Chapter 28 #2
“Alice,” Madison says carefully. “Do you really think it’s a good idea to snoop around?”
I’ve already cleared the stairs and am moving toward the third-floor stairwell.
“Hold up,” Madison says, following. “Maybe sit down first? Think things through? I know you’re pissed at Ryder, but don’t you think…”
I discard my backpack and empty chip packet on the floor and step onto the next staircase.
“Alice, slow down.”
“You don’t get it,” I finally say. “I need to know about my own life. Everyone treats me like I’m something to use, and I’m sick of it. I need my own power. My own identity. That starts with finding out about the past.”
“What past?” Madison asks, panting to keep up with me.
“About my mom. About what Miranda’s been hiding. I’ve asked, and she won’t tell me. I’m done waiting for her to decide when I deserve answers about my family.”
Madison’s footsteps creak on the narrow stairs, and she mutters something under her breath.
“What?” I ask.
“I said, I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Madison says, carefully taking the stairs behind me. “I just want it on the record that I helped you. Whatever happens next.”
“Noted.”
“And if there’s a ghost up here, I’m leaving.”
“There’s no ghost.”
“Says the girl looking for answers about her mother.”
The third-floor hallway is exactly as I remember it. Short and dim, with warm air pressing in from both sides. Miranda’s bedroom door on the left, slightly ajar. The office door on the right, closed.
I stop in front of the office door, staring at the brass handle in the low light.
Madison stops beside me, catching her breath. She looks at the door, then at the key in my hand, then at my face. Whatever she sees makes her press her lips together and not say anything else.
I put the key in the lock. The mechanism gives a soft, clean click, and then the door swings inward.
I cross the room without hesitation and go straight for the filing cabinets in the corner. My sights are on the one labeled ‘Personal’ and the drawer pulls open with a low, metallic groan.
Inside, hanging files stretch back in neat rows, each labeled in Miranda’s precise handwriting. I flip through them quickly, my fingers working past documents with dates and names I don’t recognize, until I reach mine.
With trembling fingers, I pull out the folder.
“Are you okay?” Madison whispers behind me. “If you’re too freaked out, we can just back away now.”
I wave her off. “No, I’m okay.”
Inside is a thin stack of papers clipped together. The top sheet is on official letterhead, dated the day Mrs. Rodriguez drove me here. There’s a checklist of requirements, a placement confirmation, and a section at the bottom where Miranda signed her name.
“Are you sure you want me here for this?” Madison keeps her voice low.
I shrug it off as I flip through the pages. “Why not? Everyone either finds out my business, or just makes it up anyway. Maybe if someone else knows the truth, it won’t be as bad this time.”
“You really feel that way? After what happened with Ryder?”
“I’m not leaving this big question mark hanging over my life. And I’m certainly not letting someone like Jasper uncover my past before I do.”
I thumb past my intake form and school transcript. Miranda had circled my GPA in red pen and drawn a small, neat asterisk beside the note about my accelerated graduation track.
Madison creeps forward with her phone half-raised. “Can I film this?”
I look up and her expression is somewhere between sheepish and hopeful.
“What? No.”
“Sorry.” She lowers her phone. “It just looked like it’d make good content. It would put Jasper in his place.”
I turn back to the drawer. “My life isn’t content. Why don’t you use your phone to create art instead of trying to chase trends and hope you make a name for yourself?”
“Some of us aren’t brave enough to hope we have talent.”
I pause as my parent’s supportive voices circle in my mind. “At least that’s something my parents taught me. I’m going to stand on my own two feet. I’m going to be myself.”
Madison gestures at the file spread out on the table. “And you hope to use this as leverage?”
“I need to understand my past so I can move into my future.”
I move back to the cabinet and keep searching. The next folder is unlabeled, just a blank white tab, which is exactly what makes my fingers stop on it. I pull it out, and inside is a collection of handwritten letters.
I unfold the first one, and it’s dated almost fifteen years ago.
Miranda,
I have watched you make the same mistakes for the last time.
What you call ambition, I call recklessness, and I will no longer fund it.
The music industry is not a retirement plan, and I am not a bank.
Your sister has chosen a steady life, and I had hoped you might find the same path.
Instead, I find myself writing this letter for the third time in as many years.
You are cut off, Miranda. Not out of cruelty, but because I can no longer watch you throw money into a fire and call it a career. I hope one day you prove me wrong. Until then, my decision stands.
My hands go still. “It’s written by my grandfather.”
“What does…” Madison doesn’t finish the question. Instead, she steps back, giving me more space.
I read the letter again from the beginning, slower this time, and each sentence sits heavier than the last. He’d written it three times. Three rounds of watching Miranda spend money that wasn’t hers to spend.
I fold it carefully and set it on the desk.
The second letter is written on stationery I recognize. Small white cards with a faint blue border. Mom kept a box of them in the drawer beside the kitchen phone. She used them for thank-you notes after catering events.
My throat closes over, and I unfold it.
