Many thanks to Sharon for editing this story without her love and support this story would never have been published.
Note: This story is fictional.
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I'm Harry Woods, a little over a year ago I got a phone call from my daughter-in-law Samantha, asking if the whole family could stay with us until Sam and my son Peter could find jobs and get back on their feet. I told her: "That it would mean that I had to move out of my bedroom and into my computer room while Sam and my son Peter would take my room, and their two daughters, Jane age thirteen and Sandy the eight year old would sleep, one on a roll-way bed and the other on an air mattress in the den.
I then asked Sam, "If they had any problems with those arrangements."
She said "no, as they were desperate and her parents lived in a single wide two bedroom mobile home and did not have the space to accommodate the four of them.
"Okay." I told Sam, "When do we expect you here?"
"In a few days, we need to pack our stuff and get a U-Haul and my dad is going to let us have the money for the U-Haul." She informed me.
I told my wife Mary, what was happening with Peter and his family and that they would be living with us for a short time, that is until Peter and or Sam could find jobs and save enough money to rent a place of their own.
Mary burst out laughing and then said; "I bet that they will be here more than six months"
Boy was Mary right, they ended up living with us for almost seven months, although it was rough living with four females, in a sense it was the most exciting seven months of my life.
The only reason they left was due that the couple from whom we rented had to sell the house as they were getting a divorce. I had also found a part time position in another part of the state.
The next day I cleaned out my room and moved my clothes and other personal items to the computer room where I had a single bed for me to sleep on when we had guests for a few days, or if my sister came for a visit she would sleep in the computer room.
Two days later, they arrived at the place we were renting which was a three bedroom double wide manufactured home with a den, living room, dining area and kitchen and two bathrooms, with a truck load of furniture and other household items packed in boxes along with their van filled to the capacity with clothes.
About two weeks after Sam and my son's family had moved in, Sam found a job in a retirement Center for rich folks working in the kitchen helping prepare the food and also working on the serving line. It was not the best paying job but it was above minimum wages.
About two weeks after she had started working at the retirement center she helped her mother Pamela and my wife Mary to get jobs in the dining room helping clients who were handicapped get their food to their tables and to serve them their beverages. They also had to keep their assigned tables and the area clean at all times.
That meant that Pamela had to find a place to live if she was going to be working at the center. So Sam volunteered for her mom to stay with us.
That was not to my liking at all, because Pamela had lived with us for a few months after Sandy was born and I had had to remind Pamela that she had overstayed her welcome of six weeks when Sam had told me she would be with us for about six weeks helping out with Dandy when she was born.
Pamela is a very domineering person and she knows everything, or so she thinks, all you need to do is ask her and she'll tell you; and if you can do something well she has done the same thing even better or someone in her family has done it better. Not only is she domineering she is also very opinionated.
No need to say that Pamela is not one of my favorite persons. Pamela also has a very loud and aggravating voice.
Mary lasted only a little over a week, Mary is somewhat handicapped due to an injury to her back when she fell in a street while crossing it with our daughter. She has been retired more than ten years on disability from her state nursing job and also placed on Social Security disability before the age of sixty-five. Yet she was fired because they did not think she could do the work (or as they told her "they thought she was not retirement center material") although she was hired after she had told them of her disability.
Sam lasted about two months, and got fired for visiting with a client while Peter was doing some work for the client.
After Sam was fired for visiting a client, personnel decided that Pamela also had to go, so they used some flimsy excuse saying that she had harassed some Hispanic women who worked there as well.
A couple of weeks later Sam found another job as an executive assistant for an insurance agency in a neighboring city. The agency was getting ready to relocate to a larger office complex, so they hired Peter to set up a new computer network for them. Many times Peter and Sam were alone in the offices because all the agents were out in the field trying to get new clients or to add new benefits to the company's plans that were already in place in different work environments.
After she had been with the agency for a while, Sam started to come into my room at night to chat with me; I never closed the door so she would just put her head in the doorway and ask me if I wanted to chat, I always said yes. The chats became a welcomed diversion from whatever I was doing at the time and I got so used to these nightly visits that I started to look forward to them. I always enjoyed our conversations.
One night Sam came into the room and asked me if she could ask me a personal question.
