The Kitchen My Husband’s Brother Left Gutted

It would make Matt nervous, and Matt nervous is a quiet, long thing. But it would not sink us. I ran that number three times to be sure.

I could have called a lawyer. I thought about it for maybe a minute. I was not going to sue my husband’s brother.

I could have screamed at Matt until he chose. I have seen what happens in families where the wife makes the husband pick between her and his blood.

Nobody wins those. The kids just grow up learning that love is something you take sides in.

So at about three in the morning I thought about the one thing Troy had that I could use. It was not money.

It was two men who knew exactly how my kitchen was supposed to go back together, because they were the ones who took it apart.

On Friday I left the clinic at noon and drove across the county. Troy’s house sat up on a rise at the end of a new gravel drive.

Dusty and Ben were on the back porch, framing in a set of steps. Troy’s truck was not there.

Dusty saw me get out and set his nail gun down, and he came across the yard wiping his hands on his jeans.

He had the look of a man who already knew why I had come and wished I had not. “Jenna,” he said. “Troy’s at the bank. I don’t know when he’ll be back.”

“I didn’t come to see Troy,” I said. “I came to see you. Both of you.” Ben had come down off the porch by then and was standing a little behind his cousin, the way he always does.

“What’s Troy paying you?” I asked. Dusty looked at me a long second.

Then he told me, because he is an honest man and I had asked him straight. Twenty-five dollars an hour for him. Nineteen for Ben.

“I’ll pay you thirty,” I said. “And twenty-four for Ben. Starting Monday, in my kitchen, until it’s done. I’ll pay every Friday, cash or check, whichever you want, and I’ll never once be late.”

Ben looked at Dusty. Dusty looked at the ground for so long that I started counting the boards on the porch behind him. I got to thirty-one before he said anything at all.

“We work for Troy,” he said finally. “We’ve always worked for Troy.”

“I know you do,” I said. “I’m not asking you to quit him. I’m asking you to come finish what you started at my house. You can go right back to him when it’s done. He’ll still need you.”

“Where’s the money coming from?” he asked. It was a fair question, and he asked it plainly. “No offense, Jenna. I know what that insurance check was, and I know where it went.”

“Our soybean check,” I said. “It came in Wednesday. It was supposed to go on the operating note, and I’m taking part of it anyway.”

Then he said the thing I did not expect to hear. “Troy’s two weeks behind on our checks.”

I did not say anything. I did not know that. I do not think anybody in the family knew that.

“He’s never been behind,” Dusty said. “Not once in nine years. Not through the slow winters, when nobody in three counties was building anything. He’d have eaten beans before he paid us late.” He looked back at the half built house.

“Something’s wrong with him, Jenna. I don’t think it’s just your kitchen.”

“Then come finish my kitchen,” I said, “and let him figure out the rest. Maybe it’ll be one less thing on him.”