I walked over and followed her gaze through the glass. My stomach dropped hard.
The backyard looked like it had been surgically opened and rearranged. A large rectangle had been carved out where grass used to grow. Piles of dirt sat like small brown mountains waiting to be hauled away. Wooden forms ran along the edges, metal rebar stuck up in organized grids, and stacks of stone pavers waited on wooden pallets. It wasn’t finished yet, but it also wasn’t subtle.
A swimming pool.
A full-sized, in-ground, suburban dream swimming pool. Because why quietly improve your property when you can broadcast your success to the entire neighborhood with heavy machinery, contractor trucks, and a massive concrete hole in your yard?
Lucy blinked several times, processing. “Is that for us?”
There was so much innocent hope in her young voice that in that moment, I hated everyone I was related to.
“I don’t know, honey,” I said carefully. “Let’s get your cello first.”
We walked down the hall toward the music room, the space that had always been my grandmother’s territory even when she lived with my parents. That room had been her sanctuary in this Midwestern split-level home. Temperature controlled, carefully maintained. The humidifier hummed quietly in the corner. Shelves were packed with old sheet music and scores from orchestras in Chicago and St. Louis decades ago. There was even a lock on the storage cabinet because my grandmother understood human nature better than most.
Lucy loved that room. She said it smelled like wood polish and peppermint tea. I always thought it smelled like someone who still believed in setting boundaries.
I pushed open the door to the music room.
The humidifier was still running its gentle hum. The music stand was still positioned in the corner. But the spot where the cello case always rested, where Lucy’s cello had lived like it belonged to her, was completely empty.
Not moved to another location. Not shifted to make space. Not temporarily put away somewhere safe.
Empty.
Lucy didn’t scream or cry out. She didn’t even take a breath. She just froze completely still.
Then she walked slowly to the corner like she was approaching something fragile that might break if she moved too quickly. She looked down at the bare spot in the carpet, then up at the shelf, then behind the chair, as if a full-sized cello might have somehow fallen and no one had noticed for days.
She turned to face me.
“Did Great-Grandma change her mind about letting me use it?” she asked. Her voice was small and careful, like she was trying not to disturb the air around us.
My throat tightened painfully. “No, sweetheart.”
Lucy swallowed hard. “Then where is it?”
She didn’t sound angry, which would have been easier to handle. She sounded careful, like asking the question itself might get her in trouble somehow.
Her fingers drifted toward the edge of the music stand, like she expected to feel the familiar curve of polished wood there. Something real and solid. When she found nothing, she pulled her hand back quickly, as if she’d touched something hot.
Her eyes were glossy with unshed tears, but she didn’t let anything fall. She just nodded once, too hard, like she was forcing the moment to behave and make sense.
I didn’t answer her question because I didn’t know the answer for certain yet. But I could already feel where this situation was heading, and I hated that my child was standing in the middle of it.
“I’ll be right back,” I said firmly. “Stay here for a second, okay?”
Lucy nodded again without speaking.
I left her in the music room because I needed her not to see my face when I found out the truth.
The Kitchen Confrontation
I marched toward the kitchen with purpose.
My mom was there, exactly where I expected. She is always in the kitchen when she wants to look like she’s holding the family together with her bare hands and endless patience. The open-plan space looked like something straight out of a home design magazine. Granite countertops, stainless steel refrigerator covered in my sister’s kids’ artwork, a big farmhouse table that had never actually seen a farm.
She had a coffee mug in one hand and her phone in the other. Her gray-streaked hair was pulled back like she’d been busy all morning, which in my family usually means busy ignoring something important.
My dad sat at the table scrolling through something on his tablet, calm as a man who believes the world will always make room for his decisions. He wore his Indianapolis Colts t-shirt, the one he considers proof that he’s just a regular, down-to-earth guy.
My sister Rachel was perched on a barstool sipping something green and expensive-looking through a reusable straw. Probably a smoothie from that organic place by the shopping center. She didn’t even look up when I walked into the room.
“Where’s Lucy’s cello?” I asked directly.
My mom blinked slowly, like she was confused why I’d bring up something inconvenient during her peaceful morning coffee.
“Good morning to you too, Emily,” she said with false pleasantness.
I just stared at her, waiting.
My dad sighed heavily. “What’s the problem now?”
I could feel my heart doing that uncomfortable thing where it tries to climb out of my chest and find a quieter, healthier family in another state.
“Lucy’s cello,” I repeated clearly. “Where is it?”
Rachel snorted without looking up from her phone. “Oh, please.”
My mom took a casual sip of her coffee. “Your father handled it.”
“Handled it?” My voice was already sharpening with tension. “Handled it how exactly?”
That phrase, “handled it,” has always been a warning sign in my family, usually written in cursive on disaster.
My dad finally looked up from his tablet.
“We sold it,” he said simply.
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