At lody Sumrs’s words, Caron Sumrs’s eyes lit up, his voice jumping an octave in excitent. "Really?!"
The initial joy passed, and Caron started to feel awkward. He was genuinely embarrassed to be borrowing money from his own niece.
He rubbed his hands together awkwardly and kept promising, "My dear niece, I’ll treat this as a loan! The mont I’m making money again, I’ll pay you back with interest, I swear!"
lody Sumrs nodded. "Okay."
In truth, her third uncle had been very good to lody before he started gambling online.
When they were kids, Nina Sumrs had brought a comic book with her on a trip back to their hotown. lody was at the age where she was dying to read such things, but Nina refused to let her even look at it.
Her third uncle had seen lody’s envy and bought her a whole set of comic books, telling her gently, "Our little lody should have everything the other little girls have. When your uncle makes more money, I’ll buy our little lody even more toys and pretty dresses!"
Back then, the look of pure affection on her uncle’s face as he watched her had filled lody’s heart with warmth.
Every ti she rembered this, lody was filled with a deep sense of lancholy. ’If only he hadn’t gotten hooked on gambling,’ she’d think. ’How wonderful that would have been...’
But ti couldn’t be turned back, and what was done was done.
Now, even though she was wary of him, lody was still willing to offer this small bit of help. She couldn’t just stand by and watch her uncle’s family of three freeze to death.
lody sighed to herself, then pulled out her phone to ssage Tate.
[Tate, are you back at the Residences? So relatives of mine need to rent an apartnt here. I don’t want to rent out 1603 or 1604, so could you please check if there are any other vacant units available?]
Tate replied almost instantly.
[Of course, Miss Sumrs! I’m on my way!]
About ten minutes later, Tate arrived at the door.
After getting the full picture, Tate thought for a mont. "There’s a vacant apartnt in this building, unit 1101 on the 11th floor. Would that work?"
lody nodded. "That’s perfect. Could you please take my uncle and his family over to sign the contract?"
’The 11th floor is a good spot,’ she thought. ’Close enough to keep an eye on them, but not so close that they’d be dropping by every day.’ It was the perfect place for her uncle’s family.
Her uncle’s family was thrilled. They imdiately stood up, grabbed their luggage, and prepared to leave with Tate.
Seeing only two pieces of luggage, Tate hesitated. "Excuse , is this all you have? We don’t have any fully furnished units available right now. The apartnt on the 11th floor has no furniture, no bedding, and no heating equipnt. You’ll need to acquire all those things yourselves..."
Her uncle scratched his head, looking troubled. "We did have more luggage, but we had to abandon three pieces on the way here. Our bedding and a space heater were in those bags..."
The three of them had co over on a governnt disaster relief vehicle. Its capacity was limited, so they weren’t allowed to bring much luggage to begin with—two pieces per adult and one for a minor. Their family of three had five pieces in total.
But when the vehicle dropped them off in the city, they discovered the buses weren’t running.
It was a three or four-kiloter walk from the drop-off point to The tropolis Residences, so they had to make the journey on foot.
It was freezing outside, with heavy wind and snow. Halfway there, they were too exhausted to go on and had no choice but to abandon three of their bags. Otherwise, they feared they would all freeze to death before they arrived.
Seeing their plight, lody spoke up. "It’s all right, Uncle. Why don’t you go with Tate and get checked in first? Once that’s done, you’ll be eligible to receive supplies from the complex, like free down jackets and other things."
"And don’t worry about bedding and heating equipnt. We have extras here. We’ll bring them over to you in a little while!"
Caron scratched his head, looking embarrassed. "Is that really okay? That stuff is so expensive now. If you give it to us, will you have enough for yourselves?"
He instinctively glanced toward his mother.
But she just grimaced and looked away, not saying a word.
A wave of disappointnt washed over Caron. He knew his mother still hadn’t forgiven him. It was his own fault for being such a bastard back in the day.
Seeing how tense the situation was, Grace Sutton quickly stepped in to smooth things over. "We have plenty, we have plenty, don’t you worry," she said to Caron. "When your older brother gets back, we’ll help bring it all over to you!"
Caron finally relaxed. He thanked everyone again before leaving with his wife and son, following Tate.
They had just left apartnt 1606 when Caron’s phone rang.
Caron pulled out his phone and saw the call was from Caleb.
He answered, and Caleb’s voice imdiately ca through the phone. "Hey, Caron, how’s it going? Did you get to Mom’s place? You won’t believe this, but for so reason, my mother-in-law’s landlord just suddenly canceled her lease!"
"The place my mother-in-law moved into is just a concrete shell! The floors aren’t even tiled, and the utilities aren’t fully hooked up. How is anyone supposed to live there? You need to talk to Mom and our older brother and get them to free up an apartnt for her and her family!"
Caron replied, "Caleb, stop. Mom has no obligation to find a place for your mother-in-law. Besides, there really aren’t any spare rooms here. Even I’m not staying at Mom’s. I’m renting an unfurnished place in the complex, sa as your mother-in-law."
Caleb sounded surprised. "What did you just say?" he asked, incredulous. "You got kicked out, too?! How could Mom and our brother be so heartless?"
In Caleb’s eyes, his younger brother Caron had always been the family favorite. Why else would they have helped him pay off his loans ti and ti again?
Caron corrected him. "I wasn’t ’kicked out,’ Caleb. The family is already doing everything they can to help . Mom and our brother have no obligation to clean up our sses."
The unspoken ssage was clear: Your mother-in-law is your problem. Mom and their brother had no obligation to help you suck up to her.
Caleb understood the subtext and almost laughed in disbelief. He gritted his teeth. "Oh, really, Caron? You’ve got so nerve saying that to . You think I haven’t been cleaning up your sses all these years? When did you ever ask for money that I didn’t give it to you? How dare you say that to now? Where the hell do you get the nerve?"
Caron sighed. Facing his brother’s fury over the phone, he said earnestly, "Caleb, I know you’ve helped a lot over the years, and I’ve always been grateful. I’ll pay back the money I borrowed from you, little by little. But I don’t want to put Mom in a difficult position. I can’t help your mother-in-law... I’m sorry."
Caleb couldn’t stop himself from spewing a few curses. "So what’s your ga now, Caron?" he demanded. "Are you just going to burn this bridge? You think you can just kick to the curb now that you have Mom and our brother helping you out?"
"I’m telling you, you’d better get so supplies from Mom and take them to my mother-in-law. If you don’t, don’t bla when I say I don’t have a brother anymore!"
Caron was silent for a mont. "Caleb, I’m sorry about this, but I really can’t help you plot against Mom. I know you’ve always resented her for not giving you a better start in life, but she’s never done anything to wrong you."
"To send you to college, almost everyone’s salary in the family went to you. Mom always favored you. You should really think about it. Haven’t you gone too far? Is this really how you should be treating your family?"
Before Caleb had a chance to argue, Caron hung up the phone.
...
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