“What happened here?” I asked.

I tried to keep my voice calm. I don’t think I succeeded.

A silence. “What do you mean?”

She let out this irritated sigh.

“The house is a mess,” I said. “There are beer bottles everywhere. Trash everywhere. The kids’ rooms are messy. Max’s lamp is broken.”

She let out this irritated sigh.

“I celebrated Christmas,” she said. “You said I could stay.”

“You promised it would be just you,” I said. “No parties. No guests.”

She laughed a little. “You’re being dramatic. It’s not that bad. You’re super picky about cleanliness. I was going to come back and clean.”

“I’m going there.”

“There’s broken glass in my child’s carpet,” I hissed. “He could have stepped on it.”

“Okay, relax,” she said. “I can’t afford to change a light bulb right now. Renovations are killing me. It’s just stuff. The kids are fine.”

I hung up before I could say anything I couldn’t take back.

Dave stared at me. “I’m going there,” he said.

“It’s late,” I said.

“I don’t care.”

“You won’t believe this.”

He took his keys and left.

I stood there looking at the mess, my hands shaking. I started picking up bottles because it felt better to do something than to stand still.

About an hour later, the front door opened.

Dave came in, pale and furious in a way I’d never seen before.

“What did she say?” I asked.

He closed the door slowly. “You won’t believe this,” he said. “She didn’t just show disrespect to our house.”

“She tricked us. From the beginning.”

My chest tightened. “What else did she do?”

He looked at me. “She tricked us. From the beginning.”

“Explain,” I said.

“I went to her apartment,” he said. “She tried to block the door. Said it was a disaster area. Said the renovations were worse. Said it wasn’t a good time.”

He laughed briefly, bitterly.

“So I went out and called Mom.”

“I pushed past her,” he continued. “And guess what? No renovation. None. The place was clean. Finished. Normal. The kitchen was intact. No dust. No drawers.”

I felt a sigh in my stomach. “So she lied.”

“Yes,” he said. “And when I asked why she really needed our house, she kept ducking. Changing the subject. Trying to make me feel guilty.”

He rubbed his neck.

“So I went out and called my mom,” he said. “Put her on speaker. Told her everything. Mom started asking Mandy questions. Dates. Names of contractors. Basic stuff.”

“First Mandy cried.”

He paused.

“First Mandy cried,” he said. “Then she denied everything. Then she went silent. And then she admitted the truth.”

I got ready. “What did she say?”

“She saw a post online,” he said. “Some group looking to rent a private house for a Christmas party. Cash. No questions asked. She knew we were going. Our house is bigger than hers. Fewer neighbors. So she lied about the renovations to get us to say yes.”

My mouth went dry.

“And fully planned to leave the mess to us.”

“Has she rented out our house?” I whispered.

He nodded. “She let strangers in. Took their money. And planned to leave the mess for us.”

I sat down so hard at the table that my chair scraped.

“What did she say when you called her out?”

“She said she needed the money,” he replied. “That it was just one night. That she didn’t think it would be ‘that bad.’ As if that made it okay.”

“I told her she had to pay for everything.”

He looked up at me. “I told her she had to pay for everything. Cleaning. Damages. Everything. She crossed her arms and said she didn’t pay a penny. Said we were ‘overreacting’ and ‘comfortable enough’ to handle it.”

Something inside me calmed down very, very much.

“We’re done asking,” I said.

He studied my face. “What are you thinking about?”

“We’re going back tomorrow,” I said. “And we’re going to stop being nice about it.”

The next day we drove to Mandy’s apartment together.

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