Total pages in book: 39
Estimated words: 37164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 186(@200wpm)___ 149(@250wpm)___ 124(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 186(@200wpm)___ 149(@250wpm)___ 124(@300wpm)
I sign where she points.I initial where she circles.My name looks unfamiliar each time I write it, like it belongs to someone else, someone steadier, more capable of letting go.
“This releases the property. After today, it officially transfers.”
I hesitate for half a second too long.
Then I sign.
The pen scratches across the page, loud in the quiet room.
That’s it.
The house is no longer mine. It’s no longer ours.
The movers arrive shortly after. The truck idles at the curb, too large for the street. I stand on the porch and watch them unload dollies and blankets, cheerful in the way people are when this is just a job to them.
Aunt Carol hovers nearby, giving directions, answering questions I can’t bring myself to engage with.
“Donation pile goes first,” one of the movers says.
I nod.
Boxes I helped sort yesterday are carried out along with clothes my mother loved but no longer wore, kitchen gadgets she swore she’d use again, books she read once and insisted she’d revisit. Watching them leave feels strange and irreversible.
I duck back inside and move through the house quickly now, heart pounding, adrenaline taking over where grief left a void. I grab what I can in a panic including some of the photo albums, a few notebooks, and her favorite scarves. I want things that feel like her, not just evidence of her life.
I pack them into boxes marked KEEP in as big of letters as the space allows, stacking them carefully by the door.
Aunt Carol appears beside me. “I’ll hold onto these,” she reassures me. “As long as you need.”
“Thank you,” I manage.
I pause in the dining room one last time, standing in front of the donation pile as if it might speak to me. Near the top rests the coat my mother wore every December, red wool with a fur-trimmed collar and a missing button she never bothered to replace. I lift it and press it briefly to my face before I can stop myself.
It still smells like her. I place it into my box instead, knowing some decisions don’t need to be reasoned with.
The house empties slowly, and then all at once. Furniture is carried away, the walls begin to echo, and the rooms grow larger and lonelier without the things that once gave them shape.
By afternoon, the truck is full. The movers slide the ramp back into the truck, thank me, and wish me a Merry Christmas. The words pass through me with a distant ache.
When the door closes behind them for the final time, the house feels like a body resting without a heartbeat.
Aunt Carol hands me the keys. “You don’t have to give these to the realtor yet. You can take a minute.”
I walk through the house one last time, moving from the living room to the hallway and then into the kitchen, letting each space have its moment. I pause in the doorway and allow the quiet to settle around me.
“I did it,” I whisper, unsure who I’m speaking to. “It’s all done.”
There’s no answer, only the low hum of the empty house and the weight of what has been closed.
Outside, the cold air bites sharper than before as I hand over the keys.
The truck pulls away with a low groan, its tires crunching against the frozen gravel as it turns the corner at the end of the street and disappears from view. Behind me, the house stands empty, the porch bare and the windows dark, stripped of the warmth that once lived there. The SOLD sign has already been taken down, its white post leaning against the fence like something discarded, as though it no longer knows what it’s meant to hold.
There is nothing left to negotiate with now, no space for second guesses or lingering arguments with myself. I release a long, unsteady breath, the sound of it visible in the cold air, and let the moment pass through me.
“That was… fast,” Aunt Carol trails off in thought, stifling a sob.
I nod. I don’t think I could speak right now if I tried.
She squeezes my arm once. “I’ll take these to my place,” she says, nodding at the boxes marked KEEP. “You call me when you’re ready. They can live there as long as they need.”
“Okay.”
“I love you, Savannah. You did a big thing today. She would be so proud of you.” She pulls me in tight, heart to heart, holding me close.
When she pulls away, she leaves me there, not abandoned, just trusted to have this moment alone.
The cold creeps in immediately, sharp and insistent. I wrap my coat tighter around myself and turn once more toward the house, memorizing the way the afternoon light hits the siding. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s grief refusing to let go cleanly.
A vehicle slows behind me.
I hear it before I see it; the familiar low rumble, the way it idles like it’s a part of the town.