The top page carried the county seal and my full legal name.
For several seconds, I could hear nothing except the monitor beside Amy’s bed and Sam’s thin cries from the treatment room across the hall.
Susan stood near the doorway, one hand pressed against her chest.
Karen had stopped pretending to be annoyed.
Her eyes were fixed on the brown folder as if it contained something alive.
The police officer asked me to sit down before I opened it.
I remained standing.
The first page was a recorded property deed.
The address belonged to the house where my mother had lived for nearly fifteen years—the same house she had always called hers.
At the top was my late father’s name.
Below it was mine.
According to the document, my father had transferred the property to me shortly before his death.
Susan had been granted the right to live there, but she did not own it.
She could not sell it, borrow against it, or transfer it without my consent.
I looked at my mother.
“Why is my name on your house?”
She recovered quickly.
“Your father signed all kinds of papers when he was sick.
He didn’t understand what he was doing.”
The officer took the page from me and examined it without commenting.
I pulled out the second document.
It was a loan agreement for sixty-eight thousand dollars, secured against the same property.
The borrower was listed as me.
The signature at the bottom resembled mine, but it was not mine.
I had never applied for that loan.
I had never visited the bank named on the papers.
I had never received a dollar from it.
Karen stepped backward.
Susan said, “Amy filled your head with this nonsense.”
I turned another page.
There was a proposed transfer of the property from me to Karen.
Again, my signature appeared at the bottom.
Again, I had never signed it.
The transfer had not yet been recorded.
A handwritten note from a local attorney was clipped to the front.
It stated that the signature raised concerns and that the owner should appear in person with identification before any further action occurred.
The appointment was scheduled for the following Monday.
That was three days away.
The officer looked at Susan.
“Were you aware of this appointment?”
“I don’t answer questions without a lawyer.”
It was the first sensible thing she had said all morning.
Karen pointed at her.
“This was her idea.”
Susan swung toward her.
“Be quiet.”
“You said Mark would sign eventually.
You said Amy was the only reason he kept refusing to help us.”
“Karen.”
“You told me the house was supposed to be mine.”
The officer separated them before either could say more.
I sat beside Amy’s bed, holding the documents with both hands because they had begun to shake.
Pieces of the past rearranged themselves in my mind.
For years, my mother had asked me for money.
A broken water heater.
Property taxes.
