Chapter 5 - The Honest Man
By noon, I was standing in the dirt yard of Mike’s small landscaping yard on the edge of town. Two rusted trailers sat next to a shed smelling of two-stroke oil, cut grass, and diesel fuel.
Mike was under the chassis of a commercial mower, grease smeared across his jaw, a socket wrench clutched in his rough hand. When my shadow crossed his work light, he paused, then slowly slid out on his mechanic's dolly.
He looked at me, wiped his hands on a filthy rag, and tossed the wrench into a metal toolbox.
"I don't want to fight, Mike," I said quietly.
"Good," he said, reaching into the cab of his beat-up pickup truck. "Because I don't have the energy for it."
He pulled out a manila envelope, walked over, and thrust it against my chest.
I took it automatically. Inside were three stacks of twenty-dollar bills and a small, handwritten notebook.
"What is this?"
"Four thousand two hundred dollars," Mike said evenly. "That's what's left on the loan you gave me for the replacement trailer axle. I went to the bank this morning, took out a title loan against my personal truck at twenty-two percent interest, and cleared my debt to you."
The breath caught in my throat. "A title loan? Mike, are you insane? The interest will choke you to death! I told you yesterday I don't want the money back—I have eighteen million dollars!"
"You gave me a loan, Jess," Mike said, taking a step toward me. His eyes were burning, steady and cold. "You made me sign a promissory note at Dad’s dining table. You made me list the mower as collateral in case I defaulted. Do you remember that? You looked me in the eye and said, *'It’s just good business, Mike. Keeps things clean between siblings.'*"
Tears blurred my vision. "I was terrified everyone would see me as an ATM..."
"We didn't see you as an ATM. We saw you as our little sister," he said, his voice dropping into something far more painful than anger. "When you told us you won thirty grand, I was proud of you. I told Dad you were smart for saving it. But you didn't trust us with the truth. You treated us like scammers waiting to bleed you dry."
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"Mike, please keep the money. Take more. Take half a million. Get new trucks—"
"I would rather lose this business and work the night shift at the lumber yard with my bare hands than ever touch another cent of your money," Mike said. "Take the envelope. Sign the release line on the notebook. And get off my lot."
