The Family Legacy Contract

Chapter Two

I knew something had happened before I'd even taken my helmet off.

The kitchen light was still on, which wasn't particularly unusual, but I could hear my mother laughing through the back door, followed by my brother's voice telling someone to stop making such a big deal out of something. Considering Ben was seventeen and generally regarded enthusiasm as an embarrassing condition best avoided in public, I was immediately curious.

I leaned my bicycle against the side of the house, made a mental note to bring it into the shed before bed, and let myself inside.

Our kitchen was small enough that four people could comfortably occupy it provided nobody needed to open the refrigerator. The cupboards were painted a pale yellow that Mum had chosen when I was twelve, and the laminate countertop had a burn mark beside the stove from the time Dad had attempted to make pancakes in a frying pan with a loose handle. He'd insisted the pan was defective. Mum maintained that he'd left it on the stove too long. Neither had been willing to concede the argument in the eleven years since.

Tonight, all three of them were gathered around the kitchen table.

My father, was standing behind Ben's chair with his reading glasses perched halfway down his nose. He was still wearing the navy work shirt he'd left in that morning, the sleeves rolled above his elbows, and there was a dark smear of grease along one forearm. Dad had worked at the manufacturing plant for almost twenty-five years before it closed. These days he took whatever maintenance and delivery work he could find, which meant he occasionally came home at three in the afternoon and sometimes not until midnight.

Mum stood beside him, holding a tea towel she'd apparently forgotten she was carrying. Linda was a small woman with blonde hair that had begun turning grey at the temples, although she'd recently decided to stop colouring it because, as she put it, she had better things to spend forty dollars on. She worked at the supermarket on Main Street and possessed the extraordinary ability to recognise every person in town by their shopping habits.

My younger brother was seated between them, looking simultaneously delighted and mortified.

"What's happened?" I asked, setting my helmet beside the fruit bowl.

"Nat!" Mum turned towards me with an enormous smile. "Come and see what your brother's done."

"I haven't actually done anything," Ben protested.

"Well, clearly you've done something, or we wouldn't all be standing here looking like we've won the lottery."

Dad laughed and moved aside so I could see the laptop.

Ben had inherited Mum's dark eyes and Dad's height, although at seventeen he hadn't quite grown into his long arms and legs. He was clever in a way I'd always found slightly irritating, mostly because things that took me hours of studying seemed to make sense to him after a single explanation. He was also kind, funny when he wasn't trying too hard, and occasionally capable of leaving a wet towel on the bathroom floor despite having been reminded approximately six thousand times that other people lived in the house.

He turned the laptop towards me.

"Remember that scholarship I applied for?"

"Of course I remember. You made me read your application essay four times."

"Three."

"Four, if we're including the version where you accidentally wrote that you wanted to study mechanical engagement instead of engineering."

"That was autocorrect."

"An unfortunate choice of career."

He rolled his eyes, but he was smiling as I leaned over his shoulder to read the email.

It was from the Harrison Foundation, a private organisation that offered university scholarships to students from towns affected by major industry closures. Ben had applied months earlier, after his guidance counsellor encouraged him to put together a portfolio of his school results, extracurricular projects and an essay explaining what he hoped to do with his education.

I'd helped him with the essay, although I hadn't understood much of the technical information about the little solar-powered irrigation system he'd built for a school competition.

The email began with the usual formal pleasantries before congratulating him on being selected for the final shortlist.

I read it twice.

"Ben, this is incredible."

His grin widened. "I know. I mean, there's still an interview, and they only pick six people out of the finalists, but apparently I've made it through the first two rounds."

"How many people applied?"

"Something like twelve hundred."

I looked at him.

"Twelve hundred?"

He nodded, trying and failing to appear modest.

"Oh my baby brother." I bent down and wrapped my arms around his shoulders. "I'm so proud of you."

He tolerated the hug for approximately three seconds before attempting to wriggle free.

"All right, all right."

"You're going to have to get used to this if you win."

"Please don't."

"I might come to your graduation with a banner."

"Nat."

"Something tasteful. Maybe a photograph of you as a baby."

Dad laughed, and Mum swatted my arm with the tea towel.

"Leave him alone. He's already nervous enough."

"I'm not nervous," Ben said.

"Of course you aren't," Mum replied, with the indulgent expression of someone who had spent seventeen years learning to identify precisely when her son was lying.

I straightened and read the email again, this time paying closer attention to the details. The scholarship would cover tuition, accommodation and a living allowance for four years, provided the recipient maintained the required academic standards.

It was an extraordinary opportunity. The kind that could change the entire direction of someone's life. I was so pleased for him that I could hardly stop smiling. And beneath that happiness, small and unwelcome, something else stirred. I recognised it immediately, which only made me feel worse.

Jealousy.

Not because Ben didn't deserve the scholarship. He deserved every bit of it. He'd worked incredibly hard, and I'd watched him spend evenings hunched over his desk, taking apart old electronics and putting them back together to see whether he could make them do something new.

I wanted him to win.

More than anything, I wanted him to win.

But I also remembered being seventeen and sitting at this same kitchen table with university brochures spread out in front of me, trying to decide whether I wanted to study business or international relations. I'd liked the idea of international relations because I imagined it might involve travelling, perhaps even living overseas for a while. Business seemed more sensible, and I'd eventually decided I could always study one and take electives in the other.

I'd spent hours comparing courses, reading about student accommodation and calculating how much money I would need to save before moving away.

