Chapter 4: Moving and Settling In

By the end of the month, my old house was on the market. I had found the perfect house for myself. Situated just about 10 miles southeast of the city where I was now working. It was just a mile off the interstate and 25 minutes from the ocean. The house was large for just me; having four bedrooms, three baths with an attached two-car garage. Best of all, set off slightly to the side behind the house was a 30 by 60 shop. All of this was on 5 acres. I fell in love with it and used a small portion of my inheritance to pay cash for it. This was the only change I had made in my life style up to this point.

Matt again helped with my moving in a week after I purchased the new house. He lived five miles from me, which turned out to be a blessing. The two of us had a lot in common and although Robin had still not quite forgiven him, they would meet at my house and enjoy each other's company. Matt and I on the other hand would spend hours together talking and working on different projects. When he found out, I was building my own furniture and saw some of my work he decided that he would do the same. Matt was using my shop and at times, we worked on the same piece of furniture together.

April, Robin and I were dating as a couple and threesome. I would not give into Robin's demands to be intimate with her until 18^th birthday. This caused a bit of a strain between April and Robin, April and me, and Robin and me since April would not be intimate with me until we settled our deal with Robin. April and Robin both liked the house and spent most weekends with me sleeping in a guest bedroom. April's and Robin's farm was 15 miles south of the city, which put them 22 miles from me as the crow flies. By road, it was more like 33 miles and took between 30 and 45 minutes to travel depending on the time of day and traffic conditions.

Matt had not survived his divorce as well as I did. When he gave up his share of the farm to the girls, it was the final catalyst leading to his divorce. Although his wife was not as viscous as mine was. She did run up a sizable debt by buying all new stuff after she moved out charging it to their credit card accounts. The judge split the property up saying since his wife had left everything behind and with not wanting the house felt that it was fair for Matt to assume all the debt. Although the house was bought with two incomes in mind, he was able to make the payments, but there was nothing left over at the end of the month. I knew he was eating only one meal a day quite often.

One time, when April and I were discussing this she told me how bad she felt since he was having such a hard time financially. Once when Matt was over and April was there I got him to talking about his debt, and he complained that most of the problem was that the interest on the different credit cards, which were eating up any spare money he had. April tried to give Matt some money from his share of the farm, which Matt refused. I suggest that he just stop paying them and he said that his company took a very dim view of that and when a co-worker had declared bankruptcy within the month he had been let go.

About four months later, April told him to get all his bills together and she would use the farm up as collateral against what he owed. Matt's bills came to slightly more than 32 thousand not including his house. When Robin found out about the amount, she would not agree on this. Since I had the account number on two of the largest accounts I just had my lawyer send them a check to cover the amounts due. This freed up about $300.00 per month for Matt.

April and Robin both confronted me when Matt thanked them for their generosity. I would not admit to paying it off but I asked them why they were worried about it when they were not willing to help their bother. Robin went ballistic and started yelling at me. I made some very rude and sarcastic remarks about her caring nothing for her brother. Robin responded by punching me in the chest. At that point, I started laughing. Shortly April saw the humor in it but we had to explain it to Robin. I told her that she had goaded her bother into hitting her just as I had done the same to her. I then asked her if I should get a court order to keep her away from me and not worry about any of her problems in the future. Robin started crying; I don't remember how but we all end up in bed cuddling with Robin in the center but we spent the night that way.

The next morning, Robin woke us up at 5:30. Robin wanted to know if we could go to the bank today and help get Matt a loan. At 6:00, Robin called her bother, asked him if he could get the morning off, and meet her at his bank. At 9:00, we all met at the bank and by 9:20, we left unhappy. I suggested we use my bank, which was just a mile down the road.

As we entered the lobby, the Bank Officer, I had used to help close on my house and pay on Matt's credit cards came over to talk to me. After I explained, what the problem was she led us back to her office. Not only did she consolidate his bills into a single loan using the farm as collateral and the original loan on the his house was refinanced at a much lower interest rate. This meant that he was only going to be paying out about half of what he had been. This made the monthly payment slightly over half his monthly salary instead of just over 85% of it. Matt was extremely happy. When he thanked April and Robin, Robin apologized for goading him into losing his temper so long ago. Then they hugged and made up which, made both April and I extremely happy.

