When I pulled up the long gravel driveway, my heart seized. My mother’s beige SUV was parked next to a bright pink convertible I didn’t recognize. And Molly. Molly was on the porch, my grandfather’s porch, posing for a photo. She had one hand on her hip, her hair in perfect waves, pouting at a phone propped up on the railing. She was wearing a new crisp-looking flannel shirt and designer boots caked in manufactured mud. Behind her, two large, ugly, bright white planters had been placed on either side of the door, spilling over with plastic flowers.
I got out of the car, the crunch of gravel under my boots feeling like an explosion in the mountain quiet. Molly looked up, her smile freezing when she saw me.
“Oh, hey, Care,” she said, snatching her phone off the railing. “What are you doing here? Mom said you were, you know, upset.”
“Upset,” I repeated, my voice flat.
I walked past her up the steps. “Get your things, Molly. You need to leave.”
“Whoa, okay, rude.” She scoffed, following me. “I’m literally in the middle of a shoot. This is for my job.”
I put my key in the lock. It wouldn’t turn. My blood ran cold. I tried again, jiggling it, pushing. Nothing.
“Oh, yeah,” Molly said brightly from behind me. “Mom had the locks changed. She said the old ones were probably rusty and it wasn’t secure. She’s just looking out for me.”
I turned around slowly. “She changed the locks.”
“Duh. For my safety. You should have seen the one on the back door. It was literally falling off.”
She crossed her arms, suddenly defiant. “Look, Caroline, I don’t know why you’re making this such a big deal. It’s just a cabin. You never even used it that much.”
“I was here every summer of my life,” I said, my voice dangerously low. “I was here last month helping Grandpa stack wood for a winter he’d never see. Where were you, Molly?”
“At a festival.”
Her face flushed. “That’s not fair. I was busy. And Mom said this was fine. She said you wouldn’t care.”
“Mom was wrong.”
I looked past her at the woods, at the familiar peak of the mountain. I felt my grandfather’s presence everywhere, in the sigh of the pine trees, in the rough honeyed wood of the porch, and I felt a resolve harden inside me, solid as granite.
“You have 24 hours to be out of this house,” I said, pulling my phone out.
“Or what?” she challenged. “You’ll tell Mom?”
“Or I’ll have you removed for trespassing,” I said, and I began to film. I panned slowly, capturing the new locks, the white planters, Molly’s indignant face, her car, my mother’s car.
“What are you doing? Stop that!” she shrieked, batting at my phone.
I stepped back. “This is my property, Molly, and you are here without my permission. This is evidence.”
“Evidence? God, you’re such a nerd, Caroline. This isn’t a courtroom.”
“It will be,” I said.
I stopped recording and dialed 911.
“You wouldn’t,” she gasped, her eyes wide with a mix of fear and disbelief.
“I am,” I said.
I reported a break-in and trespassing at my property, giving the dispatcher the address and my name as the legal owner. When the local sheriff’s deputy arrived, a kind man who had known Grandpa Arthur, it was a mess. My mother had shown up, alerted by a frantic text from Molly.
“Officer, this is a family misunderstanding,” Susan declared, smoothing her blazer. “My daughters are just emotional with their grandfather’s passing.”