My Father has been calling me out of my bedroom a lot lately. Usually he does that to ask an insipid question or have me type a letter, and then he'll use our face-to-face to tell me to clean my room or go to sleep early or something else dumb. This time was a little different and a whole lot more depressing.
He was looking over a couple pieces of paper in his hand, peering into them with his failing eyes in the dining room when I answered his call to me. This time he didn't want me to write a letter but an e-mail, to the guy ... (ahem) ... representing the company next door to The Store who said ... (deep breath) ... that they are buying it.
"Oh."
My parents said a lot of things detailing what the e-mail should contain and why they need me to write it, but I really remember only one thing Mother said: This company next door had a board meeting late last month and they assumed that they were putting the finishing touches on the sale.of The Store. The e-mail, in short, is asking how the meeting went.
Well, now we have an end date. It appears that The Store will be out of their lives, out of my life, out of the family history by about the end of the year. No more coming in and draining the water out of the buckets my folks laid out to catch the water falling from the leaky roof. No more walking up and down the aisles. No more climbing the conveyor belt. No more Saturday afternoons helping my parents. No more American Dream. I've been whining about how the impending end of The Store means a big chapter in my life and a huge hunk of our family's story will fade to memories. Well, this time is different because we've got something concrete -- a sale date.
Or do we? Looking closer to the pieces of paper Father was looking at, I discovered that they were just printouts of e-mails between him, this company representative and the real estate agent brokering the deal. Not in any of the correspondence did I see a sell, or words to that effect. What stands out, in fact, is an e-mail from the company rep saying that the money the company was allocating to the purchase of The Store will instead be used for something else. That doesn't mean we get to keep it or anything; I think that e-mail allows for the possibility that the company will revisit acquiring The Store next year. But My Father ordered me to change my e-mail to him to include the phrase, "Where is my check?" I don't know if a combination of entitlement and assumption is good when you're asking someone to buy something you want to sell.
Who knows, the sale may already be a done deal. But Mother did say that if the company backed out or delayed this, they will have to make contingencies. That certainly includes me; I think they're going out of the country in December, so I know I'll be in charge of taking care of The Store while they're gone if it's still ours. And even though it'll be a pain-in-the-ass to make sure the structure's still standing (especially after a blizzard), I really don't mind still having it in our possession, and in my life.
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