My husband noticed.
I nearly agreed.
Later, when Grandma had gone, he sat beside me.
“Something about that letter doesn’t add up.”
There was only one place that might give me answers.
“Then we should see the house first.”
We went to the house that afternoon.
He sat beside me.
It wasn’t grand.
Just a quiet two-story place on a tree-lined street, with a narrow porch and flowerbeds that had started to grow wild.
Inside, everything felt strangely untouched.
There were books stacked beside the couch, a knitted blanket folded over one armrest, framed photographs of mountains and beaches on the walls.
She had lived here.
Near the kitchen, I found a plastic organizer filled with medication.
That hurt more than I expected.
For the first time, my mother stopped being an idea.
She had lived here.
She had read those books, taken those pills, stood at that sink, probably looked out the same window every morning.
No family photographs.
Upstairs, there was a small guest room.
The bed was neatly made, but the room looked barely used.
No family photographs. No pictures of children. Nothing that told me who she had been waiting for.
My husband started opening windows while our daughter helped dust the shelves downstairs.
I went through a desk in the hallway.
Our daughter helped dust.
Most of the drawers held ordinary things.
