Chapter 5

Sophie stood in the doorway in pajamas, her hair messy and Max in her arms. The boy had clearly just been woken and rubbed his eyes.

Her face changed when she saw the locksmith and movers, but tears began pouring down a second later.

Sophie trembled. "Emily, what are you doing? Why did you bring these people? Max is here. Please do not scare my child."

"Sophie, I gave you notice three days ago. You said you'd move soon, but you didn't. So I came myself."

"I've been looking for a place. You have to give me time." She crouched down and held Max tighter. "You came here with all these people like robbers. What am I supposed to do with Max?"

The word "robber" fell like a pebble into a still lake, sending ripples rapidly outward.

Doors began opening one after another. Word spread through the group chat, and soon neighbors emerged from Unit 2201, the stairwell, and the elevators, gathering to watch.

A neighbor asked, "What's going on?"

Someone answered, "It's Unit 2202 again. That woman is causing trouble."

Another neighbor said, "She brought several people. Is she forcing her way in?"

Someone else shouted, "This is outrageous. Call the police!"

Sophie crouched in the doorway, holding her child, and tearfully appealed to the neighbors, "Everyone, please judge this fairly. This woman claims the apartment is hers and brought people to throw me out. I'm a single mother with a child—where can I go?"

Her voice was quiet but carried clearly to everyone. Her tears were real; they could always be real on command. Trembling in the doorway, she looked like a baby bird drenched by a storm.

Mrs. Green from Unit 2203 stepped forward first, pointing at my nose. "Do you have no conscience? Do you think it's easy for Sophie to raise a child alone? Can't you just let her live here in peace?"

"Ma'am, this apartment belongs to Emily—" Tom tried to explain, but Mrs. Green's angry shouting drowned him out.

"Her apartment, my ass! Sophie already told us she bought this place! So what if you've got a deed? Fake deeds are everywhere these days. Who knows if yours is fake too?"

"Ma'am, the title can be checked through the property registry—"

"I won't listen!" The woman waved her hand, nearly swinging the mop into Tom's face.

"You scammers only bully honest people! Sophie has lived here over a year, and we've watched her struggle to raise a child alone! What about you? How many times have you shown up? Have you ever visited her? Ever helped her?" the woman demanded.

I wanted to say I had helped—paid her property management fees, transferred money for her medical bills, and lent her my apartment when she was struggling most. But when the words reached my lips, I swallowed them again.

Because I knew saying it would make no difference.

To them, I was a stranger who never appeared, while Sophie was a familiar victim. People naturally trusted the person they knew and pitied, not the evidence.

Ms. White from Unit 2102 joined in too. "Sophie, don't be scared. We're all here. If she dares touch you, we'll help you call the police."

"Already did!" The young man from Unit 2201 held up his phone. "The police said they're on their way."

Still crouching on the floor, Sophie trembled harder when she heard, "Already did!" She buried her face in her child's shoulder, her own shoulders jerking as she stifled her sobs.

The frightened child cried too. "Mommy, I'm scared."

The image was devastating: a single mother holding a crying child at her doorway, surrounded by strangers, while I stood cast as the villain.

I stood in the hallway clutching the deed, as if at a cliff's edge, with every gust pushing me over. The locksmith glanced at me and murmured, "Ma'am, should we leave? This is getting out of hand." The movers' looks said they wanted out too.

Tom tugged lightly at my sleeve and whispered, "Emily, let's go for now. Public opinion is killing us here. Once the cops show up, this gets even messier. We leave first, then figure out the next move."

I watched Sophie crouching there. Her shoulders still shook, but she deliberately turned Max's face toward me.

The six-year-old stared through tears and cried, "Bad auntie! Bad auntie!"

Bad auntie. When I first met him, he couldn't walk. I'd held him, changed his diapers, and fed him baby food. When he first said "Auntie," Sophie sent me the video. I watched it five times at work, laughing until I cried.

Now he was calling me bad auntie. Sophie taught him that. She had to have.

I took a deep breath and put the deed back in my bag. "Let's go," I said. The five of us headed for the elevator. Behind us, the neighbors whispered their victory instead of cheering aloud, and somehow that sounded even more grating.

"See? She's leaving. Chickened out."

"Knew it. She was just here to stir up trouble."

"Sophie, don't be scared. We're here. She won't dare do anything."

As the elevator doors closed, I took one last look down the hallway. Sophie still crouched by the door holding Max, but she lifted her face from his shoulder and stared straight at me—tearless, fearless, sorrowless, wearing a faint, satisfied smile of absolute certainty.

Then the elevator doors shut. I leaned against the elevator wall and closed my eyes.

"Emily, are you okay?" Tom asked.

"I'm fine." I opened my eyes. "Tom, do me a favor."

"What is it?"

"Find me the best real estate dispute lawyer you can. Money isn't an issue."

Tom looked at me, then nodded. "So you finally get it." "It's not that I get it now," I said. "It's that I finally see her clearly." See clearly the person I somehow failed to see for fourteen whole years.