The loan officer, a woman named Priya, opened the folder and her smile faltered. She looked at Brendan, then at me, then back at Brendan. ‘Sir, I’m sorry, but we can’t move forward with this refinance.’ Brendan laughed the way men laugh when they’re about to be rude. ‘Excuse me? Everything was pre-approved last week.’ Priya slid a single page across the desk. ‘The property at 14 Birch Hollow is held in the Eleanor Whitman Family Trust. Mrs. Whitman is the sole trustee. Any lien, transfer, or refinance requires her written authorization.’ Megan’s head snapped up. ‘Mom?’ I folded my hands neatly on the table. ‘I put it in trust the day after Thanksgiving, sweetheart. The day Brendan told me, and I quote, that I should be grateful you people still invited me anywhere.’ The color drained out of his face in real time. ‘You said you didn’t even know how trusts worked.’ ‘I said I didn’t understand interest rates, Brendan. I taught high school economics for thirty-one years.’ Priya pressed her lips together to hide a smile. I turned to Megan, and my voice went soft, the way it used to when she was small and scared of thunder. ‘Honey, I have copies of the texts. The ones where he told you to stop visiting me. The ones where he called me a leech. I’ve had them for eight months.’ Megan started to cry, quietly, the way she cries when she finally lets herself see something. Brendan stood up so fast his chair scraped. ‘This is manipulation. This is elder—’ ‘Elder abuse?’ I finished. ‘Funny. That’s exactly what my attorney called your behavior in the letter she’s mailing to you this afternoon.’ I picked up my purse, the cheap canvas one Brendan once mocked at Christmas, and stood. ‘The lake house stays in the family, Megan. Just not his half of it.’ I walked out into the parking lot, got into my fourteen-year-old Corolla, and for the first time in three years, I didn’t cry on the drive home. I sang.
