But I kept a file.
Every few months, I checked the Memphis property records, partly out of professional habit and partly out of personal interest.
The house on Willowmere Drive changed hands once.
A small investment property on Lamar Avenue appeared under Edwin’s name, then disappeared.
He was moving money. Or trying to.
I noted it all.
Jean started preschool at a Montessori center two blocks from our apartment. She was brilliant already—reading simple words, obsessed with puzzles, utterly fearless. She had Edwin’s bone structure and my eyes, and absolutely nothing else about her belonged to him.
She was entirely her own person, and watching her become that person was the single most profound thing I had ever experienced.
She asked about her daddy once, very matter-of-fact, the way four-year-olds ask about dinosaurs or where rain comes from.
“Where’s my daddy, Mama?”
I held her face in my hands and said, “He’s not here, baby. But you’ve got me all the way. Every single day.”
She accepted that the way only children can—completely, without footnotes.
Then she went back to her puzzle.
I was not bitter.
I want to be clear about that.
Bitterness is a weight you carry for someone who doesn’t feel it. I had put that weight down.
What I had instead was clarity. And a real estate license. And a plan.
Year four.
I was 30 years old, and Beverly Holloway sat me down in her office on a Thursday morning, closed the door, and said something I did not expect.
“I want to sell the brokerage, Camille. And I want to sell it to you.”
I stared at her.
“Beverly…”
“Don’t tell me you can’t. Tell me why you won’t.”
Beverly was 61, recently diagnosed with early-stage rheumatoid arthritis and tired in a way she had been quietly managing for two years. She had no children. She had built Arcadia Realty from two agents and a rented desk into eleven agents, a commercial division, and a reputation across three counties.
And she was handing it to me.
“I can’t afford what this is worth,” I said honestly.
“You can if I structure the sale right. Owner financing, Camille. Five years. You’ve got the numbers. You’ve got the relationships. All you need is the nerve.”
I spent two weeks reviewing the books with Roslin, who flew up from Shreveport and sat at my kitchen table with her reading glasses and a legal pad and went through every line item like a surgeon.
At the end of it, she looked up and said, “This is solid. This is real, baby. Do you understand what she’s offering you?”
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