Chapter 3 - THE EMPTY DRIVEWAY
-3-
The drive back to my apartment was nothing short of euphoric.
As I sat behind the steering wheel of the white SUV, inhaling that glorious, intoxicating scent of new leather, every single second of humiliation, frustration, and helplessness I had endured over the past two weeks evaporated into the night air. The city lights blurred past my windows as I took the scenic route home, cranking the stereo up to a volume I never would have dared use while the car was at my parents' house.
When I finally pulled into my apartment complex, I didn't just park in my designated stall. I backed the vehicle in with absolute precision, cut the engine, and sat in the quiet cabin for a long moment, simply listening to the faint ticking of the cooling metal.
It was mine.
I pulled the heavy silver keyring from the ignition, hopped out of the car, and locked the doors with a crisp, satisfying beep from the fob.
True to Grandpa’s instructions, my first order of business the following morning was changing the locks on my apartment. I didn't want to take any chances. I knew Mom still had a spare key from the time she had offered to “water my plants” while I was away on a business trip—a plant-watering expedition that had conveniently resulted in several of my favorite books disappearing into her tote bag.
By 10:00 AM on Monday, a local locksmith had installed a heavy-duty deadbolt, handing me three freshly cut keys that no family member possessed.
Next came the digital lockdown.
I sat at my kitchen counter, hooked the secondary GPS tracker Grandpa had given me into my phone’s secure app, and calibrated the geofencing parameters. Within minutes, a digital perimeter was drawn around my apartment complex, my office building, and my regular grocery store route. If the car so much as crossed county lines without my biometric approval, Grandpa’s phone and mine would simultaneously erupt with blaring red alerts.
As I finished setting up the parameters, my phone buzzed against the counter.
I glanced down, expecting an angry text from Mom or a passive-aggressive threat from Ava. Instead, the notification banner displayed an incoming call from an unknown local number.
I frowned, swiping to answer. “Hello?”
“Amelia? Oh, thank God, you picked up.”
The voice was shaky, breathless, and unmistakably male. It took me a second to place it, but then the recognition hit me. It was Uncle Marcus—Mom’s younger brother, who lived two towns over and mostly stayed out of the toxic vortex of our immediate family drama unless forced into it by holiday obligations.
“Uncle Marcus?” I asked, my tone instantly cautious. “Is everything okay? What’s wrong?”
“Well, that depends on who you ask,” Marcus let out a nervous, breathless chuckle. “Look, Amelia, I’m calling you because your mother has been camped out on my living room sofa since last night, and she is currently working herself into a stroke, and frankly, my wife is threatening to hose her down with the garden hose if she doesn't stop crying about your grandfather.”
I blinked, momentarily stunned. “Mom is at your house? Why?”
“Because your grandfather changed the locks on the farmhouse and forwarded her mail to a PO box in town,” Marcus said, lowering his voice as if he feared Mom might overhear him from the next room. “He told her she’s persona non grata until she learns how to respect boundaries and stop treating you like her personal chauffeur. And since her own house was foreclosed on—wait, did you know about the foreclosure?”
“I knew,” I said calmly.
“Right, well, she didn't have anywhere else to go, so she showed up on my doorstep with three suitcases and a profound sense of injustice,” Marcus sighed heavily. “She’s telling anyone who will listen that you manipulated your grandfather into cutting her off, that you staged some elaborate conspiracy using a car tracker, and that you’re the most ungrateful, vindictive daughter in the history of North Carolina.”
A bitter, humorless laugh escaped my lips. “Of course she is. Did you expect her to take accountability?”
“No,” Marcus admitted honestly. “Honestly, I didn't. But here’s why I’m calling, Amelia. She wants to come see you. Or rather, she wants to ambush you. She’s planning to drive out to your office building this afternoon with Ava in tow, camping out in the parking lot until you come down and agree to ‘fix this’ with your grandfather.”
My grip on the phone tightened. The thought of Mom and Ava showing up at my workplace—creating a scene in front of my boss, my coworkers, and the corporate clients I had worked so hard to impress—made my blood boil.
“Uncle Marcus,” I said, my voice dropping into a razor-sharp register. “Tell her that if she steps foot on my office property, I won't just refuse to talk to her. I’ll have campus security slap a trespassing order on her so fast her head will spin.”
“I tried telling her that,” Marcus groaned. “She told me I was taking your side and called me a traitor. Look, I just wanted to give you a heads-up so you weren't caught off guard. Protect yourself, kiddo. Your mother is operating on pure desperation right now, and desperate people do stupid things.”
“Thanks for the warning, Uncle Marcus. I appreciate it.”
“Anytime. Stay safe.”
The line went dead.
I dropped the phone onto the counter and stared blankly out the window. So, the siege of the fortress had begun. Mom hadn't learned a single thing from the weekend’s catastrophe. Instead of reflecting on her toxic behavior, instead of realizing that her manipulation had finally caught up to her, she was doubling down, playing the victim, and planning a tactical assault on my professional life.
Well, she had severely underestimated the new perimeter defenses.
I pulled up my office building’s security portal on my laptop, logged into the visitor management system, and typed in two specific names: Helen Vance and Ava Vance. I flagged their names with a red-level security alert, attaching a note that instructed front desk security to deny entry and immediately notify building management if either of them attempted to access the premises.
Then, I opened my calendar, cleared my afternoon schedule so I could work remotely from the bulletproof safety of my apartment, and settled in with a cup of coffee.
Let them come to my office. Let them waste their gas driving all the way downtown. Let them stand out in the cold parking lot shouting at locked glass doors.
May you like
They had spent twenty-four years controlling every aspect of my life, dictating where I sat, what I drove, and how much space I was allowed to occupy.
Those days were officially over.
