Chương 5
"Okay."
"And Claire?"
"Yes?"
"Patrick says Linda's arrangement with you predates the written occupancy agreement by several months."
"That's impossible."
"Why?"
"Because she didn't move in to care for Evan."
I stopped.
Something old and unpleasant surfaced.
Not a memory exactly.
A conversation I had dismissed because, at the time, I had more important things to survive.
Mom standing in my kitchen in January while I packed Evan's medication cooler.
Her saying, You should put something in writing so nobody can throw me out if anything happens to you.
I had laughed because I thought she meant if I died.
I had said, The house would go through my estate, Mom.
She had answered, That's not what I mean.
I hadn't asked what she meant.
"Claire?" Daniel said.
I looked at the refrigerator.
CALL PATRICK.
January.
The vacation had also been booked in January.
"She was planning something before I listed the house."
Nobody answered because nobody in the room knew what that something was.
The terrier scratched at the back door.
Owen let him into the yard.
I walked down the hallway toward my old bedroom.
Mom had taken that room after I moved temporarily to Oakland.
The door was open.
Her bed was made.
A stack of mail sat on the dresser beneath a ceramic bowl full of costume jewelry.
I didn't touch it.
Then I saw the envelope underneath.
My name was visible through the plastic window.
Not Linda Mercer.
Claire Mercer.
The return address belonged to my mortgage company.
The envelope had already been opened.
I stood in the doorway without touching the envelope.
For seven months, most of my mail had been forwarded to the Oakland studio, but enough still slipped through that I had asked Mom to put anything addressed to me in a basket by the front door.
The basket was empty.
"Marisol."
She came down the hallway.
I pointed.
"Photograph that."
She did.
Owen appeared behind her and leaned around us.
"Is that yours?"
"Yes."
"Why is it open?"
I called Daniel before anyone could answer.
He told me to photograph the envelope where it lay, then check whether there was other mail addressed to me in plain view.
"Don't start opening drawers," he said.
"I know."
"I'm saying it because you're angry."
"I'm not angry."
Owen made a noise behind me.
I turned.
He raised both hands.
Daniel heard him.
"Who was that?"
"My ex-husband calling me a liar without technically speaking."
"Listen to him."
The mortgage envelope contained a routine escrow analysis from April.
Nothing useful.
Nothing urgent.
That almost made it worse.
Whoever opened it hadn't been responding to an emergency.
They had simply decided my mail belonged to them.
I found three more opened envelopes in the stack.
A homeowners insurance notice.
A county tax statement.
A letter from the title company sent after I accepted the buyers' offer.
The last one made Daniel swear quietly.
"What?"
"Photograph every page."
The title company letter included the scheduled closing date, escrow contact information, and the buyers' names.
My mother hadn't needed Marisol to give her the buyers' information.
She had taken it from my mail.
"I want to call her."
"No."
"Daniel."
"No."
"She opened my mail."
"And right now she doesn't know you know."
That stopped me.
Daniel's voice softened slightly.
"Information is useful before the other side knows you have it."
I hated that my family had become the other side.
I hated more that the phrase fit.
The final walkthrough was canceled before noon.
The buyers, Hannah and Marcus Lee, weren't willing to enter the property while there was a disputed possession claim.
They weren't terminating the contract yet, but their attorney requested documentation.
Their movers had already charged them a cancellation fee.
Their own buyers were scheduled to take possession of their current home Friday.
My mother's lie had acquired strangers.
That bothered me in a way the legal language didn't.
Somewhere in Sacramento, two people I barely knew were suddenly trying to figure out where they and their furniture would sleep because my family didn't want an apartment in Citrus Heights.
Marisol stood beside her car making calls.
Owen took Milo around the block after we found a leash hanging by the back door.
I sat on my front steps with coffee I had forgotten to drink.
Across the street, Mr. Hanley dragged two garbage cans toward his garage.
He had lived there since before I bought the bungalow.
He saw me and stopped.
"Claire?"
I lifted a hand.
His face changed as he crossed the street.
"I heard about your boy."
"Thank you."
He stood awkwardly at the bottom of the steps.
Mr. Hanley was seventy-something and treated emotional conversation like a malfunctioning appliance.
"Evan was a good kid."
"He liked you."
"He stole my oranges."
"He said they fell."
"They fell after he climbed the fence."
I smiled.
Mr. Hanley looked relieved.
Then he shoved both hands into his pockets.
"Your mother's coming back, then?"
The question pulled me upright.
"What?"
"From the trip."
"Eventually."
"I figured, with the moving and all."
"What moving?"
Now he looked confused.
"The stuff they took out last week."
I stood.
"What stuff?"
"A truck came."
"When?"
He squinted toward my driveway as though the answer might still be parked there.
"Thursday, maybe."
Thursday was June 5.
The day before Evan died.
"What kind of truck?"
"Rental."
"Did you see what they moved?"
"Some furniture."
He rubbed his jaw.
"Boxes."
"Who?"
"Your sister's husband and another fellow."
"Ryan?"
"Yeah."
"Was Mom here?"
"Think so."
My pulse had begun climbing.
"What furniture?"
"Couldn't tell you."
He glanced at the house.
"Not everything."
Owen returned with Milo just as Mr. Hanley described a dark pickup that had made two additional trips.
I asked whether he remembered the company name on the rental truck.
He didn't.
Then he said, "Hold on."
He crossed the street and disappeared into his garage.
Owen looked at me.
"You okay?"
"No."
May you like
"Good."
I frowned.
