Chapter 5
I didn't sleep much that night. Dad moved me into the big guest room next to his bedroom, not my little room near the back stairs. He said it was just for tonight, just until we figured things out. He put the brown leather briefcase on the dresser and the key remained zipped in his navy jacket, which he hung on the closet door where I could see it.
In the morning the house felt different. Light came through the tall windows and made squares on the polished floors, but the hallway that led to the east wing still looked dim, even with the sun up. It was like that part of the house lived in a different weather.
I found Dad in the kitchen, already dressed, turning the silver key over in his palm while his coffee steamed untouched. His silver wristwatch caught the light when he moved.
"Did you try it?" I asked.
He shook his head. "Not without you. And not without knowing what we're walking into."
"Stepmother said it might be unsafe."
"She wanted us not to look," he said simply. He held the key out and let me hold it fully for the first time. It was heavier than it looked, the filigree bow ornate and cool, the teeth shaped in a way I hadn't seen on any other key in the house.
After breakfast, Dad asked Mrs. Elena, the housekeeper who'd worked for Grandma for twelve years, to come sit with us at the kitchen table. Mrs. Elena was a practical woman who wore her keys on a clip and never gossiped, but when Dad asked about the east wing, her face tightened.
Mrs. Elena said Grandma had locked those dark double doors herself about fourteen months ago, after she got her diagnosis. She had hired a locksmith from town to change the lock and had told Mrs. Elena not to clean beyond the doors. "She said, 'Let it sleep until Lily is ready,'" Mrs. Elena recalled, looking at me with soft eyes. "I thought she meant when you were older. She used to sit in there some afternoons before she locked it. Just sitting."
"What was in there?" Dad asked.
"Her sewing room, her reading room," Mrs. Elena said. "And the small bedroom where your father —" she glanced at Dad — "where you slept as a boy, before the addition was built. She kept it just so."
I tried to picture it. I had been told Grandma's wing was just old furniture under sheets.
Dad asked if anyone else had a copy of the key. Mrs. Elena said no, that Grandma had told the locksmith to make only one. When she passed, the envelope with the key taped to the back had been with the will at the lawyer's office, not in the house.
Stepmother came into the kitchen while we were still talking. She had changed clothes and done her hair, but her eyes were puffy. She paused in the doorway when she saw the key in my hand.
"You're really going to open it," she said. It wasn't a question.
Dad stood. "We are. This afternoon. But I decided we won't do it alone."
"We're not?" I said.
He looked at me, then at her. "Grandma left that wing to you, Lily. Legally it's yours. Before we open a door that was sealed for a year, I want the lawyer present. I want someone who can document what we find, so there's never a question about what was there or who it belongs to."
Stepmother's shoulders dropped a fraction, as if she'd expected a fight right then and didn't get it.
"So it stays locked a few hours more," Dad said, and he gently took the key from my palm and slipped it back into his pocket. He zipped it again.
May you like
I felt disappointed and relieved at the same time. I wanted to see what Grandma had left for me, but I didn't want to walk down that cool, blue-tinted hallway and push open those dark doors without knowing what would be on the other side.
We left the hallway empty that morning. The dark double doors stayed shut, reflecting the dim light without a sound, while Dad called the law office downtown and asked for an appointment that same day.
