I Came Home From My Mother-In-Law’s Funeral Still Wearing Black, Only To Find My Husband, His Sister, And A Lawyer Already Sitting In My Living Room With A Will That Called My Ten Years Of Caregiving “Service,” Left Him The House, And Gave Me Forty-Eight Hours To Disappear

Five thousand dollars.

The lawyer’s transfer had already gone through—efficient and impersonal.

I did the math automatically, the way I had always done.

Motel rates.

Food.

Gas.

It would last a few weeks if I was careful.

Two, maybe three.

I went to a grocery store down the road, the kind wedged between a dollar store and a nail salon in a strip mall, and bought the cheapest things I could find.

Bread.

Peanut butter.

Soup.

I stood in line watching the total climb on the screen, my stomach tightening with each dollar.

I had paid for medications that cost more than this in a single month.

I had never once kept track.

Now every cent mattered.

The days blurred together.

I slept in short bursts, waking whenever the heater kicked on or someone slammed a door nearby.

During the day, I sat on the bed and stared at the television without turning it on, listening to the hum of electricity in the walls.

I thought about calling Daniel.

Then I dismissed it.

There was nothing left to say.

I thought about calling friends I hadn’t spoken to in years.

Then I realized I wouldn’t know how to explain what had happened without sounding like I was asking for something.

I had spent too long being the one who handled things.