Chapter 15 - The Empty Driveway
By late afternoon, I was back in Raleigh. I drove past the manicured lawns and white picket fences of our suburban neighborhood, pulling smoothly into our driveway.
The front of the house looked exactly as it always had. The grass was trimmed, the flower beds were blooming, and the late-afternoon sun bounced brightly off the surface of the pool in the backyard. But the heavy, suffocating weight that had lingered in the air for months was completely gone.
I parked the car, walked up the steps, and unlocked the front door.
Inside, the house was profoundly quiet. No hidden phone calls. No rushed excuses about running errands. No lingering scent of cheap perfume mixed with sunscreen.
I walked straight out to the patio and sat down on one of the lounge chairs. The water in the pool was crystal clear, shimmering in the golden hour light. The automated filtration system hummed softly beneath the deck, keeping everything in perfect balance.
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For the first time since we moved into this house, the backyard belonged entirely to me.
I pulled out my phone, unlocked the screen, and tapped into the security application. With a few quick keystrokes, I permanently deleted the *Archive-2024* folder from my encrypted server. The digital ghosts of the past nine weeks vanished into the ether, wiped clean just like the residue in the pool filters.
