“Just sign here, here, and here,” the young man said, clicking his shiny silver pen against the polished fake mahogany desk. He did not look at my sister Martha, who was trembling in her wheelchair beside me.

He just wanted to get us processed and out of his office before his lunch break. He pushed a thick stack of papers toward me, a forty-page contract that looked like it had been drafted by a team of corporate lawyers who got paid by the comma. “It is standard paperwork, hon. Most families do not even bother reading it. It is mostly just dry legal jargon.”

I did not say anything right away. I just looked at his neat blue tie and his perfectly combed hair.

I have lived in Macomb County, Michigan, my entire life, and I know when someone is trying to rush me through a door. I reached into my purse, pulled out my drugstore reading glasses, and slipped them onto my nose. Martha was clutching her faded yellow cardigan, the one our mother had knit for her back in 1984. The plastic buttons were mismatched, and the sleeves were frayed, but it was her security blanket. She looked terrified, and that was the only reason I kept my voice polite.

“I will just take a quick look,” I said, adjusting my glasses. The young man, whose name tag read Tyler, let out a tiny, high-pitched sigh. He leaned back in his leather chair and his left knee started bouncing. It was a rapid, nervous tick that made the loose coins in his pocket jingle. He did not know that I spent forty years working as a clerk of court in the municipal building downtown. I have read more contracts, deeds, and probate filings than this boy has read diner menus. I know exactly how people hide things in plain sight when they think nobody is paying attention.

I started on page one, reading every single line with my finger tracing the text. Tyler’s knee bounced faster. The office smelled like lemon-scented floor wax and stale coffee. Outside the window, the traffic on Mound Road hummed steadily. Martha shifted in her wheelchair, her breathing shallow and dry. She had her stroke back in November, right around Thanksgiving. It took her left side completely, leaving her hand curled up like a dry leaf. We did not have much money. I drove an old Buick LeSabre with a rusted driver-side door, and we clipped coupons every Sunday at my kitchen table.