Chương 8
Her mother had left the house.
Her father had stayed.
That was the story.
Simple.
Except it was not.
The final paragraph was shorter.
If you want the truth, talk to Claire's sister.
Do not talk to Evan first.
Mara lowered the page.
For the first time since finding the letter, she felt something stronger than curiosity.
She felt betrayal.
Not because her father had secrets.
Because he had left instructions.
He had decided who she could trust after he was gone.
She grabbed her phone and searched for her aunt's number.
She stopped before pressing call.
Her aunt Rachel had not spoken to the family in eight years.
Not since the argument at her mother's funeral.
Mara remembered Rachel standing outside the church, refusing to come inside.
She remembered her father watching from a distance.
At the time, Mara thought it was grief.
Now she was not sure.
The house suddenly felt less like a memory.
It felt like evidence.
And she was standing in the middle of it with no idea what had actually happened.
She reached for the phone again, then stopped when she saw her own reflection in the dark screen.
She looked tired in a way that sleep would not fix.
There was dust on her jacket from the floor, a faint streak of dirt across her cheek, and the same expression she had seen in photographs of her mother when she was trying not to cry.
Mara hated that comparison.
Not because she disliked her mother.
Because it made the distance between them feel smaller.
She placed the phone on the table and walked toward the hallway.
The house had always had a strange way of making people lower their voices.
When she was a child, she thought it was because old houses were supposed to be quiet.
Now she wondered if everyone had simply been afraid of waking something they could not put back to sleep.
She stopped outside the small office at the end of the hall.
Her father had kept the room locked after his illness got worse.
Not because he had anything dangerous inside.
At least that was what Evan believed.
Daniel Vance had always been protective of that room.
Even when Mara was young, she remembered him closing the door whenever she entered without knocking.
She had once joked that he was hiding treasure.
He had smiled and told her that some things were only valuable because nobody else knew they existed.
At the time, she thought he was talking about money.
She was not sure anymore.
The office door was unlocked.
She pushed it open.
Nothing dramatic happened.
No hidden compartment opened.
No forgotten voice played from an old device.
There was only a desk, a chair, stacks of paper, and the smell of old wood mixed with the coffee her father drank until the doctors told him to stop.
The ordinary nature of the room bothered her more than any secret would have.
Secrets were supposed to look like secrets.
They were supposed to hide in dark corners.
They were not supposed to sit beneath family photographs and unpaid utility bills.
Mara moved toward the desk.
She did not know what she was searching for.
That was the part she did not want to admit.
She was not looking for truth.
Not yet.
She was looking for something that would make the truth easier to accept.
The first drawer contained pens, receipts, and a small notebook filled with her father's handwriting.
She opened it carefully.
Most of the pages were lists.
Things to repair.
Things to buy.
Names of people he needed to call.
On one page, there was only a sentence.
Ask Claire before it is too late.
Mara froze.
The handwriting looked rushed.
That alone felt wrong.
Her father wrote everything slowly.
Even grocery lists looked like they had been prepared for publication.
She checked the date.
Nine years earlier.
Two years after her mother died.
She sat down in the chair.
Her mother had been gone for two years, and her father had still been writing her name.
The realization did not make her angry.
That would have been easier.
Instead, it made her feel something closer to embarrassment.
She had spent years telling herself her parents had stopped loving each other long before the divorce.
Maybe she had needed that story.
Maybe it was easier to believe people stopped caring than to believe they cared and still failed each other.
A knock came from the front door.
Mara stood quickly.
For a moment, she considered pretending she was not there.
Then she heard the voice.
"Mara?"
She knew it immediately.
Rachel.
Her mother's sister.
The woman who had refused to enter the church eleven years earlier.
Mara walked to the door but did not open it right away.
"How did you know I was here?"
Rachel answered through the wood.
"Because your brother called me."
Mara closed her eyes.
Of course he did.
Evan never knew when to leave something alone.
She opened the door.
Rachel looked older than Mara remembered.
Not dramatically older.
Just worn down around the edges.
Her gray hair was pulled back carelessly.
Her coat looked like she had grabbed it without checking the weather.
She held a paper grocery bag in one hand.
"I brought food," Rachel said.
Mara looked at the bag.
"You came here with groceries?"
"I panicked."
That answer surprised her.
Rachel looked away.
"When people panic, they usually bring flowers or say something useless."
A small, unwilling smile appeared on Mara's face.
"Food is less emotional?"
"Food gives people something to do with their hands."
Rachel stepped inside before Mara could invite her.
It was a familiar family habit.
Everyone in the Vance family acted like doors were suggestions.
They walked into rooms.
They avoided conversations.
They pretended those two things were unrelated.
Rachel placed the bag on the kitchen counter.
"I know about the letter."
Mara leaned against the wall.
May you like
"How?"
"Because Daniel asked me to help him write it."
