On that drive, I laid the whole thing out in my head, the way I used to lay out a case on a yellow legal pad.
Darcy’s credit cards were at twenty thousand dollars in March of 2024. I had no reason to think they’d gone down.
The boutique had closed.
My son’s paycheck as a shift manager at a distribution warehouse wasn’t going to cover it.
As far as I knew, Norine’s condo was paid off. She bought it with her divorce settlement in 2020.
At eighteen hundred and seventy-five dollars a month, that condo would bring in twenty-two thousand, five hundred dollars a year.
And somebody named Darcy was collecting every cent of it by Zelle.
All they needed was somewhere free to put Norine. And her piano. And her students.
My house had four bedrooms. A big living room with good light. And an owner who was “never home anyway.”
On my way back into Chico, I stopped for coffee on the Esplanade. It’s a little place with a corkboard by the door, covered in flyers for guitar lessons and lost dogs and yard sales.
I was waiting for my cup when I saw a yellow flyer. Right in the middle. At eye level.
“NORINE TACKETT PIANO STUDIO. Now in my new home studio!”
Underneath was my address.
My house number. My street. My zip code.
“Fall Student Recital. Sunday, October 12th. 2 PM. Light refreshments. All welcome!”
I didn’t pull it down.
It wasn’t my corkboard. And it wasn’t my place to edit somebody else’s lie in public.
I took a picture of it with my phone. I paid for my coffee. I tipped the girl at the counter two dollars.
My address. My living room.
Ten days away.
Ethan Blake is a skilled Creative Content Specialist with a talent for crafting engaging and thought-provoking narratives. With a strong background in storytelling and digital content creation, Ethan brings a unique perspective to his role at TheArchivists, where he curates and produces captivating content for a global audience.
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