Mom reached inside the yellow envelope again.
She removed three sheets of paper.
“These arrived six months ago.”
I picked up the first.
It was a letter from a bank.
The language was formal and dense, but one sentence immediately caught my attention.
It referenced a loan application secured against property owned by our mother.
The lake house.
I looked up.
“Mom, did you take out a loan?”
“No.”
Melissa closed her eyes.
Just for a second.
But I saw it.
I looked back at the document.
There was Mom’s name.
Her address.
Her property information.
And near the bottom—
her signature.
Except something about it seemed wrong.
My mother’s handwriting had become slightly shaky during the past few years. Her capital letters tilted toward the right.
This signature was smooth.
Confident.
Almost too perfect.
I looked at Melissa.
She wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“Did you sign this?”
“No.”
“Melissa.”
