Chapter 2 - The Suitcase at the Door
By 5:25 AM, the apartment was dead silent.
Garrett was in the kitchen, aggressively banging pots and pans together in a pathetic attempt to make it look like he was preparing breakfast.
At exactly 5:30 AM, a sharp, repetitive pounding rattled the front door.
Bang, bang, bang!
Before Garrett could rush out from the kitchen, I walked calmly down the hallway, my heels clicking sharply against the floor. I turned the deadbolt and pulled the door open.
Standing in the hallway was Tabitha, breathless and aggressive, with two massive, bursting suitcases sitting at her feet. Behind her stood her three children, shivering in the cold morning air, and trailing behind them was Lorraine, wearing a smug, superior expression that could curdle milk.
“What took you so long to open the door?!” Tabitha snapped, pushing past me without an invitation, dragging her heavy suitcases right over my imported wool rug. “Do you know how cold it is out here in the hallway?! My kids have been standing here for ten minutes!”
I didn't move. I kept my hand firmly planted on the open doorframe, blocking the threshold.
Tabitha stopped, turning around with a scowl. “Well? Are you going to help us bring the rest of the bags up from the elevator or just stand there like a statue?”
“You misunderstood something, Tabitha,” I said, my voice carrying a terrifying, deadpan chill that made the hallway temperature feel like it had dropped twenty degrees.
Tabitha crossed her arms over her chest. “What are you talking about now?”
“You are not coming in,” I said clearly.
Silence fell over the hallway. Tabitha’s jaw dropped open. Lorraine gasped, clutching her pearls as if she had just been physically struck.
“What did you say?!” Tabitha shrieked, her voice echoing down the apartment building's corridor. “What do you mean we’re not coming in?! I brought my three kids, and we’re family!”
“Precisely because we’re family, you should have called first,” I replied, staring straight into her wide, outraged eyes. “You showed up unannounced, demanding to move in for a ‘little week’ after your plumbing supposedly burst. This is not a shelter, and my apartment is not a charity ward.”
“Garrett!” Tabitha screamed at the top of her lungs, ignoring me entirely as she looked down the hall toward the kitchen. “Garrett, come out here right now! Your wife has completely lost her mind! She’s leaving us out in the hallway!”
Garrett came running out of the kitchen with a spatula in his hand, looking frantic. “Elena! What are you doing?! Let them in right now!”
“It’s my apartment, Garrett,” I said, turning my gaze to my husband. “I bought it before I ever met you. If you want to host family gatherings without asking the owner, you are free to go buy your own place.”
“You left my sister and my nephews out on the street?!” Garrett yelled, his face turning bright red with rage.
“I told her to find a hotel.”
“She’s my sister!”
“And this is my home.”
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With those final words, I pulled the heavy wooden door shut right in front of their faces and threw the deadbolt.
On the other side of the door, muffled screams of pure outrage erupted, but I didn't flinch. I walked back toward the bedroom, picking up the heavy, leather-bound suitcase I had packed the night before and setting it neatly beside the front entryway.
