Part 4 — I Returned Home Five Days Early and Found My Mother’s Friend in My Bed — But I Froze When I Saw My Mother’s Face

The next morning at six o’clock, someone knocked on the door.

Diana had not slept all night. She sat in the living room, her hands resting on her knees, looking at one point on the floor. Sophia stood by the window. And I sat at my father’s old desk, turning the key holder that I had thought lost for years.

The knock was repeated.

“I will open it,” I said.

The same investigators stood at the door, along with yesterday’s notary representative and a woman holding several documents.

“I am an investigator from the tax service,” she said. “We discovered that the money transferred by your mother is connected not only with the sale of the house, but also with your father’s medical accounts.”

Diana stood up.

“I will explain.”

“Madam, today your explanation will be possible only in the presence of a lawyer.”

Diana took out her phone and called the lawyer. Ten minutes later she received an answer.

“Marco will no longer work here,” she said.

“What does that mean?” Diana asked.

“He said that he has a conflict of interest. In addition, he does not want a case where the client forged her own son’s signature.”

Diana’s hand stiffened.

She looked toward me.

“Did you ask him to refuse me?”

“No.”

“But you wanted this.”

“I only wanted the truth.”

The investigator placed a small recorder on the table.

“This is your conversation from yesterday. For court, it will be necessary to establish that the voice truly belongs to you.”

The recording was turned on.

My mother’s voice sounded in the room.

“Noah will not check anything. I will make him sign when he comes.”

Diana raised her head.

She heard her own voice.

Not as her own thought, not as the words spoken during an argument, but as the calm, cold confession of a stranger.

“Turn it off,” she said.

The recording continued.

“If he resists me, I will tell him that his father’s debt remained.”

Diana sank into the chair.

For the first time I saw how a person’s own words can return to them, and how there may be nothing heavier than them in this world.

Sophia did not go to her side.

Neither did I.

The investigator gathered the documents.

“The investigation will continue. You will not be able to sell the house, withdraw money from the accounts, or contact the buyer.”

“Will you arrest me?” Diana asked.

“Not today. But you will have to appear in court.”

When they left, a strange emptiness remained in the house. It was as if even the walls had understood that the old order was over.

Diana tried to speak with me.

“I did not want to hurt you.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you looking at me like that?”

“Because sometimes a person can not want harm and still hurt you all their life.”

She could not find an answer.

Three weeks later, the court canceled the sale of the house. The forged power of attorney was declared invalid. The bank returned part of the money, while the rest went to cover Diana’s debts. She was given a suspended sentence, placed under strict supervision, and forbidden to manage my financial affairs.

I was not happy.

Justice did not resemble victory. It more resembled closing a door behind which a part of childhood remained forever.

After the trial I returned home alone.

My mother’s room was empty. One shelf remained in the wardrobe, and in the drawer lay an old photograph of her and my father. Behind the photograph, in the dust, I again found the old little bag for the wooden key holder in which my father kept train tickets.

I took the key holder in my hand.

The star-shaped cutout looked like a small window in the light.

Sophia stood in the doorway.

“You can stay, if you want,” I told her.

“Not because you are obliged.”

“Because I want to.”

She nodded.

“I want to too, but first I must learn to be alone.”

“Then let us both learn.”

That night she stayed in the guest room. She left the door open. For the first time in several weeks, silence no longer frightened me.

Two months later the city changed. At the beginning of winter I moved into a small apartment near the river. In the mornings I worked in the university library, and in the evenings I tutored children in mathematics. I hung my father’s drawing on the wall, but I still could not bring myself to put up my mother’s photograph.

Sophia moved to the other side of the city. Once a week we had lunch together. We slowly entered each other’s lives, the way people enter a room where there is still broken glass on the floor.

One morning, during the first snow, Sophia brought me a drawing by a little boy. He was her nephew, six years old, and in the drawing the three of us stood in front of a train.

“This is you,” Sophia told me.

“Why do I have such a big head?”

“Because children always bring the truth to the surface.”

I smiled.

“And you?”

“I am standing by the window.”

“Why?”

“I am watching the road.”

Months later Diana wrote to me for the first time. The message was short.

“I want to talk to you. I understand everything. I know that I lost you. Perhaps we could meet at least once.”

I looked at the screen for a long time.

Then I replied.

“The meeting will happen when you apologize not for forgiveness, but for responsibility. I am not ready now.”

No answer came from her.

And for the first time I did not begin comforting her.

I did not say that everything would be all right.

I did not hide my own pain so that she would feel hers less.

In spring the court issued its final decision. Diana’s debts remained her responsibility. I used the money returned from my account to pay off the university loan. I sold half of the house, and gave the rest to the village’s young people as an educational center. There, children were given books, and in the evenings they drew in my father’s workshop.

Once Sophia asked me:

“Do you miss the old house?”

“I miss the house I thought I had.”

“Those are two different things.”

“I know now.”

After the first snow I kept the child’s drawing for a long time. Beside it lay the small wooden key holder, with its star-shaped cutout.

One evening I opened the window. A train passed in the street. From far away its sound entered the room and made the shadows hanging on the walls move.

I took the key holder in my hand.

My father thought that it opened a door.

Only now did I understand that in reality it was showing me the way.

And this time I chose for myself where I was going.