Jessica’s house—yes, she called it a house, but she always spoke about it like it was an estate—smelled like roasted meat and expensive candles. Vanilla and sandalwood and something else I couldn’t name but always recognized as “rich person scent.” The dining wing was lined with framed family photos, professional beach shots where everyone wore white and looked sun-kissed and effortlessly happy.
In almost every photo, Jessica stood front and center, smiling like she owned the world.
I walked past them without looking.
I opened the hall closet, grabbed my coat, and shrugged it on with hands that shook just enough to make the zipper fight me. My keys slipped from my fingers twice before I managed to get a grip.
I could feel eyes watching from the dining room doorway.
No one followed.
No one said, “Nina, wait.”
Why would they?
Apparently I was “the help.”
Outside, the November air slapped me hard across the face—cold, sharp, smelling like wet leaves and distant chimney smoke. Jessica’s neighborhood was one of those planned communities where every lawn was manicured, every house some shade of beige, every tree planted at the same distance from the curb like symmetry could guarantee happiness.