Chapter 71: Jacob's Ambition

Mom's eyes welled up. "I... I just thought that now that our son is making so much money, I ought to do better too. I was just..."Dad rubbed his forehead with his hand, a pained expression on his face. "And I thought you were acting strange around me because I wasn't helping you enough around the house..."

A tear slid down my mom's cheek. "I guess I just felt a bit unneeded." her voice was trembling.

"Mom," I began softly, "you've done more than enough already. From the moment Sydney and I were born, you worked tirelessly—making sure we had food, taking care of our clothes, cleaning the house, preparing everything we needed and working a day job at the same time as well..."

"It's time for you to take a break. If you want to find another job, that's entirely up to you. But please, don't feel bad about this. You've given so much of yourself... It's okay to rest now. You shouldn't feel guilty, you should feel proud of everything you have done for us."

Her tears started to fall more freely.

Dad reached out, taking her hand gently. "Jess, that's not how I see it at all. I never thought you weren't doing enough." he then pulled Mom into a hug.

"Thank you... I guess I needed to hear that." Mom's voice was soft.

Sydney sat quietly at the table, her eyes darting between me and our parents. She didn't know what to say.

'Thankfuly, I realised that my mom was dealing with this soon so that it didn't get worse.' I thought.

About 20 minutes later, after going through some things, my mom calmed down quite a bit.

"Hey, Dad, did you already get around to that lung cleaning treatment?"

"Not yet. I'm scheduled for it next week." he replied, then shifted the conversation. "Son, I've been meaning to ask... We left you with $50,000. How did you make a million dollars? What did you put that money in?"

"It's actually pretty simple. I put everything into a Chinese company that's been selling video games. That's it."

"That's all?" My dad's eyebrows knitted together in confusion.

"Yep. Just a single investment. The company did incredibly well."

"I mean... that's unbelievable. I never imagined money could be made like this," he marveled.

"Oh! And also, I found a job," I added casually.

"What? Where?" My mom asked, now more composed.

"As a trading advisor for Johnson Trading in Orlando. They will pay me $13,000 a month."

Their jaws dropped.

"Waaaa!" Sydney exclaimed. "You're rich, bro!"

I looked at her. "And I wasn't without that job?"

She calmed down at that. "True. But still... you should have bought me a better present than your car."

"I can buy you a kick in the ass, Sydney..."

"We're so proud of you, Jack," my dad said. "Oh, right..." He looked like he remembered something. He stood up and walked over to the refrigerator. He grabbed a letter from it's top and held it to me. "You got a letter from Bank of America."

"Those must be the credit cards..." I muttered to myself.

"Credit cards?" mom asked.

"Yes, they offered me a Diamond Membership. Those credit cards let me get better deals on some things."

"Damn! Rich life must be nice." Sydney said.

"If they weren't making profits from this, they'd never offer it. They make people buy more than they need to."

"Nothing's free in this world," Dad said.

"That's right, Dad." I replied and then I stood up. "I wanted to go visit Jacob today, but I will be right back, okay?"

"Will you be having supper at his place?" my mom asked, looking concerned.

"I don't know, Mom, but don't worry, if you make something, I'll definitely eat it."

I left the house and walked west, heading to Jacob's house.

I reached his house, and I noticed something new. There were at least a dozen cars standing in their backyard and there was a large advertisement banner showing a mechanic standing beside a shiny, well-maintained car.

As I got closer, I saw the slogan on the banner: "When your car is out of luck, McCoy will fix it up."

'What brought this idea on? They never had a banner like this.' I thought.

CLANK! CLANK!

I heard sounds coming from their large garage.

Someone's working at this time of day? Sёarᴄh the novel(F~)ire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

It was almost evening.

I walked to the garage; curious to see if it was Jacob's father working so late into the day.

CLANK!

"Good afternoon!" I called out.

From beneath a silver Mercedes, a car creeper slid out. "Whoa! If it isn't Jack!" It was Jacob. His hands and face were dirty with car oil or something similar. "What's up, dude? You caught me in the middle of some serious bolting!"

"I came to visit," I said, glancing around the garage. "We haven't caught up in quite some time. But I'm shocked—you're still working at this hour?"

Jacob didn't bother standing up. "Yeah, things have changed quite a bit since you left, man. I gotta hustle if I want to get things where I need them to be. Anyway, give me about ten minutes, okay? You can sit here or get inside, my parents are home." he said and then creeped back under the car to continue his work.

After about fifteen minutes, Jacob emerged from under the car, wiped his hands and face clean in the garage sink, and stretched. "Alright, bro. Come on in."

I followed him inside, and after greeting his parents, we went up to his room.

Jacob had three siblings so his parents needed to raise the house after his youngest brother was born.

I sat on his bed. "Tell me what's up, Jacob. Since when is that banner in your backyard?" I asked him.

Jacob handed me a can of Coke and sat down in his chair. "I'm not gonna lie to you, bro, it's partially because of Lucy."

"Lucy? You're still together?"

"Yeah," he said with a grin. "I guess we fit pretty well together."

"So, you're saying the banner is because of Lucy?"

"Not just because of her," Jacob clarified. "But she definitely pushed me in that direction. My dad was hesitant about it because we already had enough clients at the time. But I wanted to expand, you know? Lucy wanted me to try harder too. So when I made enough money, I bought the materials and put up the banner myself." He enthusiastically gestured with his hands.

He continued. "I'm thinking about turning our family business into a real company. We could hire some more people and really grow it."

'Maybe Lucy White's influence on Jacob isn't that bad after all.' I thought.

"Jacob, do you need money?" I asked.