Chapter 3 - The Empty Driveway
The morning air felt like broken glass against Kate's face as she stepped out of the house.
The storm that had been threatening all Christmas Eve had finally deposited a thin, icy crust over the neighborhood. The trees along the suburban street glistened under the gray morning sky, their branches weighed down by clear, fragile sleeves of ice.
It was 8:30 a.m. On any other Christmas morning, the street would be quiet, filled only with the faint sound of children screaming with joy inside warm living rooms and the smell of woodsmoke drifting from chimneys.
Mark drove the SUV slowly, his hands clamped tight at ten and two on the steering wheel. The tires crunched rhythmically through the slush. Neither of them spoke. The heavy white envelope sat on the dashboard, held down by a small brass paperweight Kate had brought from her desk so the defroster wouldn't blow it away.
As they turned onto Oak Street, the neighborhood changed slightly.
The houses here were older, built in the late 1970s—modest, single-story ranches with wide front lawns and attached single-car garages.
Number 142 stood at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac.
It was a beautiful house. Kate had made sure of that. Two years ago, when the original yellow vinyl siding was fading and cracked, Kate had hired a contractor to install modern, slate-gray composite siding with bright white trim. She had paid for the brick pathway that wound from the driveway to the front porch. She had paid for the dark red composite front door with its polished brass handle and decorative leaded glass insert.
In the driveway sat three vehicles.
The first was her father’s eight-year-old pickup truck, sparkling clean, its tires freshly shined.
The second was Janelle’s brand-new, white luxury SUV—the three-row vehicle Janelle had bought four months ago, the one with the leather seats and the panoramic sunroof that cost more than Mark earned in a year of teaching.
The third was a silver sedan belonging to Janelle’s close friend, Brenda—one of the women whose children had occupied the seats at the dining table the night before.
Kate looked at the house.
A large, plush evergreen wreath hung on the bright red front door, adorned with a velvet bow. Warm, golden light spilled from the large picture window in the dining room. Through the thin lace curtains, Kate could see figures moving inside—the silhouettes of people holding coffee mugs, gathered around the very table where there had been "no room" twelve hours earlier.
Mark pulled the SUV to the curb fifty feet down from the driveway, idling the engine.
"You want me to walk up with you?" he asked. His voice was steady, but his eyes were fixed on Janelle's luxury SUV with intense disgust.
"No," Kate said. "I want you to stay in the car with the engine running. This isn't a conversation."
She reached for the dashboard, picked up the white envelope, and slid it into her coat pocket.
"Kate," Mark said, touching her arm. "Are you sure? Once you drop that off, there's no turning back. Your mother will burn the bridge down completely."
Kate looked toward the warm, glowing window of 142 Oak Street. She thought of Abby sitting on the couch in the dark, staring at a cold piece of buttered toast on a paper towel, holding a tin of cookies she had spent three hours baking for people who didn't even invite her past the foyer.
"The bridge was already burned, Mark," Kate said softly. "They just didn't realize I was the one holding the land on both sides."
She opened the passenger door, stepped out onto the icy asphalt, and pulled her coat tight around her throat.
The walk up the brick pathway was completely silent. Her boots crunched through the light crust of ice.
As she approached the front porch, she could hear sounds coming from inside the picture window. Laughter. High-pitched, easy laughter. A male voice—her brother-in-law Greg—booming out a joke. The clinking of silverware against fine china. The faint, festive melody of a Christmas album playing on the high-end sound system Kate had bought her father for his sixtieth birthday.
They were having Christmas morning breakfast.
They were eating the strata, the cinnamon rolls, the thick-cut bacon that Eleanor made every single year.
Kate stood on the porch for three seconds.
She didn't ring the bell. She didn't knock.
She reached into her coat pocket, pulled out the heavy white envelope, and slipped it firmly between the red composite door and the brass doorframe, sliding it down until it wedged tightly near the handle.
On the front of the envelope, in crisp, black, mechanical print from her home computer, were two names:
FRANK AND ELEANOR MILLER.
Below the names, in smaller print, was a single reference line:
RE: NOTICE OF TENANCY TERMINATION & FINANCIAL DISCONTINUANCE.
Kate stepped back.
She turned to walk back to the car.
Then, behind her, the lock clicked.
The heavy red door swung inward six inches.
Eleanor Miller stood in the entryway. She was sixty-eight years old, her silver hair styled in soft, permed waves, wearing a long, velvet holiday robe in rich burgundy. She held a porcelain mug painted with holly leaves in her right hand.
She looked at Kate standing on the porch.
For a fraction of a second, a flash of annoyance crossed Eleanor's face—the instinctive, familiar irritation of a mother whose least favorite child had disrupted a pleasant moment.
"Kate?" Eleanor said, her voice sharp, instantly defensive. "What are you doing here so early? I thought you were working a double shift."
Kate stopped on the top brick step. She didn't walk closer. She didn't step back.
"My shift ended at seven," Kate said. Her voice carried clearly through the cold morning air.
Eleanor adjusted her grip on her coffee mug, leaning against the doorframe. "Well, if you're coming to make a fuss about last night, don't bother. Janelle told me Abby was being completely dramatic. We simply didn't have the space, Kate. Greg's family came in unexpectedly, and Brenda brought her girls. It was a simple seating issue. There was no need for Abby to storm off like a spoiled brat."
Kate stared at her mother.
She didn't raise her voice. She didn't yell. She didn't let her mouth twitch.
"Abby didn't storm off, Eleanor," Kate said smoothly. "She was turned away at the door by her grandmother and her aunt after driving thirty minutes alone on Christmas Eve."
"Oh, don't use that tone with me!" Eleanor snapped, her cheeks flushing red. "You always do this! You always turn everything into a federal case! We offered her the den! It wasn't our fault she didn't want to sleep on a sofa! We were overwhelmed! You have no idea how hard I worked on that dinner!"
Behind Eleanor, the inner door opened wider.
Janelle stepped into the hallway. She was wearing matching silk pajamas, a glass of mimosa in her hand, her blonde hair perfectly blow-dried.
"Is that Kate?" Janelle called out, her tone dripping with artificial, theatrical fatigue. "Kate, seriously? It's eight-thirty on Christmas morning. Are you really doing this right now? Can't you just give it a rest for one day?"
Kate looked past her mother at Janelle.
She saw the silk pajamas. She saw the mimosa glass. She saw the expensive gold chain hanging around Janelle's neck—a gift from their parents two Christmases ago, bought with money Kate had provided for their heating bills.
"I'm not doing anything, Janelle," Kate said cleanly.
She pointed toward the brass doorhandle.
"I just dropped off your mail."
Eleanor looked down. Her eyes caught the white envelope wedged into the frame.
"What is this?" Eleanor demanded, reaching out with her free hand to pull the envelope from the door. "Is this a check? Because the water bill came yesterday and it was higher than usual—"
"Read it, Eleanor," Kate said.
She turned on her heel, stepped down off the porch, and walked down the brick pathway toward the idling SUV.
"Kate!" Eleanor yelled from the porch, her voice rising in pitch. "Kate! You get back here right now! Don't you walk away from me when I'm speaking to you! Katherine Mary!"
Kate reached the passenger door of the SUV, pulled it open, and stepped inside.
"Go, Mark," she said softly.
Mark put the vehicle in drive. The tires crunched against the slush as the SUV pulled away from the curb.
May you like
In the side mirror, Kate watched her mother open the envelope on the front porch under the gray morning light. She watched Eleanor pull out the three pages of crisp white paper.
She watched her mother’s face go completely, terrifyingly white.
