Chapter 8: The House
The Highland Park house was addressed in a separate motion: exclusive use, inventory, the return of items that had never stopped belonging to me in law even when Grant declared ownership with his voice and his hands.
A supervised walkthrough was scheduled. I went with counsel and a security lead. Grant was ordered to be absent. Vanessa was not mentioned in the order and was not present. The dining table still held the ghost of a meal that had never been about food. The marble console by the door looked ordinary in daylight. I did not touch it. I listed what I wanted: my mother’s crystal, the rest of my jewelry, documents, clothes, the small objects that made a life distinct from a set design. The rest—his trophies, his wine, the furniture he had chosen to impress people who were impressed by furniture—could stay and become someone else’s problem.
May you like
In the bedroom I found a second phone Grant had not surrendered in the first exchange of devices. Counsel bagged it. I did not need to know what was on it to understand why it had been kept separate. Some discoveries confirm a story already told in bruises. This was one of them.
Outside, the security gate opened for our car with the same mechanical indifference it had shown when it released me barefoot into the rain. I watched it close in the side mirror and felt nothing like triumph. Triumph would have required me to want his house more than my exit. I wanted the exit. I had already taken it once. This time the law walked with me.
