Chapter 5: The First Night
Caroline Briggs called after dark, as if she had expected the afternoon.
I told her the suitcases had reached the threshold and not the master bedroom. She allowed herself a small sound of approval and said she would send a formal notice of ownership and occupancy rights in the morning, copied to Rebecca’s last known address and to Trent’s office email, so that no one could claim confusion later. I thanked her. She asked whether I had opened Eleanor’s envelope. I said yes. She did not ask what it contained. Good attorneys know which silences are part of the design.
May you like
I ate toast at Eleanor’s counter and slept in the guest room because the master still smelled like her soap and I was not ready to replace that with my own. In the night the lake made its steady noise against the pilings. I lay awake long enough to name the feeling in my chest: not triumph, not even anger sharp enough to use. It was the plain weight of a boundary held. Harder than shouting. Quieter than a suitcase wheel on pine.
At dawn I walked to the boathouse and moved the fishing poles to one wall, the life jackets to another. Order was not for them. Order was for me, so the next time someone pointed at the loft and called it cute, the space would already be speaking for itself.
