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Some people would see it that way, but Iris viewed it as a fresh start.

While she didn’t have a plan per se—when did she ever?

—she’d figure it out when she saw the house.

At the least, it was a place she could live rent free.

Her expenses would be lower, and she wouldn’t have witnesses when she failed.

People in St. Claire didn’t really know her either, so maybe she could shake off her reputation as well.

“I can be patient,” Frederic said with a magnanimous air.

Now that he’s seen proof that I have money incoming.

When Iris had gotten word about Great-Aunt Gertie’s passing, she’d scraped up enough to send flowers, living on ramen that week.

If I’d known she meant to leave me everything, I would’ve sold something for gas money to show my face at her service.

That was a crappy feeling, one that she couldn’t shake even as Regina and Candace got home.

She heard Frederic in the kitchen, explaining the situation in a low voice. Then Regina headed into the living room, where Iris was curled up on the couch. “I’m so glad you figured out your next move,” she said in an overly cheerful tone.

Regina wasn’t really a friend, more of an acquaintance who’d vouched for Iris. She tried not to take the comment the wrong way. “Yeah, it’s a minor miracle.”

Candace came to the doorway, folding her arms. “You realize you’re praising her for having a dead relative.”

When you put it that way…

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to be hurtful,” Regina said.

“When are you going to see about your inheritance?” Frederic asked.

Though he’d said he could be patient, he wanted his money.

Iris headed for her room to pack a weekend bag.

According to the navigation app on her phone, it was six hours in the car from here to St. Claire.

If I go now, I could be there by midnight.

She knew where Great-Aunt Gertrude used to keep the spare key too.

It was impulsive and absurd, the kind of behavior that made Iris an odd duck in a family of swans.

Thankfully, none of her relatives knew about this yet, and her roommates didn’t care enough to stop her.

Her mind made up, Iris crammed socks and underwear into her backpack, along with a few clean shirts, plus one pair of pants and something to sleep in.

She dropped toiletries into her purse and snagged her keys.

“I’ll see you later,” she said. “I don’t know how long it will take to square things away, but I’ll be back to pay my back rent and to collect my stuff.”

“Drive safely,” Regina said, seeming relieved that she wouldn’t wind up pissing off everyone in the house.

Frederic waved and Candace watched from the doorway as Iris drove into the night, away from the house where she was a square peg in a round hole.

* * *

Eli Reese wasn’t the kid everyone made fun of anymore.

He owned a condo in Cleveland and a vacation cottage in Myrtle Beach, by virtue of two successful apps steadily feeding his bank account—one to gamify household management, including to-do lists and budgeting, and another social platform that focused on sharing recipes.

The second had taken off in a modest way; users were collaborating on dishes, doing recipe challenges, and sending food pics to each other, and he’d just patched in an update supporting video clips.

The revenue was decent on both, and he was already getting offers.

A German tech company wanted Task Wizard, which let users create an avatar and level up based on the amount of real-world work accomplished, while a Chinese communications conglomerate had made an offer for What’s Cooking?

If he sold one, it would give him enough capital to fund his next project.

He just hadn’t decided what that should be yet.

Eli never imagined he’d be in a position where he didn’t need to work, but there was no urgency fueling his productivity anymore.

It was strange being free to do what he wanted with his life; the problem being—he didn’t know what that was.

His favorite thing was flying; it was magical stepping out onto the balcony of his condo, leaving his clothes and cares behind.

Transforming into a hawk and soaring over the city and then far beyond—over the whorls of trees and the scurries of small mammals in the underbrush, hidden colors in a spectrum his human eyes couldn’t glimpse.

Red-tailed hawks were common enough that he didn’t attract unwanted attention from ornithologists, although he was larger than usual in his shifted form.

Those nightly flights were the closest Eli came to pure freedom, but multiple people would disapprove of him withdrawing from personhood in favor of joining bird-dom.

Mostly Liz and Gamma, to be honest.

Music played in the truck, soft classical that didn’t distract him from his thoughts.

Currently, his most pressing concern was his grandmother.

He’d come to St. Claire to help her relocate, as she was selling her house in the Midwest and moving to New Mexico.

Gamma had looked at Florida and Arizona as well, but she’d bought a condo in a retirement community in a suburb outside Albuquerque and was looking forward to all the activities and built-in social life.

Eli had offered to assist with cleaning her basement, attic, and garage, getting the stuff she didn’t want hauled away, and prepping the house to be put on the market, which involved painting and staging to make buyers picture themselves living there, undistracted by the current owner’s clutter.

He could’ve contracted the work out—hired someone to do this.

But Gamma hated strangers touching her belongings, and unlike the other grandkids, he didn’t have a day job or a limit to his vacation time.

Plus, some of them agreed with Gamma’s ex-wife or had been conditioned to do so, so there was a certain distance between them.

And Eli appreciated the chance to spend time with Gamma and help her out.

She wasn’t the kind of grandparent who said stuff like You’ll regret not visiting me when I’m gone , but since Gamma had held Eli’s hand as they buried his dad and then helped raise him, he understood that it was important to see people while he still could.

Words like orphan were really Oliver Twist, but his mom had died when he was six, and his dad had passed away when he was thirteen.

Friends took turns inviting him for the holidays, which was awkward as hell.

Usually, he said he had plans, and sometimes he did hang out with people, but even then, he felt…

extraneous. In every space he occupied, while he might be welcome, he wasn’t necessary.

Nobody needed him. If he made his excuses and stayed home, wallowing in solitude, no one followed up.

He didn’t have the sort of friends who barged in with pizza and beer, determined to keep him company.

Hell, Eli didn’t even know if he wanted that anyway. He did know something was missing, though.

He focused on reaching his destination, turning down the narrow street.

Gamma’s house sat on the right side of a cul-de-sac, a three-bedroom Cape Cod house with white siding where he’d spent his teen years.

In this neighborhood, the houses were mostly homogenous, built around the same time with similar designs—Cape Cod, bungalow, and ranch.

He pulled into the driveway, seeing the minute signs of neglect that had crept up.

The hedges had to be trimmed, and the yard was a bit tall and weedy, while the gutters needed to be cleaned, and he might need to get on the roof to have a closer look at that soggy patch.

Those were issues prospective buyers would notice right away.

As ever, the porch was welcoming with a profusion of potted plants and blooming flowers.

Two Adirondack chairs painted forest green framed the front door with the single step leading inside.

Gamma opened the screen door and popped her head out.

“Come in! I made your favorite.”

Eli smiled, wiping his feet on the mat. He took his shoes off on the uncarpeted tile just inside and padded across the improbably pink carpet, through the living room and into the kitchen.

He breathed in deep, savoring the smell of barbecued chicken.

There was also macaroni and cheese and garden salad with a bottle of ranch dressing on standby.