Chapter 4: The Woman Who Thought Her Father Didn't Love Her
Ethan found Patricia's number in an old email thread, forwarded to himself years ago and never opened again.
He stared at it for a long time before he dialed.
She picked up on the third ring.
"Hello?"
"Patricia.
It's Ethan.
Carol's son."
A beat of silence.
"Ethan." Her voice was careful.
Not cold.
Careful.
"It's been a long time."
"I know.
I'm sorry for that." He glanced at me across the kitchen table.
"I need to talk to you about something.
About Grandpa's estate."
Another silence.
Longer this time.
"That's been settled for eleven years."
"I don't think it was settled correctly."
She didn't hang up.
That told me something.
"What do you mean?"
"I found a copy of the original will.
The one before the version my mother presented to the family."
"Ethan—"
"You were in it, Patricia.
Equally.
A full third of everything."
The line went so quiet I thought she'd dropped the call.
"That's not possible."
"I had the document.
I've been holding it for three years, trying to figure out what to do with it.
And now my mother has taken it from our house."
"Your mother." Her voice had changed.
Flatter.
"Of course."
"I know this is a lot to hear."
"Do you." It wasn't a question.
"Do you know what I thought when your grandfather's estate was read?
I thought he'd spent the last years of his life hating me and I never knew why.
I thought I'd done something.
I went through every conversation we'd ever had trying to find the moment I lost him."
My throat tightened.
"Patricia, I'm so sorry."
"You're not the one who should be sorry." A pause.
"Where is the document now?"
"My mother has it.
She came into our house with a key she wasn't supposed to have and she took it."
"She always was thorough." The bitterness in her voice was quiet and very old.
"What do you want to do?"
"I want to fix it.
If there's a way to fix it."
"Eleven years later."
"I know."
She was quiet for a moment.
"I kept copies of everything from that period.
Every letter.
Every document I was given.
I didn't know why I kept them.
I just couldn't throw them away."
Ethan sat forward.
"Would any of that help?"
"I don't know.
Maybe.
I'd need to talk to someone who does."
"I know an estate attorney.
A good one.
I can call her today."
"Ethan." Patricia's voice softened slightly.
"Why are you doing this?"
He looked at me again.
"Because my grandfather loved you.
And you should have known that eleven years ago."
She didn't say anything for a moment.
"I'll send you what I have," she said finally.
"Give me a day."
After he hung up, we sat at the kitchen table and neither of us spoke for a while.
"She kept everything," I said.
"She didn't know she'd need it.
She just couldn't let go."
I thought about that.
About a woman packing boxes in a house she'd grown up in, carrying away letters and documents she didn't understand, holding onto the edges of a family that had just told her she didn't belong.
Ethan's phone buzzed again.
Diane.
A second text.
*I need you to understand something before you do anything you'll regret.
Call me.*
He set the phone face-down on the table.
"Tomorrow," he said.
"We meet her tomorrow.
Together."
"Together," I agreed.
That night I lay awake thinking about the camera footage.
About the bag Diane carried out of our house.
About the way she'd laughed on the phone when Ethan asked where the socks came from.
She hadn't been nervous.
May you like
She'd been confident.
That was the part that worried me most.
