Chapter 6: Her Real Voice
Walter didn't move.
Didn't reach for the papers.
Didn't look away from her.
"Sit down, Brooke," he said.
"I asked what this is."
"And I asked you to sit down."
She didn't sit.
She stepped into the kitchen and picked up the printout from the table.
Her eyes moved across it fast — too fast, like she already knew what it said.
She set it back down.
"You went through my things."
"Your name is on a public record," I said.
"Anyone can find it."
She looked at me like I'd walked into her house uninvited, which technically I had, but Walter had asked me in and Walter owned the house and we both knew it.
"This is a private conversation," she said.
"Between me and my husband."
"She stays," Walter said.
Brooke turned to him slowly.
Something had shifted in her — the careful, controlled version of herself was still there, but it was thinner now.
Like a coat worn too long.
"Walter, I can explain the business registration.
It was for liability coverage.
My instructor certification requires —"
"You used my address without telling me."
"I told you I was handling the paperwork."
"You told me there wasn't much paperwork."
"There wasn't.
It was one form."
"One form that lists my home as the registered address of a business I didn't know existed."
Her jaw shifted.
"You're making this into something it isn't."
"Then explain what it is."
She pulled out a chair and sat down — not because he'd asked her to, the moment for that had passed, but because she'd decided to change her approach.
I watched her make that decision.
It happened in about two seconds.
"I've been trying to build something," she said.
Her voice went softer.
"A real practice.
Something sustainable.
I needed a registered address and we're married, Walter, this is our home —"
"It's my home," he said.
Quietly.
Completely without cruelty.
Just fact.
The softness left her face.
"So that's where we are," she said.
"I called Richard this morning."
A pause.
"Your attorney."
"Yes."
"About the house."
"About several things."
She looked at the table.
Then at me.
Then back at Walter.
The calculation was visible — she was deciding how much she'd already lost and what she could still protect.
"You're going to make me look like the villain here," she said.
"In front of the whole street.
That's what this is."
"Nobody is making you anything," I said.
"You came into my home —"
"Walter's home," Dana said.
We both turned.
Dana was standing in the kitchen doorway.
I hadn't heard her come in.
Walter had left the front door open.
Brooke looked at the three of us.
"This is harassment," she said.
"This is exactly what Saturday was.
You're coordinating against me."
"We're sitting in a kitchen," Dana said.
"You distributed a fake legal notice to six families.
You lied to a nine-year-old boy.
You told him his mother had already agreed to keep him off a public street." She said it the way you state a weather forecast.
"Those are the facts."
Brooke stood up.
"I want everyone out of this house."
"Brooke." Walter's voice stopped her.
"Sit down.
We're not finished."
"I am finished."
"Then you should know that Richard is drawing up paperwork this week.
He'll be in touch with you directly.
Until that's resolved, I'd ask you not to approach any of the neighbors or their children.
Not to distribute anything.
Not to make any calls." He looked at her steadily.
"Can you do that?"
Her chin came up.
"And if I don't?"
Walter looked at the printout on the table.
"Then Richard will have more to work with," he said.
She left the kitchen.
We heard her on the stairs.
Then a door — closed, not slammed, always not slammed — and then nothing.
Walter sat at his table and looked at the ceramic rooster.
"She moved it once," he said.
"First week she was here.
Put it in the cupboard.
I found it and put it back." He touched the base of it lightly with one finger.
"She never moved it again."
Nobody said anything.
Then his phone lit up on the table.
He looked at the screen and turned it face-down without answering.
"Unknown number," he said.
May you like
I looked at Dana.
"That's the third time," I said.
