Daniel’s fingers closed around the phone.
Nobody moved.
The message from Mau remained on the screen, beneath the screenshot of a betting account swollen with enough money to make every debt on our table seem briefly manageable.
One last chance.
That was how gambling spoke to Daniel.
Not as greed.
As repair.
He stared at the balance.
Teresa’s hand slowly withdrew from his.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
Daniel didn’t answer.
His thumb hovered over the screen.
I wanted to take the phone away.
Every instinct I had as a father told me to remove the danger from his hand before he could make another mistake.
But another instinct, newer and harder learned, stopped me.
If I confiscated the phone, I would know what I had chosen.
I would learn nothing about him.
Daniel opened Mau’s message.
Mau had sent another one.
“I can get you in. Deposit tonight and we can clear what you owe.”
Daniel swallowed.
“How much does he want?” Teresa asked.
“Five hundred.”
She laughed once, without humor.
“Of course.”
Daniel looked at her.
“I don’t have five hundred.”
“That never stopped you before.”
The words escaped her before she could soften them.
Daniel’s face tightened.
Teresa looked immediately ashamed.
“No,” he said. “You’re right.”
That silenced all of us.
He opened the keyboard.
For several seconds he typed.
Deleted.
Typed again.
Deleted again.
Then he placed the phone facedown.
“I need to call my therapist.”
It was not the dramatic choice I had expected.
Maybe that was why it mattered.
He went into his room.
Teresa looked at me.
“Should we follow him?”
“No.”
“What if he’s messaging Mau?”
“Then following him won’t cure anything.”
She hated that answer.
So did I.
Twenty minutes later, Daniel came back carrying the phone.
He put it on the table.
“I blocked Mau.”
Teresa looked at the screen.
“You called the therapist?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Daniel sat.
“He asked what I thought would happen if I bet.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That I could win.”
He rubbed his face.
“Then he asked what I thought would happen if I lost.”
Teresa waited.
“I told him I’d need more money.”
The simplicity of it seemed to frighten him.
He looked at me.
“That’s the whole thing, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“There is no last bet.”
I didn’t answer for him.
He answered himself.
“If I win, I think I should keep going. If I lose, I think I have to keep going.”
He picked up the phone again.
“I blocked him.”
“Good,” I said.
Daniel frowned.
“That’s it?”
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know.”
“A parade?”
Despite everything, Teresa laughed.
Daniel did too.
For perhaps ten seconds, the three of us sat around the table laughing at something that wasn’t funny.
Then Daniel’s expression became serious.
“Mau knows where I work.”
Teresa stopped laughing.
“Why does that matter?”
Daniel stared at the table.
“Because I owe him money.”
I felt my stomach tighten.
“How much?”
“Not much.”
“Number.”
“Eight hundred.”
“For gambling?”
“Mostly.”
“What does mostly mean?”
Daniel rubbed the back of his neck.
“He covered some bets for me.”
“Did you steal from him?”
His eyes shifted.
That was enough.
“How much?”
“I took two hundred from his wallet.”
Teresa whispered his name.
“I was going to put it back.”
I leaned forward.
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Then you stole it.”
Daniel nodded.
“What happened the night you got hurt?”
“He found out.”
“Did he hit you?”
“Not at first.”
“What happened first?”
“I denied it.”
I waited.
“He showed me a camera recording from the apartment.”
Teresa shut her eyes.
“And then?”
“We argued. I pushed him.”
The hospital story changed shape.
Not completely.
Mau had still beaten him.
But Daniel had omitted the part that made him look worse.
Again.
“I pushed him,” Daniel repeated. “He hit me. Then it got out of control.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police?”
“Because he had the video.”
I sat back.
Daniel looked at me cautiously.
“You going to throw me out again?”
“No.”
He seemed almost disappointed.
“Why not?”
“Because you just told the truth before we discovered it ourselves.”
He stared at me.
“That doesn’t erase the theft.”
“I know.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Nothing.”
His eyebrows rose.
“You’re going to do something.”
“No. You are.”
“What?”
“Figure out how to repay him without gambling, stealing, borrowing from your mother, or asking us to solve it.”
Daniel looked irritated.
“That’s impossible.”
“Then start with the possible part.”
