Her wedding photograph balanced on the windowsill next to a bottle of dish soap.

Upstairs, she explained in the flat voice of a hostage reading a statement, Derek and Melissa had taken the master suite. Sandra had the second bedroom with the good morning light.

The third bedroom — the one my mother had wallpapered herself in a vintage floral — had been stripped and turned into Melissa’s “crafting studio.”

“Melissa says florals date a property,” Mom said, without a trace of bitterness.

That absence of anger frightened me more than anything else. Anger is a foundation you can build on. Resignation is a hole with no bottom.

On the refrigerator, held up by a pizza magnet, was a laminated grid titled House Schedule. In Melissa’s round handwriting, the whole arrangement was documented.