Miranda,
I’m writing this because I can’t seem to say it out loud without us both ending up in tears, and we’ve done enough of that.
Dad left me money in the will. I know that wasn’t fair. I know you expected more than what you received, and I understand why you’re angry. But what he gave me, he gave to me for a reason. Giving it to you would go against his final wishes. I can’t do that. I’m not sure I could live with myself.
I’m sorry. I truly am. But I can’t keep being the one who fills the gap between what you have and what you need.
The handwriting is so familiar it makes my ribs ache. I’ve seen that slant a thousand times. On grocery lists stuck to the fridge, on birthday cards, and on sticky notes packed into my school lunches.
There’s a third letter on the same stationery. I take a deep breath and unfold it.
Miranda,
Fine, you win. I’m giving you the money. You already know how hard it is for me to say no to you. You’ve pushed me so much, so here it is.
But this time, I need you to hear me.
I can’t keep doing this. Every time we talk, it costs me something.
And I’m not talking money. It’s a piece of me that I don’t get back.
I can’t keep doing this with you because my daughter is already four.
She’ll grow up in the blink of an eye, and she needs to be my sole focus.
I can’t be present for her when half of me is always worrying about you.
You take risks I don’t understand. I used to admire that, but I don’t anymore. I think you’ve taken too much time mistaking recklessness for courage. I don’t have the energy to make you see the difference.
This is the last time, Miranda. I mean that, not as a threat but as a fact. I am a mother, and I’m putting my family first.
I love you. That hasn’t changed. But love isn’t the same as being available. I hope someday you find what you’re really looking for.
Sarah
The room is very quiet.
I read the last paragraph again, and tears drop onto the page before I realize my eyes had welled up.
I press the letter flat against my chest, and the paper is cool against my palm. Mom had written Miranda out of her life with the same finality she brought to everything. The careful way she folded napkins into swans, or the way we needed to set cutlery half an inch from the edge of the table.
Mom chose me over her sister.
Then she died, and Miranda took me in.
I walked into this house two weeks ago, hoping my aunt wanted me here.
Did she want my money? At least whatever money she thought I was coming here with.
The fragments of what Ryder told me fit into context. A hefty loan, buying this house when it was under foreclosure, and selling her record label before going into talent management.
Miranda is bad with money. Am I her next payday? If things don’t work out with Sky Chaos, is she going to work me like she did my mother and bleed me dry?
I can’t let her find out about the business and house sales. I dig through the social services files, wondering if there’s anything about Mrs. Rodriguez’s next visit.
“Alice?” Madison asks. “What’s wrong?”
Without answering her, I pull out my phone, searching for any messages from Mrs. Rodriguez that I had left ignored.
“Alice?”
“I can’t…” I stammer, scrolling through my phone. “I can’t stay in this house. I can’t be under Miranda’s guardianship.”
“My gosh, what did you read in there?”
My hands tremble so much that I drop my phone. Madison is quick to scoop it up for me, but in a panic, I gather all the letters, shove them back in the filing cabinet, and close the drawer with a sharp click.
“I need to get out of here,” I say.
“Okay, we can go downstairs and...”
“I mean out of this house. I need a plan.” I turn around, and whatever is written on my face makes Madison go quiet. “Will you drive me to school in the morning?”
Madison flinches. “You want me to drive all the way out here again? In the morning?”
“Yes. I can’t get back into a car with Ryder or Miranda. I need to get to school and see the guidance counselor first thing.”
“Guidance counselor?” Madison tilts her head. “What are you up to?”
I look at the filing cabinet one more time, then at the key in the office door.
“At my old school, I was on track to graduate early,” I say.
“I let it slide because I didn’t want to leave home a year early.
But turns out life had other plans.” I move toward the door and pocket the key.
“I need to leverage being enrolled at Ashworth Academy, get noticed by some good colleges, and get the heck out of this house.”
I step into the hallway, and the narrow walls press in from both sides. “I need to get far away from my aunt before she goes after my mother’s money again. If I can graduate early, I can also find a way to get emancipated and not have anyone as a guardian.”
“Okay,” Madison says, pulling the office door closed behind her. “Guidance counselor. Early graduation. Escape plan.” She falls into step beside me on the narrow stairs. “You’ve had a terrible day, and you’re somehow the most organised person I’ve ever met.”
“My parents ran a catering business,” I say. “Prep is everything.”
The house groans around us as we descend, its old bones settling in the cooling evening air. I grip the key in my pocket all the way down to the ground floor.
“Are you going to tell your aunt what you saw?” Madison asks.
“Nope. I’m gonna drop this key near the side table where I found it, and plead ignorance.”
“You’re not going to stew on this all evening, are you?”
“If by stew you mean research scholarships and legal firms, then yes.”
Madison pouts, rubbing my arm. “This is a lot, Alice. Don’t stress yourself completely out.”
I notice the length in my spine, and my hands have become steady. “Compared to the hell I’ve already been through, this is nothing.”