Nobody mentioned any of that at the service.
Vanessa had insisted on hiring a professional eulogist because, as she put it, “We need someone who can speak properly, not just ramble about old stories.”
The man talked for twelve minutes about Daniel’s business acumen. He mispronounced his name twice. Daniel Jacob Hayes, not Haze. I did not correct him.
Now we were back at the house on Maple Avenue, the old Victorian I had scrubbed and maintained for four decades, and Vanessa was already redecorating the narrative.
“This house needs to be sold,” she announced to the room.
My sister Linda was sitting on the couch, nodding along. My own sister. Sixty-five years old, flown in from Ohio not to comfort me, but to position herself for whatever scraps might fall from the table.
“The market’s good right now,” Linda added, as if she knew anything about real estate beyond watching HGTV. “You could get eight hundred ninety thousand. Maybe more.”
“Daniel left everything to Robert,” Vanessa continued.
She was pacing in front of the fireplace where our wedding photo used to hang. She had taken it down the day before and replaced it with some abstract painting she bought at a gallery in SoHo.
