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That night, I lay in bed and felt the duplex in my bones, like a new language I was finally getting fluent in. Ethan texted a sunrise he’d taken the day before. The edge of the sky caught fire and turned everything beneath it into a silhouette.
“Tomorrow’s just a door,” he’d captioned it. “You’re already holding the key.”
The woman who packs a tool bag in the trunk because she knew who she was on the other side of a fixed leak. My family, they congratulated Kayla for discovering backsplash. They asked me how work was like it was a neighbor’s name they couldn’t place.
And when Mom’s hand patted mine with that soft pity, the old ache rose and dissolved because I knew something she didn’t. I was building, and this time the blueprints were mine. The thing about living a double life is that it’s not about deception.
It’s about protection. By day I was still the responsible older daughter who never takes risks. By night, I was on Zillow, Redfin, and county foreclosure pages like they were confessional prayer books.
By July, the first duplex was running smoothly. The tenants paid on time. Maria brought me tamales as thank you gifts.
Every month, I transferred the leftover profit into a separate savings account labeled roof fund. That account became my secret victory file. Every time I looked at the balance growing, a quiet, steady heartbeat, I felt more alive than I ever did at those family dinners.
But secrets have a way of humming beneath the surface. Ethan noticed at first. “You’ve been somewhere else lately,” he said one evening, leaning against my kitchen counter while I fixed a stir fry from the clearance produce section.
“Not bad. Just focused.”
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