PART 3 — THE TRUTH THEY HID
Aunt Colleen came to my apartment the next morning.
She carried a folder.
Not a few papers.
A thick folder.
The kind that meant someone had been collecting evidence for a long time.
“Katie,” she said.
“I need you to understand something.”
I opened the folder.
Inside were documents.
Loan applications.
Tax forms.
Financial records.
My name.
Everywhere.
I felt sick.
“What is this?”
Colleen looked at me carefully.
“Your father signed these.”
I stared.
“No.”
“He used your information.”
My hands started shaking.
The bills were one thing.
The groceries.
The phones.
The utilities.
That was betrayal.
But this?
This was something else.
I called Dad.
He answered quickly.
“Are you coming home?”
“No.”
Silence.
Then:
“Your aunt is putting ideas in your head.”
I looked at the documents.
“No, Dad.”
My voice was calm.
“Did you use my name?”
A long silence.
That was the answer.
When he finally spoke, his voice was softer.
“Katie, I was going to fix it.”
“When?”
Another silence.
“When someone found out?”
He had no response.
Then Jenna came on the line.
“Katie, you’re destroying this family.”
I laughed quietly.
“Jenna.”
“What?”
“You mean the family I paid for?”
She went silent.
Because there was no argument.
Not anymore.
They had depended on me so long they forgot I was a person.
Not a resource.
Not a backup plan.
A person.
Aunt Colleen helped me contact the bank.
The lawyer reviewed everything.
And slowly, the truth started coming out.
The money.
The documents.
The lies.
The excuses.
My father wasn’t just struggling.
He had been hiding things.
And Jenna knew.
That hurt the most.
May you like
Because Milo wasn’t the reason I left.
The adults were.
