Free Second Chance by Shelby Gates

She stopped at the first door on the right. Her grandmother’s bedroom.
    She’d been in once since her return that first day, to strip off the sheets draped over the furniture. Her eyes had roved over the familiar furniture that filled the room. Her grandmother’s antique sleigh bed, nicked with age, and the rocking chair tucked in the corner, the table next to it still filled with books. The ancient roll-top desk and the small vanity that sat next to it, the place she’d loved to park herself while her grandmother puttered around the room, putting away laundry or making the bed. Elle would pull the heavy, silver brush from one of the drawers and glide it through her hair, loving the feel of the boar-hair bristles on her scalp. She’d play with the bottles of lotion and the magic eye cream her grandmother swore by, dabbing it under her eyes, rubbing gently, hoping she would be as beautiful as an old woman as her grandmother was.
    She stepped into the room. She was fairly certain she wouldn’t find any information about the house in the dainty vanity. But the desk? Her eyes fixed on the drawers. There might be something in there.
    She sat down on the chair and hesitated for only a second before pulling open the bottom drawer. It was lined with files and Elle breathed a sigh of relief. Jackpot.
    She thumbed through the folders, reading the tabs at the top. Car insurance. Health insurance. House. She pulled the thick file and set it on the desk. The folder was filled with information—a manual for the new water heater installed in 1996, a receipt for electrical work dated 1992. No deed, no title, no sales information from when her grandmother had purchased the house.
    She replaced it and kept looking. There were more files—vacation brochures and information, favorite recipes, tons of gardening info—but nothing else about the house.
    Elle opened the middle drawer. It was smaller, brimming with mementos. Her heart lurched as she spied things written in her own handwriting. Christmas cards. Her high school graduation picture. Not the big one—that copy was hanging on the wall in the hallway—but the wallet-sized one she’d sent along with it. There were postcards from friends, invitations to baby showers, newspaper clippings for weddings and funerals. Her grandmother didn’t keep a scrapbook of memories. She’d kept a drawer.
    There was one drawer left, the top one. It was narrow, slim, and was probably filled with writing instruments and paper clips. She opened it, anyway. Maybe her grandmother had put her really important paperwork on top. Easy access.
    She let out a little sigh. She’d been right. A small plastic container filled with pencils and pens. A miniature stapler. A box of blank notecards and a booklet of stamps. Elle smiled sadly when she saw them. They were from 1999, the year her grandmother had died. She picked them up, held them in her hands. Her eyes drifted back toward the opened drawer. There was a sealed envelope that had been tucked underneath the booklet of stamps. She recognized her grandmother’s elegant script before she noticed what was written.
    There was a name and an address written across the front.
    It was addressed to her.
     

FOURTEEN
     
     
    Elle dropped the booklet of stamps and stared at the envelope. What had her grandmother been sending her?
    She picked it up. It was thick, as if there were several sheets of paper inside. Her grandmother had never been much of a writer, had preferred phone calls or in-person visits. It was one of the reasons she’d footed the bill for Elle to come and visit each summer. She liked having her granddaughter around, liked having the time to cultivate and nurture a relationship with her only grandchild. And when the time came for Elle to go home at the end of each summer, they stayed in touch with phone calls. Never with letters. She’d send a card for her birthday and for different holidays. But letters? Elle couldn’t remember receiving a