Elena read the letter aloud in her office.
Gerald claimed the porch finish had faded prematurely.
Diane claimed the railings were already chipping.
They estimated repairs at more than six thousand dollars.
That estimate would wipe out Dad's unpaid balance and leave him owing them money.
I stared at the number.
“They're making it up,” I said.
Elena looked toward Dad.
“Maybe. We need to know what they're relying on.”
Dad asked for photographs.
The Prescotts' attorney sent three.
One showed a scrape near a porch chair.
Another showed a small chipped area below a window.
The third showed a railing with paint rubbed away where a metal planter rested against it.
Dad recognized the planter.
It had not been there during the final walkthrough.
He had a photograph of the same section without it.
The independent inspector's report described the marks as consistent with impacts or abrasion after application.
It did not identify a widespread failure of the coating.
Elena compared the photographs.
“They can still disagree,” she said.
“But they need an evidentiary basis for their deduction.”
Dad asked whether he should offer to touch up the marks.
He wanted to keep the job's reputation intact.
Elena recommended handling any visit through counsel and documenting the condition first.
She also warned that agreeing to repair damage caused by others could be misunderstood as accepting fault.
Dad thought carefully.
He was willing to inspect a genuine workmanship concern.
He was not willing to let the owners invent an unlimited list of free jobs.
They agreed to offer a supervised inspection and correction of defects actually attributable to his work.
The Prescotts declined.
They said Dad was not welcome back on the property.
I asked how they could demand repair and then refuse access.
Elena folded her hands.
“That's one of the questions we'll put in writing.”
Outside the office, I called my husband, Aaron.
He had listened to me talk about the Prescotts almost every evening.
He was patient until I began pacing the sidewalk.
“Come home,” he said.
“I can't believe this.”
“Your dad has a lawyer. Let them do the work.”
I knew he was right.
I did not like hearing it.
At home, Lily was waiting with her model bridge.
The stand Dad had made fitted perfectly.
She had written his name on a small card beside it.
“Built with Grandpa Walter,” it said.
I sat at the table and helped her check the measurements.
For an hour, I did not think about Gerald Prescott.
It was the first quiet hour I'd had in days.
Later, Dad called.
“Did the bridge hold?”
A few days after the photographs arrived, I drove past the lake with Aaron.
We were taking Lily to a birthday party on the other side of town.
The road curved along the water before reaching the bridge.
From the car, we could see boats resting at their docks.
A fisherman was packing up his equipment near the public landing.
The lake looked peaceful.
I hated that the view now reminded me of an argument.
Aaron noticed where I was looking.
“Still thinking about that house?”
“Yes.”
“Your dad isn't letting it eat him alive.”
“Maybe he's hiding how much it hurts.”
“Maybe he's handling it differently from you.”
I turned toward him.
He kept his eyes on the road.
“You don't have to feel less angry,” he said.
“But you don't need to spend every day finding a new version of the argument.”
I looked back toward the lake.
He was right.
I had been telling the story to myself each morning as though repetition could improve the ending.
At the party, Lily ran off to greet her friends.
Aaron and I stayed for coffee with the other parents.
A woman asked what my father had been working on lately.
I nearly launched into the whole Prescott dispute.
Then I stopped.
“He finished a lake house this summer,” I said.
“And now he's painting a reading room at the daycare.”
The woman smiled.
“My little boy goes there. The yellow walls look lovely.”
We talked about school schedules instead.
I was surprised by how much better I felt.
That evening, Dad called to ask whether Lily had enjoyed the party.
She had come home carrying a paper crown and a bag of candy.
I told him she was already asleep.
He asked if Aaron and I wanted to join him for breakfast Sunday.
We agreed.
Then I asked whether he had thought any more about the demand for repainting.
“Elena has the letter,” he said.
“I've done what she asked.”
“Are you worried?”
“Some.”
He admitted that the uncertainty was tiring.
He disliked not knowing whether the matter would end in weeks or months.
But he had put enough money aside to keep working and paying his ordinary expenses.
He was managing the risk.
I told him Aaron thought I was obsessing.
Dad laughed gently.
“Your husband is usually a sensible man.”
I groaned.
“Everyone's against me.”
“No,” Dad said.
“We just want you to enjoy your Saturday.”
I looked toward the room where Lily slept.
That was the first night in weeks when I put my phone away before dinner and left it there.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He paused.
“You've been carrying my dispute like it's yours.”
“They were cruel to you.”
“I know.”
“I can't stop thinking about it.”
“Then think about how we answer them. Not how angry we ought to be.”
He told me that someone could be both disrespectful and legally wrong.
Those were different problems.
He intended to pursue the money.
He could not force Gerald to become a decent man.
I stared at the bridge on the kitchen counter.
“Doesn't it bother you that he said you might die?”
Dad was quiet for a while.
“Yes,” he said.
“More than I told you.”
That admission surprised me.
He rarely discussed fear.
He said the sentence had reminded him how old he was becoming in other people's eyes.
He knew his body was slowing down.
He felt it after climbing stairs.
He noticed it when the air turned cold and his hands took longer to loosen.
But he was still alive, capable, and present.
Gerald had treated him as though his remaining years were something to exploit.
“That made me angry,” Dad said.
“Then why didn't you shout?”
“Because shouting wouldn't give me more years. Or the money.”
After we hung up, I opened the folder Dad had let me copy.
I read the contract again.
I noticed the dates of the signed change orders.
I noticed how often Diane's requests had pushed the schedule.
I noticed that Dad's final invoice did not charge for several small courtesy tasks.
He had repaired a loose latch.
He had tightened a railing screw.
He had filled nail holes left by a contractor who installed the porch light.
Those details were not the legal heart of the dispute.
They told me something about the job.
Dad had tried to leave the property better than he found it.
The Prescotts had noticed only the amount they thought they could avoid paying.
Two days later, Patrick called Elena again.
The buyers had commissioned their own review of the exterior.
They saw no reason to repaint the porch.
But their attorney had discovered that the contractor dispute might complicate the title process if unresolved.
The buyers were not threatening to cancel immediately.
They were asking for a reliable plan.
Gerald had another opportunity to settle.
Instead, he sent Dad a message directly.
It was only six words.
“You won't see a single dime.”
Dad forwarded it to Elena.
Then he returned to work.
Click here to continue reading: PART 8: The Buyers Asked for Clear Answers While Gerald Tried to Turn Delay Into Leverage
The Prescotts Refused My Father’s Final Payment and Signed a Paper They Barely Read
Part 7 of 16
