Daniel was still talking when I turned the second page.
“Claire, listen to me.
Mom misunderstood the arrangement.”
I barely heard him.
The document in my hand looked, at first glance, like a transfer of ownership.
My name appeared as the person giving up an interest in Unit 12B.
Daniel’s name appeared on the other side.
At the bottom was a signature that resembled mine closely enough to fool someone who had only seen me sign birthday cards.
But it wasn’t mine.
The loops were too round.
The final stroke in Bennett curled upward.
Mine always cut straight across.
More importantly, I had never agreed to transfer my apartment to anyone.
“Claire?” Daniel said.
I looked at the date.
Three weeks earlier.
I had been in Boston that day, sitting beside my sister’s hospital bed while she slept.
“What did you do?” I asked.
Silence.
It was brief, but it answered me before he did.
“Nothing,” he said.
“Where are you?”
“In my apartment.”
“Our apartment.”
“No, Daniel.
Mine.”
He exhaled sharply.
“This is exactly why we need to talk in person.”
I turned another page.
There was a photocopy of my driver’s license.
Then a document naming Daniel as though I had authorized him to handle property matters for me.
The signature on that page was fake too.
My stomach went cold.
“You copied my identification.”
“What?”
“You copied my license.”
He stopped pretending not to understand.
“Claire, none of that is what you think.”
I almost laughed.
For years, Daniel’s favorite defense had been to make certainty sound irrational.
If I questioned why money disappeared from our joint checking account, I was controlling.
If I asked why his mother had a key to our home, I was hostile to his family.
If I objected when he joked about my job in front of friends, I couldn’t take a joke.
Now I was holding documents with a fake version of my signature, and somehow I was still the person who did not understand.
I heard pounding at the front door.
“Claire!”
Lorraine.
Apparently security had escorted her to the elevator, but not out of the building yet.
“You can’t keep me out of my own home!” she shouted through the door.
Daniel heard her over the phone.
“Don’t call anyone,” he said immediately.
That sentence settled everything.
Not hello.
Not are you okay.
Not why is my mother screaming outside your door.
Don’t call anyone.
