The unit smelled of oil and lemon cleaner. Everything I had loved—dishes, the cedar chest, my wedding dress—was stacked in neat rows, but at the center a folding table held a ledger, photographs pinned above it, and a cheap video player with a cassette marked TOM-12. I dropped to my knees because, face down under a yellowed ribbon, lay my sister’s diary. Its pages were splayed open, torn where someone had impatiently ripped entries apart. A pen had been left across a page that named Megan and my son together at an auction, signatures beside them.
My hands shook as I scooped it up. The ledger had column after column of dates, amounts, and names—estate sale receipts, deposit confirmations, a wire transfer to a numbered account. My necklace photo, the locket Tom had given me, was cornered on the table with a price scrawled next to it. Photographs arranged like evidence showed men loading my things the week before the funeral, Megan laughing as she handed a clipboard to one of them. My throat closed. The tape player clicked when I pressed play, and Tom’s voice filled the stale air, halting and apologetic.
“Ellen,” he said. He used my name, the way he never had when the room was full of people. He explained debts, threats, and a promise he’d made to protect us by letting things go quietly. He sounded small. Halfway through he faltered, then whispered, “They made me sign.” The camera panned to a document with my signature beneath a forged name.
I sat back on cold concrete and felt the bone-deep betrayal settle. My eviction notice smelled of paper and theft. I would call the police, but first I had to know who else had been sold, what Tom had left me, and where it went.
