I found this in my girlfriend’s bathroom. We’ve been looking at it for an hour now and still can’t figure out what it is.

“Lena, just calm down.”

She looked at him directly.

“You gave her access to my card?”

“It was for emergencies,” he said, not meeting her eyes.

Diane slammed her mug on the counter hard enough to make the surface shake.

“Don’t act like I’m stealing from some kind of saint. You have money. I want five thousand, and I want it by Friday.”

“No,” Lena said.

Diane’s expression hardened in an instant.

“Excuse me?”

“No,” Lena said again, with the same calm.

The silence lasted less than a second.

Then Diane grabbed the mug and threw the hot coffee directly at Lena’s face.

The pain was immediate, scalding and shocking, and Lena heard herself cry out before she could stop it.

The coffee splashed across her cheek, neck, collarbone, and the front of her blouse. The mug shattered on the tile near her feet. She pressed her hand against the burning skin of her face and felt her eyes fill with tears from the pain alone.

Eric shouted his mother’s name.

Diane stood where she was, breathing hard, as if Lena had done something to provoke her.

Lena looked at both of them through burning eyes, and when she spoke, her voice was shaking but certain.

“You are going to regret this.”

She picked up her purse, her keys, and a folder she had kept in the office drawer for months, the one Eric had never once asked about, which contained the deed to the house, registered in her name and her name only.

Then she walked out.

At six in the morning the following day, Diane was still in bed when she heard loud knocking at the front door.

When she opened it, two police officers were standing on the porch.

Behind them was a locksmith.…continue reading …