My son and daughter-in-law laughed when I walked into the courtroom. “Ha-ha, now we’re going to leave her with nothing,” Daniel whispered, certain the bruises they had put on my body would convince the judge I was confused, unstable, and hurting myself, but they had forgotten one important thing about me.

“I scanned what you gave me.”

“You edited the PDF.”

“You told me they were corrections!”

Curtis stepped away from the table.

Actually stepped away.

Physically distancing himself from his own clients.

That was when Daniel panicked.

“She’s lying! Vanessa is lying!”

Vanessa stared at him.

“You said your mother’s doctor forgot to add the diagnosis!”

“There was no diagnosis,” I said.

Vanessa turned to me.

She looked suddenly smaller.

“You told me she had dementia,” she said to Daniel.

“I said she was declining.”

“You said a neurologist told you!”

Judge Mercer struck the bench once.

“That is enough.”

Silence.

Then he said, “Mrs. Vance, do you have evidence relating to the creation of the altered document?”

“Yes.”

Daniel closed his eyes.

Vanessa started crying harder.

A week before the hearing, their home printer had malfunctioned.

Vanessa emailed the altered PDF to a copy center.