“The trust has a current balance of exactly four thousand, three hundred and twelve dollars,” the teller said, her voice dropping to that quiet, polite register people use when they are delivering bad news.

I just stood there. My hand was resting on the faded blue plastic binder my dad had bought at Walmart years ago.

The plastic spine was cracked, and the front cover had “Leo and Mia’s College Fund” written in my dad’s neat, blocky handwriting.

My son, Leo, was standing next to me. He had his Purdue orientation folder tucked under his arm. He was eighteen, and he had been talking about the engineering dorms the entire car ride over.

“There has to be an error,” I said. I felt a weird, greasy weight settle behind my ribs. “My father opened this account in 2017 with a deposit of one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. It hasn’t been touched.”

The teller, a young woman named Marilyn, looked at me with genuine pity. She didn’t say anything else. She just clicked her mouse a few times and pointed to her printer.

My sister, Linda, was the sole trustee. She was a licensed CPA with a small, successful firm in Indianapolis. When our dad was dying of lung cancer in 2017, he had insisted on making her the manager of the fund.

“Linda is the responsible one,” my dad had told me from his hospital bed. His breathing was shallow, but his eyes were clear. “She knows how the tax laws work, Sarah. She’ll make sure the kids get every penny when they’re ready.”

I had agreed without a second thought. Why wouldn’t I? She was my sister. We shared Sunday dinners at our mother’s house. We exchanged Christmas gifts. I trusted her completely.

But as the printer beside Marilyn began to warm up, a high-pitched hum filled the quiet bank office.

She handed me a four-page ledger. The paper was still warm from the toner.

My eyes scrambled over the columns of numbers. The initial deposit of $120,000 was there, dated November 12, 2017. But then the withdrawals started in the summer of 2019.

There was a withdrawal of $800 in June. Then $1,200 in August. By 2021, the numbers had swollen. There were transfers of $5,000, $8,000, and once, a single withdrawal of $12,000 in December.

Every single line had the same notation: “Withdrawal by Trustee for Educational Expenses.”

My kids were twelve and nine in 2019. They went to a public middle school. There were no tuition payments, no private tutors, and no educational expenses that could have possibly totaled $115,700 over five years.

I stepped away from the counter, my legs feeling strangely light and useless. I pulled out my phone and called Linda. It took three tries before she answered.

I could hear the loud, bright chatter of a restaurant in the background. There was the distinct, sharp sound of champagne glasses clinking.