Chapter 2 - The Flash Drive
The word hung in the air, heavy and sharp as a shard of glass.
Vanessa’s smirk wavered for a fraction of a second, the skin around her eyes tightening. But she recovered quickly, tossing her head back with a forced, ringing laugh that made several guests flinch.
“A video?” she mocked, though her voice lacked its earlier conviction. “Oh, please, Emily. Grief makes people hallucinate, but making up home movies? That’s pathetic. Daniel didn’t make any video for you. He was too busy planning his future with me. Look at the paper! Look at the signature!” She shook the cheap printer pages furiously in the air.
My parents were staring at me now, horror and confusion etched deep into their aging faces. My mother reached out a trembling hand, trying to tug on Vanessa’s sleeve. “Vee, stop this. Put that away right now. This is Emily’s home. Daniel just died.”
“Let her speak, Mom!” Vanessa’s voice rose, shrill and desperate, piercing through the ambient noise of the party. “You’ve always favored Emily! You’ve always treated me like the second-class daughter! Well, I’m carrying his blood! I have rights!”
I didn’t raise my voice. When you are standing on solid ground while someone else is flailing in quicksand, shouting is entirely unnecessary.
I turned away from the kitchen island and walked slowly toward the hallway closet. Inside, behind a locked metal panel disguised as a standard breaker box, sat our heavy-duty home safe. I dialed the combination—our anniversary date, followed by the number of countries we had traveled to together. The heavy steel door clicked open with a satisfying, airtight hiss.
Inside sat the blue file. Right on top of it was a sleek, black USB flash drive, resting on a small piece of folded cardstock.
I picked up the flash drive. It felt cool against my palm.
When I walked back into the living room, the atmosphere had shifted from awkward party discomfort to a suffocating, breathless tension. People had stopped moving entirely. My uncle Greg, who had been holding a paper plate of potato salad, had set it down on the coffee table as if he didn't want any distractions.
Vanessa was still standing in the center of the room, her chest heaving, the fake will clutched so tightly in her manicured fingers that the edges were beginning to curl and crumple.
“You’re bluffing,” she whispered, her eyes darting toward the hallway. “There’s nothing on that. You’re just trying to scare me because you can't stand the thought of losing your precious house.”
“Am I?” I asked softly.
I walked over to the sleek 65-inch smart TV mounted above the stone fireplace. Using my phone, I cast the contents of the USB drive directly onto the screen. A loading bar popped up instantly: Reading media files... 1 file detected.
The file name appeared in plain white text against a black background: FOR_EMILY_AND_EVERYONE_ELSE.mp4.
My father swallowed hard, his voice barely a rasp. “Emily... what is that?”
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“It’s insurance, Dad,” I said, looking right at him before shifting my gaze to my sister, whose face had suddenly drained of all color, leaving her skin a pasty, sickly grey. “Daniel was an engineer. He anticipated structural failures before they even happened. It turns out, human relationships are no different.”
I pressed play.
