My stepmother handed me a trash bag of my clothes and said, “Your father is d;ea;d, and the house is mine. Get out.” She slammed the door in my face while her kids laughed from the window. I was eighteen, broke, and alone. She thought that was the end of the story. She didn’t know my father had left a separate, secret will in a safety deposit box that only I had the key to. Ten years later, I bought the company she worked for. Today, I’m going to walk into her office and ask her the same question she asked me: “How does it feel to lose everything?”

“No,” I said. “Gut it.”

“Sir?”

“Tear it all down to the studs,” I said, touching the wall. “I want to build something new. Something that has no memory of her. I want light. I want open spaces.”

“Understood. When do we start?”

“Tomorrow,” I said.

I walked out onto the back porch. The sun was setting, painting the sky in brilliant hues of orange and purple.

I took a deep breath. The air tasted sweet.

I was home.

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