Chapter 12: The Stepping Stones
The deed was restored to David's sole ownership six weeks later.
Geoffrey called on a Friday afternoon to deliver the news.
The property fraud review had confirmed the backdating.
The joint tenancy transfer was declared void.
Jessica's name was removed from the deed.
The will was simultaneously under a separate review, but Geoffrey expected the same outcome — the changes made under what he formally described as *sustained undue influence during a period of bereavement* were unlikely to hold.
David sat in the kitchen after the call and said nothing for quite a while.
Jasmine made tea.
Set a cup in front of him.
Sat across the table.
"It's done?" she asked.
"The deed is.
The will takes a little longer.
But Geoffrey says it's a formality now."
She wrapped her hands around her own cup.
"How do you feel?"
He thought about it.
"Older," he said.
"And lighter.
Both at the same time."
She understood that.
---
Tyler texted Jasmine on a Sunday, two weeks later.
*She's moved in with someone.
I don't know him well.
I'm staying with my uncle for now.*
Jasmine read the message twice.
Then typed: *Are you okay?*
He replied: *Yeah.
I think so.
She's my mum.
But.*
He left it there.
Jasmine understood the *but*.
It was the kind of word that carried everything a person wasn't sure how to say yet.
*You're welcome here anytime*, she typed back.
*That's from my dad too.
He asked me to tell you.*
A pause.
Then: *Tell him thanks.*
She did.
---
The will was formally amended four weeks after that.
David instructed Geoffrey to restore the original terms: the house to Jasmine, the savings split evenly between them.
He also added a small amount for Tyler — set aside and held in trust until the boy turned twenty-one, with no conditions attached.
When Geoffrey asked if he wanted a note included in the document explaining the gift, David said no.
"He doesn't need a reason," David said.
"He told the truth when he didn't have to.
That's enough."
---
On the last Saturday of October, Jasmine went into the back garden.
The rosebush had gone dry and leggy at the edges — nobody had tended it properly in years.
She got the pruning shears from the garage and spent the better part of an afternoon working through it.
It was slow and careful work.
The kind that couldn't be rushed.
David came out at some point and stood watching her.
"Your mother used to do that every autumn," he said.
"I know.
I watched her."
He was quiet for a moment.
Then he got the garden gloves from the shelf by the garage door and came over.
They worked through the rest of the afternoon without talking much.
The light went from gold to pale and then to that particular flat grey that comes before the lamps need turning on.
Jasmine stepped back and looked at what they'd done.
The stepping stones her mother had laid were still there.
A little uneven now, the way old things settle.
She had always meant to straighten them.
She had always assumed there was time.
She crouched down and pressed her palm flat against the nearest stone.
Cold and solid.
Still exactly where her mother had placed it.
She didn't say anything.
She didn't need to.
Her father came and stood beside her.
He looked down at the stones and then out at the garden.
"We should plant something new in the spring," he said.
"What do you think she'd have liked?"
Jasmine stood up.
She thought about her mother — the real sound of her, the specific way she laughed, the smell of her coat, the way she said *sweetheart* like it was the most natural word in the world.
"Lavender," Jasmine said.
"She always wanted lavender along the back wall."
David nodded.
"Lavender it is," he said.
They walked back inside together as the lights of the neighboring houses came on, one by one, in the early October dark.
---
Sometimes the people who try to take the most from us end up giving us something we didn't know we'd lost — the chance to fight for what matters, and the people we're willing to fight for.
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