Both Matt and I had taken the day off. April went to work and Robin to school promising to return to my house at the end of the day to celebrate. Matt went home to change in to his work clothes before coming over. I stopped off at the meat market to pick up some good T-Bones for dinner on the way home.

I had changed into my work clothes and was having a cup of coffee when Matt arrived. I offered him a cup and he looked at the magazine on boating I had reading while I got him a cup. I had circled a couple ads in it. Matt and I discussed boats for a bit. Then he mentioned that one of his college friends was now the managing owner of the Deaton Yacht Brokers and he would be glad to introduce him to me today. I made some wise comment about not being dressed properly and he laughed and said, "I use to go there when I wanted to do woodworking. This is how I go all the time!"

When we arrived at Deaton's, Matt introduced me to Dale. Matt explained that he had found me looking through ads for boats this morning. Dale asked what I was looking for and I told him a 40 to 70 foot boat a single person could handle.

I wanted speed to get out to the fishing areas and preferred two motors for safety. Dale said "I have such a deal for you!" while twisting his imaginary mustache.

We all laughed but he went on to explain. "A family friend had bought a 60 footer that sleeps up to 8 people five years ago. Six months later, the wife contracted an inner ear infection and from then on every time they went out or slept on board, she got motion sick. Last month, her husband had retuned from fishing and was steering the boat up to the pier when he started the foghorn and keeled over from a massive heart attack. People on the pier managed to board and secure the boat but it was too late for him. The wife has hated the boat for the last four years because he would go out every chance he had. Then his dying on it was just too much and she will sell the boat for $750,000 and it is worth over a million but she just wanted to it get rid of it now. If you buy, it directly from her there would be no brokerage fees. Could I send you to see it?"

I asked him what he knew about the boat. Dale said, "All maintenance has been carried out here in the yard and I can personally vouch for everything except the hull because it had not been out of the water since it was last inspection two years ago."

I asked him to describe the boat and he said it had two Cummins diesels, which gave it a cruse speed of 32 knots and a top speed of 38 knots. The boat carried 1500-gallons of fuel, 250-gallons of water, and had a 100-gallon holding tank, the boat's controls were in the deckhouse and on the flying bridge although the radar did not have a repeater on the flying bridge. He then listed an impressive electronic package. Dale went on to say it had three staterooms with their own toilet and shower except for the master bathroom, which also had a Jacuzzi tub. A fourth bath held just a sink and toilet was just aft of the saloon and galley. The master bedroom had a king-size bed and the rest were built-in queen-size bed. Two more could sleep in the saloon as needed.

I asked him how many people it took to run the boat. That I could not see myself maneuvering it into a slip by myself and he laughed and said sorry I forgot to mention that it has bow thrusters so it can turn in a circle the length of the boat. That was the one of the reasons for purchasing the boat. I told him I would like to look at it and Dale told Matt and I where to find the boat and that he would call Mrs. Davis and advise her we were on our way.

We drove up the coast five miles to an exclusive marina. A woman who looked to be between 65 and 70 met us on the pier. Matt immediately recognized her and gave her a hug. He introduced her as Mrs. Davis. Mrs. Davis first question was "Are you going to buy the boat Matt?" Matt told her no that he could not afford it or the upkeep but I was part of the family now and then introduced me. We talked for a few minutes and I found out that at one time they had been neighbors owning the farm to the west of April and Robin's farm. They talked about the families and both said they were sorry to hear about the deaths of their loved ones.

When we started to look at the boat Mrs. Davis told Matt to show it to me and that she was never going to step foot on it again. Matt and I spent about 2 hours looking through everything.

They had taken the aft cabin and made it into more of a study installing bookcases and a desk with a built-in computer although they left a single bed instead of the queen. Later on deck Matt pointed out the satellite dish, saying it could be connected to the Internet, although he did not think it ever, had been.

When we returned to the pier, I asked Mrs. Davis "How much for the boat as she is?"

She said, "$800.000.00"

I told her "I would like it, Could you wait till next week for the money?"

Matt asked. "Do you have that type of money?"

"Yes I do but it will take me a few days to sell some stock to get it." I explained.

"If Matt and Dale vouch for you I will trust you for it!" stated Mrs. Davis.

I then asked, "How about retaining this slip?"

Mrs. Davis had a funny look on her face and said, "I forgot! We own this slip and pay an association fee of $25 a month plus electric. I do not know what I paid for it, or what it is worth today! I guess I can just give it to you!" and then smiled.