Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 57897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 232(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 289(@200wpm)___ 232(@250wpm)___ 193(@300wpm)
It had also been valuable to my mother and to the people she loved. That made it harder to imagine just letting someone else take over without even giving myself the chance to experience it.
“Did Maisie live on the property?” I asked.
“She did until she went into the hospital. There is a house on the land, but it isn’t livable in its current condition. She was living in a trailer. All the utilities are connected, and the local police did a goodwill welfare check on her not too long ago and said the place was a bit cluttered and messy, but in good condition otherwise.”
I thought for another second, then nodded even though he couldn’t see me.
“Alright,” I said. “I’ll go. If the trailer is habitable, I’ll stay there for a few weeks to decide what to do with the property and get everything handled. If there is internet access, I can work remotely.”
“I believe there is,” Mr. Warren said. “I can’t promise it is as fast or reliable as you are accustomed to, but it should be manageable.”
That almost made me sigh, but I reminded myself I’d committed. I asked the lawyer to send directions and any other information he had to share, ended the call, and started my preparations. I needed to get out there before I could change my mind, so I immediately put my mail on hold and packed my bags with enough essentials to last me for at least a couple of weeks.
I imagined there would be laundry facilities available, and there had to be a store nearby. If I outstayed what I brought, I could always get what I needed. I put my packed bags at the door and went into the kitchen to make dinner. I needed to get to bed early so I could hit the road as soon as possible in the morning.
2
JASON
When I was in school, my cousin Carter was my hero. Both literally and figuratively. He was a war hero with shrapnel in his leg and medals where Uncle Sam thanked him for his service and his sacrifice. I looked up to him more than any other person on the planet, celebrities and sports stars included. The fact that he was my cousin, just a few years older than me, gave me something to inspire me, to push me to be better.
When Carter came home from the desert, he moved to Ashford, Tennessee, and started a logging company with two of his buddies. It was extremely successful, due to their hard work and willingness to put in the extra effort to make it so. I kept in touch with him over the internet, and we exchanged Christmas cards and emails regularly.
Carter had been encouraging from afar and had cheered me on as I finished school, offering that if I wanted to take some time between high school and college, that I could always come out to Ashford and work for him for a while. It didn’t take long before that was The Plan.
My girlfriend at the time, Charlotte, had been my high school sweetheart. We met in sophomore year and had been together ever since. I was ready to marry her, and when I told her the plan, I was totally fine with the idea that we might have a long-distance relationship if she chose to go to college. We would work it out. We always had.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t how she reacted. I loved Charlotte and would have done anything for her, but her plans were to go to school in Baltimore and live in an apartment with me in Maryland. So, I stayed. I thought we were happy, and she was going to be mine forever.
Then, the accident happened.
I had been working in a warehouse while I tried to figure out what I was going to do with my life. College was still an option, and I had taken some classes online to get the basic stuff out of the way. But the warehouse paid well.
One day, I was working in the office of the warehouse when one of the workers had taken the power jack out while he was drunk. He plowed right into the glass window in front of the office and destroyed the wall. Pieces of concrete slammed into me and broke my arm, but it was the gash across my face and neck that was the worst. I nearly died on the floor, bleeding out. I was trapped under rubble, and the glass had sliced me so deeply in the face and across my throat that I lay there in that puddle of blood and thought for sure that I was seeing my last moments on Earth.
I passed out, waking up in a hospital with bandages around my face and my arm in a sling.