I spent the last three years praying my miserable, entitled old neighbor would just pack up and move away. Arthur Sloin was the kind of man who seemed to live purely to make my life harder.

I was working two minimum-wage jobs just to keep my electricity on, and he was constantly reporting me to the HOA for grass that was half an inch too long or parking my beaten-up Honda slightly over my driveway line.

We despised each other. I was twenty-six, drowning in medical debt from my late mother’s illness, and barely surviving. Arthur was in his late seventies, living alone in a massive, beautifully maintained $400,000 Victorian home that made my dilapidated rental look like a shack. He would sit on his immaculate wrap-around porch, sipping iced tea, and scowl at me every time I trudged up my driveway in my grease-stained diner uniform.

We never exchanged pleasantries. Our entire relationship consisted of his complaints and my exhausted apologies. So when an ambulance quietly pulled up to his house late one Tuesday night, and I saw them wheel him out under a white sheet, I didn’t celebrate. But I didn’t shed a tear, either.

I figured it was the end of a very stressful chapter in my life. I assumed some distant relatives would swoop in, sell the house, and a nice young family would move in. I was dead wrong. Three days later, a thick, expensive-looking black envelope appeared in my mailbox.

The return address belonged to one of the most prestigious estate law firms in the city. My heart dropped into my stomach. My immediate, panicked thought was that Arthur had somehow managed to sue me from beyond the grave. Maybe he claimed my tree roots damaged his plumbing, or maybe he had been keeping a log of every time my car leaked oil near his pristine curb.

I couldn’t afford a lawyer. I could barely afford groceries. I took the bus downtown the next morning, my hands shaking the entire ride. When I was called back into the office, the contrast between me and my surroundings was painfully obvious. I was wearing my only clean pair of jeans and a faded sweater; the lawyer, a stern-looking man named Mr. Davis, was wearing a suit that probably cost more than my car.

Mr. Davis gestured to a plush leather chair. He folded his hands neatly on his desk and looked at me with a perfectly neutral expression. “Ma’am, as you know, your neighbor, Mr. Sloin, recently passed away. My deepest condolences.” I couldn’t help the bitter, exhausted laugh that escaped my lips.

I gripped the straps of my cheap purse. “Thank you, Mr. Davis, but… I really don’t understand why I’m here. He was just my entitled, grumpy old neighbor. We had a completely terrible relationship. Did he leave me a bill? Because I have to tell you right now, I don’t have a dime to my name.” Mr. Davis didn’t smile.