Perfectly styled hair. Crisp silk blouse. Sharp eyes that inspected me like an inconvenience delivered by mistake.

For a brief moment, I thought she might flinch. Or soften. Or at least seem surprised.

She didn’t.

“You’re out,” she said flatly.

“Where’s my dad?” My voice sounded unfamiliar—rough, too loud.

Her lips tightened.

Then she said it.

“Your father died last year.”

The words hovered, unreal.

Buried.
A year ago.

My mind refused to accept it. I waited for clarification. For cruelty disguised as a joke.

But she didn’t blink.

“We live here now,” she added. “You should leave.”

The hallway behind her was unrecognizable. New furniture. New pictures. No sign of my father’s boots. No jacket. No smell of sawdust or coffee.

It was as if he had been erased.

And she held the eraser.

“I need to see him,” I said, desperation clawing at my chest. “His room—”

“There’s nothing left,” she replied, closing the door. Not slamming it. Just closing it. Slowly. Final.

The deadbolt clicked.

I stood there, stunned.

A year.

I learned my father was gone standing on his porch like a stranger.

I don’t remember leaving. Only walking. Until my legs burned. Until the sentence stopped echoing.

Eventually, I reached the only place that made sense.

The cemetery.

Tall pines loomed like guards. The iron gate creaked open.

I didn’t have flowers. I just needed proof.

Before I reached the office, a voice stopped me.

“Looking for someone?”

An older man leaned on a rake near the shed. Alert eyes. Wary.

“My father,” I said. “Thomas Vance.”

He studied me. Then shook his head.

“Don’t look.”

My stomach dropped.

“He’s not here.”

He introduced himself as Harold, the groundskeeper. Said he knew my father.

Then he handed me a worn envelope.

“He told me to give you this. If you ever came.”

Inside was a letter. A card. And a key.

UNIT 108 — WESTRIDGE STORAGE

The letter was dated three months before my release.

My father had known.

At the storage unit, I opened a world he had hidden—documents, records, proof.