Page 2 of The Neighborly Thing To Do
Mr. Davies looks at me with some sort of benevolent pity that raises my hackles. I got that look alotright after my father died, but it’d tapered off when I’d proven I could handle my shit. But now it’s back, because he thinks I’m a stupid kid who’s missing some crucial piece to the puzzle. I hate it. I might hate him.
“The thing is, Cassidy, Hearthstone’s laws don’t work like you’re used to in the human world.” He’s explaining it like he might to a toddler. “We have to prioritize our community,and the unique protection we provide supernatural people. We don’t allow humans to live here.”
I flinch back at his words. I don’t want to—don’t want him and fuckingHughto see that—but I can’t help it. “You didn’t mind a human living here the past decade,” I spit out.
Mr. Davies sighs. “No one denies you did a good thing, Cassidy. But it’s done. Georgia is grown now, and you can return to the human world. You have a place there. It’s better for everyone, really.”
My mouth falls open at the high-handed condescension. I turn to Hugh. “So you’ve, what, suddenly decided you want to move home?” I ask incredulously. As far as I know, Hugh Saunders hasn’t been in Hearthstone since the funeral, and he wasn’t around much before that, either.
“I’m a business man,” he says in that raspy voice of his. “I think I can bring a certain something into Hearthstone.”
That’s not an answer to my question. “What does that have to do withthis house?” I demand.
“The land’s been surveyed and is valuable. It’s perfect for a boutique hotel,” he says shamelessly. “Summer tourism is an untapped industry up here, and I intend to ensure that Hearthstone fully develops that market.”
“You can’t do that,” I argue, brain spinning with what he’s saying. Tear down my house and put up ahotel? “What about Georgia?” I ask, grasping at straws.
“I’ll let Georgia stay with me when she comes home to visit,” Hugh says. “Free of charge, for family.” His voice gets more grating every time he speaks.
The idea oflettingGeorgia stay on her own damn property is galling, and I don’t know what to say. I want to tell them they can have the house over my dead body, but I can’t make the words come out.
“I’m prepared to pay a competitive rate,” Hugh says, and Mayor Davies looks at me like he expects me to jump on board.
I slam the door in their faces and turn the lock.
They don’t bang down my door. They’re both toocivilizedfor that, and I’m sure Mr. Davies went back to the town hall to draw up some sort of formal eviction notice. Can I even be evicted if I’m not a tenant?
Well, it sounds like he’s going to try. Or he’s at least going to draw up the paperwork for the sale and then force me to sign it. I begin to pace the house, thinking.
I don’t know what to do. It’s not like I have a lawyer, and I’m not stupid enough to think that this town would respect a human lawyer, either. Mr. Davies wasn’t wrong when he said they operate by their own rules here.
I need to talk to someone, but the problem is, the only person I really speak to regularly is G, and she’s out for obvious reasons.I’m not going to tell her that her only other surviving relative is threatening to steal our home. She’s startingcollege, for fuck’s sake. She needs to be focused on school. She has so much to learn, and I’m not going to be the one to ruin it for her.
I end up calling my mom once it reaches a decent hour. She lives all the way on the west coast, so it takes a while, and I won’t have that long to talk before I’ll have to think about getting ready for work, but it’s never a good idea to piss her off by calling too early.
“I don’t understand,” she proclaims, and I can hear voices in the background. She’s talking to me while she’s out on one of her walks, then. “You’re done, Cassidy. You finished what you set out to do. Why would you want to stay there? There’s nothing more in that town for you. Come home.”
I don’t know what I expected. My mom spent the last ten years hoping I’d hand Georgia off to someone else and come home. She hasn’t said anything explicit about me moving back after G left for college, but that’s because of the number of times I threatened to stop talking to her altogether if she told me to give up my sister again. It shouldn’t surprise me that she’s stillthinking it.
“This is my house,” I say stubbornly.
“So take a buy-out, Cassidy. Honestly. Ask the man for a lot of money to go quietly, and take it as the win it is. Getout. It sounds like he can afford to pay you, and you can use that money and build a lifehere, where you belong. They never wanted you in that town; take the hint, stop trying to make them like you, and come back to your life. Yourreallife. You had so much potential, honey.”
I bite my cheek so I don’t say anything, now wishing I didn’t call. It’s not her fault. My mother loves me and wants the best for me, and she’s been convinced I’ve been deprived of it my whole life. Whether it was my dad leaving her, or him only seeing me twice a year, and always at innocuous locations, never his own home, or me choosing to drop out of college to take care of G—my mom sees some sort of idealized life and wasted potential when she looks at me.
It’s not that I don’t want some of that. Yes, I’d maybe have liked to have a father who wasn’t embarrassed to talk about me. And yes, I wish I got to finish my college degree. But this is my home. This is my house; Dad left it to me fair and square. I built a life here with G. It’s all I’ve known for ten years. I’m not giving it up just because someone said so.
“You can stay here while you get on your feet,” my mom says when I don’t answer her fast enough, like that’s the thing I’m getting stuck on. “I’d be happy to have you. Your bedroom is a workout room now, but we can get it set back up.”
“Mom,” I say heavily. “It’s my house. They don’t get to kick me out.”
They don’t get to sayno humans allowedlike little kids hanging a sign on the tree house. Sure, maybe this town isn’t designed with me in mind, but I’ve been here. I bag their groceries andI raised G and Ilive here. If we’re getting technical, I was even born here.
“You’ve always been stubborn,” Mom mutters, and then, predictably, “The one thing you got from your father.”
Mom blamed my stubbornness grumblingly on my father my whole life, but I think I come by it honestly from both sides.
“Mom—”
