“It’s time,” I told my mother, checking my watch. “I need to stop by Maple Avenue before heading to the highway.”
Helen’s eyebrows rose.
“You’re going to the house? Is that wise?”
“Necessary,” I corrected. “The new owners want vacant possession, and the closing is tomorrow morning. Jonathan will handle the paperwork in my absence.”
“And if they haven’t cleared out?” Helen asked practically.
“Then what remains becomes part of the donation I’ve arranged,” I said. “The deadline was clear.”
Helen nodded, respecting my decision despite her evident concern.
“I’ll follow in my car,” she said. “So I can drive myself home afterward.”
The morning was bright and clear as we made the fifteen-minute drive across town to the stately colonial on Maple Avenue that had been my father’s pride and joy.
Pulling into the driveway, I noted immediately that Blake’s car was absent, though remnants of hasty packing were evident—discarded packing materials on the front lawn, the garage door ajar revealing half-empty storage shelves.
“Looks like they’ve been busy,” Helen observed as we approached the front door.
Using my key—an act that still felt natural despite the property’s imminent transfer—I entered the house that had been in our family for two generations.
The immediate impression was abandoned chaos. Empty picture hooks on walls. Rectangular dust outlines where furniture had stood. Packaging materials scattered across floors.
“They’ve cleared out the major items,” I noted, moving through the foyer into the living room.
“Though their housekeeping leaves something to be desired,” Helen remarked dryly. “Amber was never one for cleaning up her own messes—literally or figuratively.”
Room by room, we surveyed the hastily vacated house.
The kitchen, recently renovated at my expense, stood eerily empty, expensive appliances gleaming in contrast to the detritus of rapid departure.
Upstairs, closets hung open with scattered hangers. Bathroom cabinets displayed abandoned toiletries deemed not worth packing, and wastebaskets overflowed with discarded possessions.
In what had been Amber and Blake’s bedroom, a peculiar sight awaited: a neat stack of photo albums placed deliberately in the center of the floor where their bed had stood.
I recognized them immediately.
The carefully curated collection of Amber’s childhood photographs I’d assembled over years, documenting everything from first steps to law school graduation.
“She left your photo albums,” Helen observed, her tone unreadable.
