it current in his wallet but we'd put the declaration page in here too. He unfolded it.
The spare car was listed second. Primary driver: Eli J. Keller. Secondary: Mara L. Keller. No other drivers listed. In small print at the bottom it said permissive use required prior consent of insured and a note about coverage limits for non-listed drivers.
I read it twice. The letters blurred a little.
"If he crashes it," I said, before I could stop myself, "it's on us."
Eli nodded once. "It's on us. Our rates. Our liability. If he hurts someone."
I felt my stomach drop. When I'd texted Jason Friday night I'd only thought about his truck being in the shop and how he'd helped me move before Eli and I even met. I hadn't thought about that piece of paper at all. I pressed my fingers to the table edge to steady them.
From the doorway Tyler cleared his throat.
"I was with him when he bought it," he said. He wasn't looking at the driveway now. He was looking at the table. "Last March. Out at Henderson County Ford. End of the month, they were trying to hit quota."
Eli glanced up.
Tyler shoved his hands deeper in his pockets. "He'd been looking for three weekends. You were working that Saturday, Mara. I rode with him. He test drove three and picked the gray one because you liked the backup camera."
I remembered that day. Eli had come home and tossed the second set of keys to me on the couch and said, "We have a spare now. Just in case."
That had felt good at the time. Like we were building something together. Now that same memory felt heavy.
My phone was on the table beside the folder. I hadn't looked at the actual thread since Friday. I told myself it wasn't as bad as Eli thought. Maybe I'd misremembered what I'd actually promised.
I opened messages and scrolled up to Friday, 9:47 p.m.
Jason: still good to borrow the spare for weekend? my truck still dead
Me: I already promised him the car for the weekend.
Me: You can survive without it for two days.
Reading my own words back, exactly as I'd said them this morning in the foyer, made my face go hot. I hadn't asked Eli. I hadn't said "let me check with Eli." I'd answered like the car was mine to give.
Eli wasn't reading over my shoulder. He didn't need to. He'd already heard those lines.
I locked the phone and set it face down. The declaration page and the title were side by side in the lamplight from the side table. The lamp threw warm light across the hardwood and up the white staircase railing.
"We can't lend it alone," I said. The sentence felt strange and formal, but it was true. "Not legally."
Eli finally opened his hand and set the keys down on the table between the papers, not pushing them toward me, not toward the door. Just there.
"No," he said. "We can't."
May you like
Outside, Jason shifted his weight against the SUV. He hadn't knocked. He was waiting for me to come out and tell him it was okay, the way I'd said it would be Friday.
I didn't know what to say to him yet, but I knew I couldn't hand him those keys by myself anymore.
