Marcus uncrossed his arms.
“Nobody stole anything.”
“What would you call taking someone’s refrigerator while she’s at work?”
“Family helping family.”
“Which family member did I help by losing my refrigerator?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it.
Patricia stepped in before the silence could embarrass him.
“You weren’t using half of it.
You don’t have kids.
You work twelve-hour shifts.
You’re barely home.”
There it was again.
The strange arithmetic she had used to justify everything.
If I wasn’t sitting on my couch, she could take it.
If I wasn’t drinking from a coffee mug, she needed it more.
If I had steady work and she didn’t, then anything I had earned had somehow become excess.
I remembered being fifteen and giving Patricia the money I had saved for a class trip because she needed new shoes after refusing to wear the perfectly good pair Mom had bought her.
I remembered being twenty-three and leaving a date because Patricia had called me crying over a fight with a boyfriend.
I remembered our mother saying, every time, “You’re the strong one.”
It had sounded like praise when I was young.
By thirty-six, I understood it was often an invoice.
Patricia shoved the folder back toward me.
“Mom already told you.
I’m struggling.”
“Mom told me you said there was a misunderstanding.”
“There is.
You’re treating this like strangers broke in.”
“Did I give you permission to enter my house Tuesday?”
She paused.
“You gave me a key.”
“For emergencies.”
“This was an emergency.”
“For whom?”
“For us.”
“Exactly.”
Marcus began pacing near the window.
With the lamps gone and nothing else in the room, every step sounded louder than it should have.
“What do you want, Claire?” he asked.
It was the first useful question either of them had asked.
“Everything returned.”
Patricia laughed once.
Too quickly.
“That’s impossible.”
My stomach tightened, but I kept my face still.
“Why?”
She looked at Marcus.
Marcus looked at the floor.
That tiny exchange told me more than either of them intended.
“Why is it impossible?” I repeated.
Patricia folded her arms.
“Some things are already being used.”
“Where?”
“At our place.”
“Then bring them back.”
“We need them.”
“They’re mine.”
