One by one, I made it clear to every vendor that any work done on that property without my written signature was legally invalid and would not be paid for. My mother called me on Wednesday afternoon, sounding indignant as she told me that Sienna was absolutely devastated because I had humiliated her in front of her friends.
I stared at the wall of my apartment in Philadelphia and reminded her that she was the one who told the police she had no idea who I was. She tried to claim that I was acting out of control at the time, but I countered by asking if asking about a party at my own home was considered unstable.
There was a long, awkward silence on the line before she finally blurted out that Sienna needed that house more than I did because I already had my life sorted out. She argued that because my sister was just starting her new life with Max, she deserved the prestige of the lake house more than I deserved my own privacy.
I did not answer her right away because the truth often takes time to settle into your bones, and it hurts much more when you finally see people for who they are. They did not want my forgiveness or a chance to share the space, they simply wanted to take what I had built because it was easier than working for it.
That night, I received a text message from an unknown number calling me sick and claiming that I was making everything about myself just to be spiteful. I knew it was from Sienna because she didn’t even have the courage to use her own phone number to attack me after what she had done.
I didn’t reply to her, but instead, I forwarded the message directly to Quentin so he could add it to the file we were building for the harassment claim. Two days later, the local police department called me to confirm that the property was indeed in my name and that there were massive inconsistencies in the previous report.
I filed a formal complaint for trespassing and filing a false police report, and that same Thursday, I sent the certified letters to my mother and sister. On Saturday morning at seven in the morning, my phone rang, and I saw that it was Max Spencer calling me for the very first time.
His voice sounded completely broken as he told me that he was at the house and that my mother and Sienna had returned to continue the wedding planning. He explained that they had somehow forced their way onto the property, but the police had already arrived because the new silent alarm had been triggered.
“Max, you need to understand that they are currently trespassing on my private property and they have no legal right to be there,” I told him firmly. There was nothing but heavy breathing on the other end of the line for a moment before he whispered that Sienna had told him I was mentally unwell.
He confessed that she had lied to him by saying the house belonged to the entire family and that I often made things up because of my supposed episodes. I closed my eyes as the weight of her deception hit me, realizing that the web of lies she had spun was finally starting to unravel in public.
