I was in the next room.
I heard Veronica tell her it was the tax renewal form.* A copy of the new will.
The insurance policies.
A printed bank statement showing four thousand dollars deposited monthly — Alvin’s transfers — and then, starting eight months ago, a new automatic withdrawal of thirty-eight hundred dollars routed to an account Alvin didn’t recognize.
He read that last line twice.
Derek had been intercepting the money.
For eight months, Alvin had believed his parents were living comfortably on four thousand dollars a month.
In reality, they had been surviving on two hundred dollars.
Two hundred dollars, a storage shed, and paper plates.
He sat very still for a moment.
Then he took out his phone and photographed every page, front and back.
He placed everything back in the envelope, sealed it, and tucked it under his arm.
“I’ll need to take these with me,” he told Mr.
Okafor at the door.
“Of course.” Mr.
Okafor looked at the envelope, then at Alvin.
“Is Mr.
Serrano all right?”
“He will be,” Alvin said.
He meant it.
He was three blocks from the bank when his phone rang.
Not Inez.
Not his parents.
Derek.
Alvin stared at the name on the screen.
His thumb hovered.
He let it ring.
Four times.
Five.
Then it stopped.
A text came through thirty seconds later.
*Hey bro.
Heard you might be in town.
Come by the house — we should catch up.*
Alvin read it once.
Put the phone back in his pocket.
Alvin sent the photographs to Inez before he walked through the front gate.
He rang the doorbell.
His parents’ doorbell, on his parents’ front door, on his parents’ property — and he rang it like a visitor.
Derek answered in a linen shirt, holding a coffee mug, wearing an easy smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
“Alvin.
You should’ve called.”
“I did.
You didn’t pick up.” Alvin stepped inside without being invited.
“Where are Mom and Dad?”
“Out back, I think.” Derek closed the door.
“You want coffee?”
“No.” Alvin turned to face his brother in the front hallway.
The house smelled the same — wood polish and old plaster — but the furniture was wrong.
New leather sofa.
A large mounted television where their mother’s sewing cabinet used to stand.
