The Reading

Naomi Bell had worn black for eleven days straight — first at the hospital, then at the funeral, and now in a lawyer's office that smelled of dust and burnt coffee. Her husband Gregory had been gone less than two weeks, and already the world wanted paperwork.

"It's just a formality," Mr. Castellan had told her on the phone. "Standard reading. You, Callum, maybe an hour."

Her son sat beside her now, nineteen and folded into himself, jaw tight the way his father's used to get before an argument. Naomi reached over and squeezed his hand. He didn't squeeze back.

"We don't have to do this today," she whispered.

"We do," Callum said. "Dad would've hated waiting."

The office door opened and Mr. Castellan stepped in, a thin folder pressed to his chest like it might try to escape. He didn't sit right away. That was the first thing Naomi noticed — lawyers who had good news sat down immediately.

"Before we start," he said, "I want you to know I only received the updated documents six days ago. Gregory filed an amendment in March. I wasn't permitted to discuss it before the reading."

"An amendment," Naomi repeated. "To what?"

"The house," Castellan said. "Ridgeline Lane."

Naomi almost laughed. Of course the house — the house she'd painted herself, the house where she'd raised Callum, the house Gregory had promised, more than once, over more than twenty years, would always be hers.

"Then read it," she said. "Let's get this over with."

Castellan opened the folder, cleared his throat, and read the paragraph slowly, like a man defusing something.

The house at 14 Ridgeline Lane was to pass, in full, to a woman named Sable Quinn.

Naomi had never heard that name in her life.