past, and it was a Friday, which meant it was her favorite of all days.
Payday.
At least, she was pretty sure it was payday. Which was good, because she was broke. She had a neat little app on her phone that let her check her bank balance—a novelty for her since Blake had never let her touch their money in the past—and when she checked her account, it showed a bright red number and a lot of negatives pending.
Whoops. That was a new experience, too.
Once school was out and her students sent home, she texted her accountant. Not that she needed an accountant, but she did need someone she could trust that was good with money, and Layla had helped her get started when she’d arrived in Painted Barrel, clueless about bank accounts and credit lines and anything of that nature.
Also, Layla was about the same age as Amy and into thrifting and estate sales, so she was determined to befriend her.
AMY: Hi Layla! Did I get paid?
LAYLA: You get paid semimonthly.
AMY: What’s that mean? It’s Friday. I get paid on Friday right? Every other Friday?
LAYLA: No, you get paid on the 15th and the 30th. You don’t get paid today. Sorry!
Oh. Well, that sucked. Chewing on her lip, she considered. The fifteenth wasn’t for at least a week, and she was broke as a joke. You would think she would have gotten the hang of how her paycheck worked at this point, but nope.
AMY: Did my alimony payment come in from Blake? That’s supposed to come in at the beginning of each month, right?
LAYLA: It is and no surprise, it has not. I’m sorry. I know he’s supposed to pay. Because he’s self-employed it’s harder for the state to shake payments out of him.
Amy sighed. She knew all about that. Ever since she’d divorced Blake, she’d learned that he loved to hide his money—and she knew he had some—in various businesses and pretend like he didn’t cut himself a check. Even though he was supposed to send her alimony money every month, it never showed up. Layla was helping her with that, but she could only do so much.
AMY: OK, thank you. Any leads on any estate sales in our area?
LAYLA: No, but there’s a huge one in Casper! You should check it out. It was on all week and they’re closing everything out later today. That means everything left will be 50% off and I know you like a sale.
Oh, heck, she did. The only things she bought anymore were on sale. Layla texted her the address, and it was close to a consignment shop in Casper, so she rushed home, fed the dog, shoved a bunch of her designer clothing into the back of the car—and some of her jewelry—and drove as fast as she could to Casper, which was more than an hour away with the snowy weather.
Much to her disappointment, the consignment shop didn’t pay in advance, so she hocked her delicate Rolex and her pearl earrings with the matching bracelet that Blake had gotten her for their second anniversary. She left the clothes with the consignment shop anyhow, since she’d probably need more than the hundred bucks she had on her now, and drove as quickly as she could to the estate sale. They were packing up as she arrived, but they let her pick through the boxes after she begged prettily.
Fifty dollars later, she had some dishes, some linens, a dog bed, and an entire box of random Christmas decorations that looked pretty dated. She was positive she could repurpose them to be useful, though. After all, the animatronic Santa humping on Mrs. Claus didn’t have to be humping, did he? She could separate them and then just have . . . two happy, jolly old elves who happened to have weird expressions on their faces.
It’d work. She’d make it work. That was Amy Mckinney’s new motto—she was independent, damn it, and she didn’t need her ex-husband, Blake Todd, to run her life. With a firm, angry nod at the world, Amy packed her finds into the back of her car and put the key into the ignition.
It didn’t start.
Her heart stuttered. She panicked. Took a deep breath. Sure, her car was old, but it wasn’t that old, was it? She closed her eyes, said a little prayer, and then tried the key again. This time, the car choked, but the engine turned over.
Triumphant, Amy set off on the road back