My uncle had drifted back over, along with my aunt and a couple of cousins. They stood at a respectful distance, but close enough to hear everything. I could see the shock on their faces, the way they looked at my parents with something like disgust.
“We need to go,” my mother said, her voice breaking. “Gregory, get the car.”
“No one is leaving until I have your agreement—in writing if necessary—that you will provide full financial disclosure,” my grandmother said. “And Maggie should come stay with me while we sort this out.”
“She is our daughter,” my father said, but there was no conviction behind the words.
“She is a 25-year-old adult who has just discovered that her parents have been lying to her for years,” my grandmother countered. “Maggie, the choice is yours, of course, but my door is always open.”
I looked between them. My parents, who suddenly seemed like strangers, and my grandmother, who was offering me a lifeline I had not known I needed. Around us, the graduation celebration continued, but our little corner had become an island of misery and tension.
“I need some time,” I said finally. “I need to think.”
“Of course you do,” my grandmother said gently. “But please at least come to dinner tonight. Just you and me. Let these two stew in what they have done.”
My parents did not protest. They looked deflated, beaten down by the weight of their own secrets finally coming to light. My mother’s phone buzzed in her purse, and I wondered how many of our relatives were already texting about the scene they had just witnessed.
“Okay,” I agreed. “Dinner. But I am going back to my apartment first. I need to be alone for a while.”
My grandmother nodded and pulled me in for another hug.
“I am so proud of you, sweetheart. Your degree, your accomplishments, everything you have done despite being handicapped by these two. You are going to be extraordinary.”
I hugged her back, breathing in her familiar scent, trying to anchor myself to something solid in a world that had just tilted on its axis. When I pulled away, I could not bring myself to look at my parents.
I drove back to my apartment in a daze, my graduation gown still on, my cap on the passenger seat beside me. The route was familiar, but everything looked strange, as if I were seeing my life through new eyes. Every billboard, every stoplight, every other car on the road seemed to be asking the same question: What else had I missed? What else had been hidden from me?
My apartment was the fourth floor of an old house converted into student housing. I had shared it with three other girls for the past two years, but they had all moved out the previous week, leaving the space echoing and strange. Our mismatched furniture was gone, replaced by their absence. I sat on my lumpy futon, the only piece of furniture I owned, and tried to process what had just happened.
$3 million.
