My grandmother spent her whole life saving so that her granddaughter would never stand at a door she could not afford to open.
And when the day came that I had to open it, I could, because she had made sure of it, decades in advance, one careful dollar at a time.
Chapter 4 — I Said No
On the night everything exploded, Amber and Indigo were waiting in my living room when I got home from work.
Indigo slapped a stack of glossy flyers onto the coffee table — a questionable real-estate development, the kind of scheme that promises everything and delivers nothing — and announced that they needed three million dollars from me to enter as founding partners.
Not asked — announced.
As though my grandmother’s life savings were simply a family resource they had decided how to spend.
I said no.
I will keep the rest of that night brief, for the reasons I have already given.
The refusal was met first with insults, and then, when the insults did not move me, with violence.
I ended up on the floor of my own dining room, with my arms wrapped around my own body, trying to make myself small.
I remember Amber leaning down close to my ear and telling me, quietly, that I would not be leaving that house until I signed the papers.
