The house was dark. Not just sleeping-dark, but abandoned-dark. The lawn, usually manicured to within an inch of its life, was overgrown. A “For Sale” sign that I had never been told about lay face down in the mud near the mailbox.

I stepped onto the porch. The air smelled wrong. It didn’t smell like rain and pine; it reeked of something damp and stagnant, like wet cardboard and neglect. I tried the handle. Locked.

I remembered the spare key. Kevin had hidden it under the heavy terracotta planter four years ago, a secret between mother and son. Stephanie had likely forgotten it existed; she was a woman who paid people to remember details for her. I shoved the heavy pot aside, ignoring the protest of my arthritic wrist, and found the brass key half-buried in the dirt.

The lock clicked—a loud, metallic judgment in the silence.