To be honest with you, the afternoon Sheila packed up wasn’t quiet at all. I didn’t want to make a scene in front of the neighbors, but she didn’t give me much of a choice.

She didn’t just pack her clothes, mind you. She tried to take everything that wasn’t nailed down. I walked into the dining room and caught her trying to wrap my mother’s crystal salad bowl in old newspapers.

“That stays,” I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could.

She didn’t even look up at me. “Your father gave this to me.”

“My aunt gave that to my mother for their silver anniversary,” I told her. “Put it back on the sideboard, Sheila.”

She slammed it down on the wood. Hard enough that I thought the glass would shatter, but thank goodness it didn’t. “You’re a spiteful girl, Diane,” she hissed.

“I’m fifty-one years old, Sheila,” I said. “And I’m not a girl. I’m the owner of this house.”

The deputy, a nice young man named Miller who actually went to school with my nephew, was standing by the screen door. He looked real uncomfortable, bless his heart, just shifting his weight from one boot to the other. He cleared his throat and looked at his watch.

“You’ve got about ten minutes, ma’am,” he said to her. “Let’s keep this moving.”

The sound of those heavy black garbage bags crinkling while she threw her shoes into them is something I won’t forget. It was the only sound in the house for twenty minutes. She didn’t say goodbye when she finished. She just marched out to her sedan, loaded the trunk, and tore out of the driveway so fast she kicked up a cloud of dust.

Once she was gone, I just sat down in Dad’s old recliner. The leather still smells like him. A mix of peppermint lifesavers, cedar shavings, and that cheap hair tonic he used for forty years.

I took a deep breath, and that’s when I remembered the second paper inside that yellow envelope. In all the rush to get to Bob Polk’s office, I’d only looked at the deed.

I pulled the envelope out of my purse again. My fingers were shaking a little, go figure.

I pulled out a piece of blue lined paper, folded into a tight square. It was Dad’s handwriting. He didn’t write letters much, so seeing those slanted pencil marks made my throat tighten up immediately.

“Diane,” it read. “If you are reading this, she has already tried to change the locks. I’m sorry I didn’t have the strength to tell her myself. I just wanted some peace at the end of my road. But you are my girl. You always were. The key to the roll-top desk is under the loose red brick by the garden hose. Take what’s yours.”