Back then, I hadn't doubted that I would go. I knew it would be difficult, but difficult wasn't the same as impossible.

Then the factory closed, Dad lost his job, and everything that had seemed reasonably straightforward became considerably more complicated.

At first, I'd decided to take a year off. I could work, save some money and apply again the following autumn. It seemed like a sensible compromise, particularly when Dad was struggling to find work and Mum had started taking extra shifts at the supermarket.

The following autumn, there still wasn't enough money.

By the third year, I had stopped talking about university quite so often.

Now, five years later, my brother was looking at a scholarship that might give him everything I'd once imagined for myself.

"So, tell me everything. When's the interview?"

"Three weeks from Friday. It's online, thankfully, so I don't have to travel anywhere."

"Have they told you what they'll ask?"

"Not really. There's an information pack attached, but I haven't gone through the whole thing yet."

"Well, we can work on it together. I'll help you practise."

Ben gave me a grateful look. "Would you?"

"Of course. Although I reserve the right to ask some very difficult questions."

"Like what?"

"Why should we give you an enormous amount of money when you can't even remember to put your dishes in the sink?"

Dad laughed so hard he had to take off his glasses.

"That's a fair question," he said.

"You're all hilarious," Ben muttered.

Mum finally remembered the tea towel in her hands and tossed it onto the counter.

"I was just about to put the kettle on. Natalie, have you eaten?"

"At work. Pete made me some fries."

"Fries aren't dinner."

"They were accompanied by a very nutritious pickle."

She gave me a look.

"I'll make you something."

"Mum, it's nearly ten."

"And?"

"And you've been on your feet all day. I'll have some toast if I'm hungry."

She considered arguing, then apparently decided she had more important things to celebrate.

"Well, there's cake."

I looked at her in surprise. "Where did cake come from?"

"Your father went out and bought one."

Dad looked rather pleased with himself.

"It seemed like the occasion called for it."

"You found a cake at this time of night?"

"Petrol station."

"Ah. The finest patisserie in Willow Creek."

"It was the last chocolate one," he said, as though this made it particularly exclusive.

Ben leaned back in his chair. "Can we actually eat it now? You've been waiting for Natalie for ages."

"Well, somebody had to," Mum said. "We weren't going to celebrate without your sister."

I stood to fetch plates while Mum took the cake out of its plastic container. It was slightly lopsided, with chocolate icing that had stuck to the lid, but she'd put it on one of our proper serving plates and arranged four forks beside it.

We didn't have much reason to use the proper plates but I was glad she'd taken them out.

For the next half hour, we sat around the table eating cake and discussing everything Ben would need to do before his interview. Mum wanted to know whether he'd need a new shirt, Dad wondered if the school could help him prepare, and Ben was primarily concerned about whether the interviewers would expect him to wear a tie.

I suggested he wear one regardless, mostly because I enjoyed the expression on his face.

Eventually, Dad pushed his empty plate away and asked whether the scholarship would allow Ben to choose any university.

"Within reason," Ben said. "There are a few partner schools, but the one I want is on the list."

"Which one?"

"Northwestern."

I stopped halfway through a sip of tea.

Northwestern.

Near Chicago.

Far enough away that Ben would have to move out, make new friends and learn his way around an entirely different city.

I looked at him, suddenly remembering the little boy who used to follow me around the house asking me to explain things I'd only just learned myself.

"You'd be a long way from home," Mum said.

"Not that far."

"It's nearly four hours by car."

"Which is considerably closer than the moon," Dad observed.

Mum looked at him.

"That's not helpful, Daniel."

"I'm just putting things in perspective."

Ben smiled down at his plate, I could tell he was trying not to look too excited about the prospect of leaving.

"Chicago's brilliant," I told him. "You'll love it."

For a moment I could see him there, walking across a university campus with a backpack slung over one shoulder, surrounded by people who didn't know anything about the factory or the empty shops on Main Street. He would meet people from other places. He'd have friends whose parents were doctors and lawyers and professors, and he'd learn things from them that had nothing to do with his classes.

He might travel during the holidays.

He might fall in love.

He might decide never to come back.

The thought hurt a little, although I knew it shouldn't.

That was what we wanted for him. That was what I wanted for him.

Dad stood to take the plates to the sink, and I noticed the way he shifted his weight off his left knee before straightening. He'd injured it a few years earlier and it still bothered him after long days, although he refused to see anyone about it unless Mum threatened to make the appointment herself.

"Leave those," I said, getting up. "I'll do them."

"You've been working."

"So have you."

"That's different."

"Why?"

He opened his mouth, then apparently couldn't think of a convincing answer.

I took the plates from him.

"Go and sit down."

"Bossy, just like your mother."

"Someone has to keep this family functioning."

Mum smiled into her tea.

While I washed up, the conversation shifted to the practicalities of Ben leaving home. Mum wanted to know whether the scholarship covered textbooks, and Dad was trying to work out whether Ben would need a laptop more powerful than the one he already owned.

I listened while the warm water ran over my hands.

The conversation was familiar in its own way. We were very good at working out how much things cost, what could be postponed, and which expenses were unavoidable.

The difference was that tonight, for once, we were discussing money in connection with something wonderful and I didn't want to spoil that. So when Mum asked how my shift had gone, I told her it had been quiet.

Which was true.

"Ruth doing all right?" Dad asked.

"She's managing."

"Good woman, Ruth."

"She is."

I placed the last plate on the drying rack and turned off the tap.