The Necklace
When I was looking for my late wife’s necklace—the only thing I truly had left of her—my daughter stood in my kitchen in Phoenix, wiped her hands on a dish towel, and said, in the same flat voice she used to complain about traffic, “The necklace has been sold. I needed the money for a vacation.”
I stared at her, not really understanding the words at first, the way you don’t quite hear the pilot on a plane when turbulence hits. Then the meaning landed.
Sold.
Eleanor’s necklace. My hands were still shaking from the search.
Upstairs, in the master bedroom of the house we’d bought in 1985, the empty velvet box sat in my top dresser drawer like an accusation. Cream satin interior, nothing inside but the faint outline where the gold heart-shaped locket had rested for forty years.
I’d torn through that room—socks dumped on the bed, coat pockets turned out, shoe boxes opened—until panic started pressing tight against my ribs.
Today was Eleanor’s birthday. Three years since she passed. I’d planned to spend the morning quietly in that room with her necklace in my hands, the way I had on other hard days, letting the cool weight of it pull her closer in my mind.
But the box was empty.
Downstairs, the house did not care about my panic. The old air conditioner hummed against the Arizona heat.
The big-screen TV in the living room poured out some football rerun. My son-in-law, Michael, sprawled across my couch with his feet propped on the armrest, a bag of chips balanced on his chest.
My granddaughter Amber perched on the stairs with her phone to her ear, complaining about how boring Phoenix was.
My daughter Jennifer moved around the kitchen like she owned it, knife in hand, chopping vegetables with sharp, angry movements. “Jennifer,” I said, stepping into the doorway. “Have you seen Eleanor’s necklace?”
“I’m busy, Dad.” She didn’t look up.
The knife kept hitting the cutting board in a hard, steady rhythm.
“Check your room. You probably forgot where you put it.”
“I did check my room,” I said, trying to keep my voice level.
“I’ve checked everywhere. The necklace is gone.”
She let out a long, practiced sigh, the kind I’d heard nearly every day since she and her family moved in after Eleanor died.
The sigh that said I was an inconvenience.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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