“You looked after the house, Samantha, and that was the full extent of what you contributed.”

Somewhere under the floorboards the old furnace kicked on with a low rumble.

He never turned to look back at me.

His phone lit up on the counter, face up, and the name on the screen was Dad.

He flipped it over before the rest of the message could show.

“My attorney will send over the financial schedule by Friday.

Read it before you go hiring somebody expensive.

It’ll save you the fee.”

Then came the slam of the mudroom door, and then the sound of his car on the gravel.

I sat down with the papers and dragged my briefcase onto the chair next to me, the brown leather one, worn pale along the handle.

The left brass clasp had worked loose back in April.

Forty-five dollars at the shop on Main Street, and I had put it off twice now.

Somewhere inside that briefcase was a law license with my maiden name printed on it.

Seven years since I had used it for anything except reading contracts at the kitchen table.