Page 123 of The New Place

“If not, I think I could still get you a non-tenured position. A lecturer, or even a postdoc.”

“No, if I can get tenure track that’s—I’ll do that. We will.”

“I know it’s Friday, but if you can get me anything by EOD, or first thing Monday, like I said we can move this forward,” Beverly says.

Ned swallows a jolt of nausea. Yes, forward. A job—a great job—for the exchange of their signed letters and this one little detail of paperwork.

Abbot’s sitting completely still, his face blank, so Ned knows he has to be the one to keep talking. He leans toward the phone and says with as warm a tone as he can muster, “Great, thank you so much. We’ll sit down and get something to you, like you said either hopefully by today or definitely by Monday.”

“Wonderful. I can email you this list of documents HR will accept. And listen, we’re looking forward to having you both.”

“Couldn’t be better for us, too.”

Ned carefully doesn’t look at Abbot when the call ends.

Okay. They can deal with this. They have two jobs waiting for them. This is all amazing. Perfect, even.

“Um,” he gets as far as saying and then stops, because he has no fucking clue what possibly comes next.

Abbot slowly opens his phone and pulls up his email.

Ned could look at the list too, but his stomach turns.

“Shared basic living expenses,” Abbot reads.

“Right,” Ned agrees. They absolutely do not share that. Or a kid or a place where they live or a marriage. They’re together. Isn’t that good enough?

No, apparently.

“We can open a bank account,” Abbot says. “And put in a few thousand dollars, enough to make it look like we pay our bills out of it. Or actually pay some bills, I suppose, and send over a statement.”

A few thousand. Right. “What else could we do?” Ned asks quickly.

Abbot glances at him. “We don’t have to touch the money and can take it back out.”

No, Abbot doesn’t need to touch his part of the money. Ned can’t put that much cash in an account and let it sit there until everything is nicely sorted out. He needs that money. And—a couple thousand is a lot. He gets paid at the end of next week. He spent plenty of his last paycheck on bills, and he still has to pay Jen this month’s child support, so he’s not even certain he has that sitting in his checking account right now.

No, he knows: He sure as shit doesn’t.

He really doesn’t want to have to say that out loud to Abbot.

“It’d have to be backdated,” Ned says. “Beneficiaries of a life insurance policy? Though mine’s set up to go to Peggy.”

“We could take out new ones,” Abbot says.

Ned shakes his head. If they’re going to put thousands into an account, buying a new policy sounds even worse.

“Medical power of attorney,” Abbot says as he scrolls farther. “Ah, only when combined with another criteria.”

“We’d need a lawyer, right?” Ned asks. “To draw that up? That’s not quick to get.”

“No, though not much is by today or even by Monday,” Abbot says.

Ned feels another answer burning at him. The way forward that will fix everything.

His breath catches. He’s not doing this. He’s not suggesting it. Is he? “Massachusetts has a waiting period,” he says. His mouth is dry. “For a marriage license.”

“Maine doesn’t,” Abbot says softly.