Family Landlords Raise the Rent to Force One Sister Out
These were the spare keys I had spent the last two years collecting from Vanessa’s kitchen drawer, from the hook behind my mother’s pantry door, and from the plastic box under the fake rock in the garden.
I had reclaimed every single duplicate that existed, ensuring that no one else could ever walk into my old home without my permission.
They were useless now that I had moved out, but having them in my hand felt like a small, quiet ledger that had finally been balanced.
I closed the lid of the box and set it on the lowest shelf of my new bookcase, right behind the dictionary.
The kitchen clock on the wall showed ten past eleven.
I had two more boxes of kitchen towels to unpack before the afternoon, and my hands were already dry from the newsprint wrapper.
I reached down to roll my silver wrist watch dial back and forth, counting the clicks against my thumb as I waited for the kettle to boil.
The water was just beginning to whistle when the buzzer by the doorway gave a short, metallic ring.
