Chapter 5: Every Light in the House
Diane had not been exaggerating.
Every window was lit.
I parked at the curb.
My parents' car was still in the driveway, alongside a second vehicle I didn't recognize — a dark blue sedan with no plates visible from the street.
Grandma looked at the house for a long moment.
The house where she had lived for forty-one years.
Where she had raised my father.
Where my grandfather had died in the back bedroom with her hand in his.
She opened the car door.
"Grandma, wait—"
"It's my house, Ivan."
She was already on the front path.
I caught up and reached the door first.
It was unlocked.
I pushed it open.
The living room had been rearranged.
Not dramatically — but enough.
The armchair that always faced the window had been turned toward the television.
The side table where Grandma kept her reading lamp and her crossword books had been cleared.
The crossword books were stacked on the floor near the wall like something waiting to be boxed.
My mother, Wendy, came out of the kitchen holding a dish towel.
She stopped when she saw Grandma.
"Mom." Her voice shifted into something practiced and soft.
"We were just — we were tidying up.
We didn't know when you'd be—"
"Where is Arthur?" Grandma said.
"He's just upstairs, he's—"
"Arthur." Grandma's voice carried up the staircase without effort.
Footsteps.
Then my father appeared at the top of the stairs.
He was holding a cardboard box.
When he saw me, something moved across his face — not guilt, exactly.
Calculation.
He came down slowly.
"Ivan." He set the box on the bottom step.
"I'm glad you're here, actually.
This has gotten out of hand.
Mom needs—"
"Put the box down," I said.
"I'm just organizing—"
"Put it down, Arthur."
He looked at me for a moment.
Then he set it on the floor.
Grandma walked to it and looked inside.
Folders.
Documents.
A smaller wooden box I recognized as the one that had sat on my grandfather's desk for as long as I could remember.
"Those are my papers," she said.
"I was making sure they were safe," Arthur said.
"Mom, you left in a hurry.
We were worried."
"You were at the bank three weeks ago," Grandma said.
"Carol told me."
Arthur's jaw tightened.
"I was acting within the scope of—"
"The power of attorney was revoked this afternoon," I said.
"Notarized and filed with the county recorder's office."
The dish towel went still in Wendy's hands.
Arthur looked at me.
Then at Grandma.
The calculation on his face shifted into something harder.
"You can't do that," he said.
"She's not competent to—"
"Choose your next words carefully," I said.
"Ivan, I'm your father—"
"You left her in a nursing facility lobby with a suitcase and drove away." My voice came out steadier than I expected.
"You hired a lawyer before she'd been gone four hours.
You came to her house with a locksmith while she was sitting in a courthouse revoking your access to everything you thought you'd taken." I looked at him.
"So choose carefully."
The room was very quiet.
Then a door opened at the back of the hall.
The man from the blue sedan, I assumed — middle-aged, in a gray jacket, holding a phone.
"Arthur," the man said.
"We should probably—"
"Who is that?" Grandma asked.
Arthur said nothing.
"His name is Dennis Farwell," Wendy said quietly.
"He's a real estate agent."
Grandma turned to look at her.
Wendy's eyes dropped to the floor.
"They had someone come to value the house," Wendy said, barely above a whisper.
"Arthur said it would only be a consultation.
I didn't know he was going to—" She stopped.
"Wendy." Arthur's voice was sharp.
But Wendy didn't look at him.
She looked at Grandma instead.
And for the first time since we'd walked in, her face did something that wasn't performance.
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"I'm sorry, Mom," she said.
"I didn't know it would go this far."