Teresa said, “You have wages coming Friday.”
Daniel turned to her.
“I’m already giving you money.”
“You are.”
She took a breath.
“You can reduce what you give us temporarily and repay what you stole.”
I looked at her.
Months earlier, Teresa would have quietly paid Mau herself.
Now she was helping Daniel rearrange his own obligations.
That difference was enormous.
Daniel calculated.
It would take several weeks.
He hated that.
“I could just borrow—”
He stopped himself.
We all heard it.
He gave a bitter smile.
“Right.”
The next day, Mau appeared outside the warehouse.
Daniel called me during lunch.
His voice was tense.
“He’s here.”
“What does he want?”
“Money.”
“Do you have any?”
“Forty dollars.”
“Then tell him when you can pay.”
“What if he hits me?”
“Are you in danger now?”
“No. Security is nearby.”
“Then stay near security. If he threatens you, report it.”
Daniel went quiet.
“Dad.”
“Yes?”
“Can you come?”
The old version of me would have left work immediately.
I nearly did.
Then I asked, “Do you need protection, or do you want me to handle the conversation?”
Another silence.
“The conversation.”
“Then no.”
He cursed softly.
Not at me.
At the situation.
“What do I say?”
“The truth.”
“That I stole from him?”
“He already knows.”
“That I don’t have the money?”
“He probably knows that too.”
Daniel exhaled.
“Tell him what you can pay and when.”
“And if he says no?”
“Then you still don’t magically have eight hundred dollars.”
I heard something almost like a laugh.
“Okay.”
He hung up.
For the next hour I checked my phone every few minutes.
Nothing.
Finally a message came.
“He agreed. $100 Friday, then $100 each paycheck.”
I stared at it.
My first impulse was pride.
My second was caution.
One honest conversation did not erase months of manipulation.
But it was still an honest conversation.
That evening Daniel came home carrying a grocery bag.
“What’s that?” Teresa asked.
“Food.”
“You bought groceries?”
He looked embarrassed.
“Don’t make it weird.”
She smiled.
“I won’t.”
She made it slightly weird.
She inspected every item as if he had returned from war carrying treasure.
Daniel finally laughed.
“Mom.”
“I’m putting them away.”
“I can put them away.”
She stopped.
Then handed him the bag.
“Okay.”
That tiny exchange told me more about our progress than therapy vocabulary ever could.
Friday came.
Daniel received his paycheck.
He divided it at the kitchen table.
One hundred for Mau.
A portion toward Teresa’s debts.
Transportation.
Food.
A little for himself.
There was almost nothing left.
He stared at the amounts.
“This sucks.”
“Yes,” I said.
He looked at me.
“You enjoy this?”
“No.”
“Feels like you do.”
“I enjoy that the numbers are honest.”
He thought about that.
Then nodded.
That night he made the first repayment to Mau and sent a screenshot of the transfer.
Mau replied with a thumbs-up.
Then another message appeared.
“You’re really done betting?”
Daniel stared at it.
“Yes,” he typed.
Mau responded almost immediately.
“You’ll be back.”
Daniel’s face tightened.
He blocked the number again.
A week passed.
Then two.
Daniel worked.
He attended therapy.
He complained.
He overslept once and missed the bus, but instead of asking Teresa to call his supervisor with an excuse, he called himself.
He received a warning.
He came home furious.
At himself.
That was new.
Then, on a Tuesday evening, Teresa’s phone rang.
She looked at the number.
Her face changed.
“What?”
“It’s the workplace fund.”
She answered.
I watched the blood drain from her face.
“Yes,” she said.
Then, “I understand.”
Then nothing for almost a minute.
When she disconnected, Daniel had come into the room.
“What happened?”
Teresa stared at the phone.
“The money I borrowed from work.”
I stood.
“What about it?”
“They’ve reviewed the account.”
“And?”
She looked at me.
“They’re investigating me.”
Daniel went still.
“For what?”
Teresa’s voice broke.
“For fraud.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 10: Teresa’s Secret Loans Threatened Her Job, and Daniel Learned That Paying Back Money Could Not Undo Every Consequence He Had Created
I Came Home With Aching Hands and Found My Grown Son Complaining About the Temperature of His Soda
Part 9 of 25
