Evie
AS SOON AS I got my first paycheck with my raise, I sent as much as I could to pay my mortgage.
What I had didn’t cover as much as I owed, and I’d had to pay other bills as well. My credit cards
were about to eat me alive. I’d divided and conquered, sendin g as much as I could afford to
each lender, hoping that the partial payments would stave off collections and foreclosure.
I didn’t have any reason to suspect it wouldn’t work. I was paying. Maybe not on time, maybe
not all of it, but I was doing what I could.
Apparently, it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.
I sat down at my dining table, holding the letter in my hands that let me know that my mortgage
lender had refused my partial payment.
I snatched up my phone and dialed the number listed on the letter. After a lengthy hold, Sharon,
in customer service, let me know she was there to help me.
“Hi, Sharon. My name is Evangeline Day. I just received a notice that my payment was refused.
Could you help me figure out why that is?” I asked, doing my best to sound calm, professional,
and courteous when all I wanted to do was scream wildly into the ph one. My breathing felt
uneven.
“I’ll need some information from you,” she said, and we began the process where I told her
everything about myself
so she could be sure it was really me. Why anyone would impersonate someone making a call
like this wasn’t clear to me, but whatever.
After that, she fell into a de ep silence. I could hear clicking keys and a sigh or two from her. With
every sound I heard, my heart pounded harder.
My breathing got faster, so I closed my eyes and tried to think about things that calmed me
down — tropical palm trees blowing in a breeze, kittens, puppies running through a field of
daffodils, a giant pile of Easter chocolate that I’d bought the day after for fifty percent off.
“Ma’am, your payment was denied because you’ve missed too many mortgage payments,”
Sharon said. “You sent in a partial payment.”
“I thought that would help,” I said, but she cut me off before I could say more.
“It would help if you hadn’t missed so many, and it might help if you weren’t already in the
foreclosure process.”
“I’m not in foreclosure!” I said, and my voice pitched too high.
In contrast, Sharon’s voice went more authoritative. She had now lumped me in with the kinds
of losers who don’t pay their mortgages. It didn’t matter why I hadn’t paid. “You haven’t gotten
the notice yet, but the lender is in the process. You should recei ve official notice within the next
week.”
“Oh my God,” I breathed. “I can’t foreclose. This is my home!”
“I suggest you watch for the notice, ma’am.”
I wanted to ask more questions, but I didn’t even know what to ask. I’d never missed payments
before. I wasn’t familiar with the situation, or my options, or what was coming next.
When we hung up, the only thing I could do was listen to the sound of my breaths coming too
hard and too fast while my phone dangled in my hands.
This was my house. My home. I’d planned to stay here until I got married and had kids or until I
died, whichever came first.
I couldn’t give it up, but I’d made some impossible decisions and now I might have to. If I lost
this house to foreclosure, getting another house would be near impossible. Prices had gone way
up and my credit would be shot. This wasn’t just financial failu re at my door, this was the
possible death of all of my dreams for my life, for myself.
I thought about calling my mom, but she wouldn’t understand.
I needed to call my dad, but he was the entire reason I was in this situation.
Then I thought about having to go to work, where I was now executive assistant to the richest
person I’d ever met, who would definitely not understand why I was heartbroken that my two -
bedroom hovel with a complete lack of fountains and dolphin statues was being foreclosed on.
I’d have to ke ep my problems locked up while I helped him build a greater empire, filled with
houses that would dwarf my home.
Nothing and no one could help me at this point. I’d messed up, and the consequences were
coming. All I could do was brace myself and try not to think too hard about it all.
For the rest of the day, I sat on my couch, binged a show, and went through various stages of
mourning. Denial — I could find a way to save my house. I made good money now. I could find a
lawyer and fix this. Anger — how could this have happened? And how was I going to afford a
lawyer? I couldn’t afford a lawyer! I skipped right over bargaining because there was no point.
Mostly, I wallowed in the d epression stage.
Sometime in the afternoon, my phone buzzed, and I checked to find a message from Rex, asking
me to attend a
fundraiser at an art gallery with him that Friday. I said yes, because that was part of the deal and
because I still needed this job. I definitely couldn’t save my house if I was also unemployed.
Those stakes were higher than ever.
So I would plaster a smile on my face, hobnob with the wealthy people of Seattle, and pretend
like my life wasn’t a hot mess, like they weren’t all going home to mansions while my home was
about to be taken from me.