CHAPTER TWO

WITH A SIGH OF FRUSTRATION, LEANNE MILLER SET the phone back in its cradle and pressed her fingers to her temple.

She'd been calling her mother for hours, and despite her continued dialing, there was no answer.

Her mom was supposed to have gone to a doctor's appointment that morning, then stopped by for dinner and birthday cake—simple, straightforward plans. But Eleanor hadn't shown up. And now the silence on the other end of the line felt heavy.

Leanne glanced toward the brass starburst kitchen clock, its second hand ticking far too loud in the quiet house. The clock itself was in stark contrast to her rigid life. The beams of light catching on the brass radiated promising hope, when she felt none. Dean was "working late" again, somewhere behind glass walls in Manhattan, and when "working" meant nursing an after-hours cocktail instead of coming home. Upstairs, the floorboards creaked faintly with the movement of her daughter, Nora, around her room, fine-tuning yet another packing list for Yale.

Leanne crossed to the bottom of the stairs and called up, forcing her voice to sound light. "I'm heading to Grandma's. Want to come?"

A pause. Then her daughter's voice floated down. "No, thanks."

That was it. No explanation, and no question as to why Leanne was going. Just a polite decline from a girl teetering on the edge of adulthood, already halfway out the door.

That made sense and was as it should be, but it still made Leanne ache a bit. She rested her hand on the banister, fingers curling around the polished wood. The house felt too big tonight—echoing with the quiet absence of a daughter ready to fly the nest, a family she could feel slipping through her fingers, and the steady ticktick of the clock, its secondhand slicing through the quiet like a metronome. Dean logged hundred-hour weeks, rarely making it home in time for dinner, sometimes not bothering to come home at all. The office couch had become his second bed.

Once Nora was gone, there'd be even less reason for him to make an appearance.

Leanne—on the verge of becoming an empty nester—tried to imagine feeling even more alone and couldn't.

Slipping out the front door, Leanne climbed into her tidy station wagon, the leather seats still warm from the late-afternoon sun. She started the engine, flipping on the headlights with fingers cold from nerves. The haloed resonance floated off the brick of her house. She backed slowly out of the driveway, slamming on the brakes as one kid and then another darted behind her car. They were still at it—playing kick-the-can in the middle of the cul-de-sac, their laughter and apologies echoing through the warm summer air, punctuated by distant calls of mothers summoning them home for dinner.

The drive across the New York City suburb of Ossining took less than ten minutes. Leanne wound past leafy streets and colonial houses with tidy lawns, until she reached her mother's unassuming home. From the outside, the residence looked just like everyone else's. It was only once you stepped through the doors that Eleanor's style collided with polite society.

Immediately, Leanne noticed the garage door was left open and empty. No sign of Eleanor's car.

Leanne cut her engine and climbed out of the Buick. Cicadas buzzed in the trees, and the sky dimmed from a burnt orange to a bruised lavender haze. She could almost picture her younger self arriving home after school or piano lessons. The front porch light wasn't on, but the faint scent of incense drifted out through an open window. The door creaked open beneath her hand as she knocked.

Leanne frowned, her chest tightening. A few weeks ago, her mother had stopped locking the door, insisting she simply forgot. Even had the audacity to joke, saying, "No one's going to rob an old woman." But to Leanne, leaving the door unlocked was an open invitation for disaster, even if her mother did live in a nice neighborhood.

She stepped inside, her kitten heels muted against the thick carpet. The house hit her like it always did: a time capsule of chaos and charm, its scent a mix of incense, old records, and something floral—jasmine or rosewater, she could never tell.

The living room unfolded in front of her—cluttered and colorful, layers of velvet throw pillows, tapestries hanging crookedly, ashtrays balanced precariously on stacks of books. Records leaned against the wall alongside framed black-and-white photos from decades past that she recognized and several that she didn't: young musicians with sly smiles, concert posters peeling slightly at the edges. She picked up one of the posters, reading the headline: The Bell of Wartime Music. Beside the advertisement was a photo that looked very much like a younger version of her mother.

Leanne turned in a slow circle, taking in the disarray. Her mother wasn't a neatnik, but this was...unlike her.

No one would guess a sixty-nine-year-old woman lived here. Instead, the space felt like it belonged to someone decades younger—a twentysomething artist still chasing freedom.

Or someone desperately trying to hold on to their memories.

A bohemian fever dream of clashing musical eras—1920s big band met with 1960s rock and roll.

Leanne stood there, taking it all in, worry gnawing sharper at her ribs. Her mother's world seemed stitched together by threads fraying just at the edges—beautiful, yes, but fragile in ways Leanne could no longer ignore.

"Mom?"

Her voice echoed softly through the house, but no answer came. Not even the familiar pitter-patter of Roxy's feet. The strange little dog usually bounded out of the bedroom at the sound of company—but tonight, nothing.

The silence prickled along Leanne's limbs.