One by one, they filed out. Some mumbled awkward apologies, eyes glued to the floor. Others just left in silence, eager to get to their cars and start the group chats. Within twenty minutes, the only people left were Mia, my sister Clare, and me, sitting in a wreckage of unopened boxes and destroyed dreams.
“Em,” Clare’s voice was gentle, terrified. “Let’s get you home.”
“This is my home,” I whispered, looking around the house Mitchell and I had bought together two years ago. The house where we’d painted the nursery. The house where he’d held me every night and whispered lies about our future.
“Not anymore,” Mia said firmly, her jaw set. “Not after what he just did. We’re packing your things tonight.”
But where would I go? I was eight months pregnant. My part-time job at the library barely covered groceries, and Mitchell had always insisted on handling the finances. “Don’t worry your pretty head about the bills,” he’d say. I realized with a sick lurch of my stomach that I didn’t even know how much money we had.
That night, as Mia and Clare shoved my maternity clothes into garbage bags, I found out.
“Emma,” Clare’s voice was tight from the living room. “You need to see this.”
She was holding our laptop. Our bank statements were pulled up on the screen. Our joint checking account—the one that should have held our savings for the baby, for the medical bills, for the crib—showed a balance of $247.
