The moment she left, I called a locksmith. When the dispatcher asked whether I had lost my keys, I smiled and said, “No. I finally found them.” Then I called movers. Ambrose arrived with three men, and they worked carefully, wrapping perfume bottles, pairing shoes, and documenting everything across five pages. Nothing was damaged, and nothing was left scattered outside.

I rented a climate-controlled storage unit four miles away and paid three months in advance. Every item was inventoried, insured, and secured. The key and the complete inventory were taped neatly to my front door at eye level. Then I washed the floors with pine soap, opened every window, and stood quietly in my own home for the first time in a long while.

That evening, Brynn called screaming about theft. I listened without interrupting. When she finally stopped, I calmly explained that her belongings were safe, insured, inventoried, and waiting for her. She had thirty days to collect them. Then I hung up. I didn’t answer when she called again. Grayson eventually came back alone in March. He sat at my kitchen table and cried. For once, he didn’t ask me for anything.

That summer, Grayson and Brynn separated. He now rents a place in Muncie and pays for it himself. On Sundays, he comes to my house and fixes whatever I write on the list attached to the refrigerator. We’re slowly becoming people who tell each other the truth. In the hallway, I still have the photograph of Alistair holding the paid-off notice above his head. I dust it every week. For two years, I mistook silence for peace and called it love. Now I understand something simpler: my name is on that deed because I earned it, and I will never again be a guest in my own life.