I inserted the key into the lock of the back door of my late mother's house. It used to smell of cinnamon and old books in here. Now, the air that rushed out to greet me was stale, choked with the artificial lavender diffusers Victoria Hensley, my stepmother's brand, bought by the dozen. My father, Thomas Hensley, had spent the last five years systematically erasing my mother's existence, replacing her solid oak antiques with Victoria's expensive, sticky mirrored furniture and acrylic chairs.
A burst of loud, performative laughter erupted from the formal dining room as I entered the hallway.
"Oh my God, guys, this single detail is literally everything."
It was my stepsister, Haley Hensley. She stood in the center of the room, illuminated by the harsh, blinding halo of a professional ring light, livestreaming to her followers. She twirled around in a designer trench coat that probably cost more than two months of my nursing assistant salary.
I kept my head down, my heavy duffel bag banging against my hip. All I wanted was the dark sanctuary of my cramped basement bedroom. I'd been awake for twenty-two hours. Between rotating patient beds in the pediatric oncology ward and secretly agonizing over the final statistical models for my doctoral dissertation in the bio-lab, my mind was wearing thin at the edges.
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