The next afternoon, Margaret called me.
I was sitting in my car outside the hospital during my lunch break.
Danny was at school, and I had spent the morning thinking about the documents.
I answered immediately.
"Hello, Aunt Margaret."
"I have the copies you asked for."
I sat up.
"The letters?"
"Yes. I think you should see them."
I asked whether I could come by after work.
She told me that would be fine.
I finished my lunch and returned to the hospital.
But my mind wasn't on my patients anymore than it needed to be.
I kept thinking about my name.
Lydia.
It was written on the property documents.
It was also written on letters I had never sent.
I couldn't understand why anyone would go to that trouble.
If my family wanted Emma to have the apartment, they could have asked Margaret.
She might have refused.
I might have been hurt.
But at least the truth would have been there.
Instead, somebody had created a story in which I had already received the apartment and expressed my gratitude.
That wasn't a misunderstanding.
That was deliberate.
After my shift, I picked up Danny and drove to Margaret's house.
She was waiting in the living room.
A brown folder rested on the coffee table.
Beside it was a cup of tea.
She had arranged the papers carefully.
I sat down.
Danny went to the other room with a book.
Margaret opened the folder.
"There are three letters."
I looked at her.
"Three?"
She nodded.
"The first arrived shortly after the apartment was purchased."
She handed it to me.
I unfolded the paper.
My name appeared at the bottom.
The handwriting wasn't mine.
The wording was polite and formal.
It thanked Margaret for her generosity and mentioned how grateful I was for the opportunity to have a new home.
I read it again.
Then I looked at the date.
I had been working a double shift that day.
I remembered because Danny had stayed with a neighbor until I finished.
I hadn't written anything.
I hadn't even known the apartment existed.
Margaret handed me the second letter.
This one arrived several weeks later.
It said I was settling into the arrangements and appreciated everything my aunt had done.
The third letter was shorter.
It suggested that I was happy with the decision and that there was no need for Margaret to worry about the property while traveling.
I put it down.
For a moment, I couldn't speak.
"They wanted you to believe I had the apartment."
Margaret nodded.
"That's how it appeared."
"But they knew I didn't."
She looked at me.
"Yes."
I stared at the papers.
There was something especially disturbing about seeing my name at the bottom.
It felt personal in a way that the apartment itself hadn't.
Somebody had taken my identity and used it to reassure the person who was trying to help me.
I felt sick.
"Did you recognize the handwriting?"
Margaret considered the question.
"I couldn't say with certainty who wrote them."
I nodded.
I didn't want to accuse someone without knowing.
But I remembered Linda's face at Christmas.
I remembered Emma saying that her mother had told her I wouldn't find out.
And I remembered my father's silence.
Margaret placed the letters back into the folder.
"I kept the envelopes too."
She showed me the postmarks.
The dates matched the period when she had been traveling.
I examined each one.
I didn't recognize the return information.
I asked whether she had received anything else.
She said she had received occasional messages about the apartment, but nothing that made her suspicious at the time.
She believed the arrangements were progressing.
She believed I had been informed.
I felt sorry for her.
She had spent months planning something generous.
Then she had returned home to discover that the people she trusted had used her absence to change everything.
I touched her hand.
"I'm sorry."
She shook her head.
"You have nothing to apologize for."
I looked at the folder again.
I wanted to take the letters home.
Margaret agreed to make me copies.
She kept the originals.
I understood why.
They were important.
They showed that someone had gone beyond simply handing the keys to Emma.
They had tried to make the arrangement look like something I had accepted.
Before I left, Margaret asked whether I had spoken to my father again.
I told her he had sent a message.
She asked what he wanted.
"To talk."
"And do you want to?"
I thought about it.
"Not yet."
She nodded.
I didn't owe anyone an immediate conversation.
That evening, I returned home and placed the copied letters beside the property documents.
I looked at them together.
My name.
The apartment.
The false gratitude.
It was all connected.
Danny came into the kitchen.
"Mom, are we moving soon?"
I looked at him.
"Yes, sweetheart."
He smiled.
"Can I pack my dinosaurs?"
I laughed.
"Not all at once. We still need somewhere to sleep."
He thought about that.
Then he pointed toward his plastic container.
"I can start with these."
I helped him put the books in a small bag.
He treated it like an important job.
I watched him carefully arranging his things.
For him, the apartment meant a bedroom.
For me, it meant something much larger.
It meant I no longer had to pretend that being independent was the same as being unwanted.
And it meant I could finally stop explaining why I deserved a place of my own.
Click here to continue reading: PART 10: I Started Packing Our Small Apartment, While My Father Kept Calling as Though an Apology Could Make the Keys Disappear
I Had Spent My Whole Life Being Called Independent, Until One Small Thank-You Made Everyone at Christmas Dinner Stop Talking
Part 9 of 20
