Chapter 5 - The Sound of the Past
The laughter started low and dry in Helga’s throat, like gravel shifting under a heavy boot, before growing into a clear, steady, ringing sound that cut sharply through the oppressive silence of the room. It wasn't the nervous laughter of a defeated woman; it was the cold, iron-clad amusement of someone watching a poorly written play collapse in the final act.
Bianca’s triumphant smile vanished instantly. Her hands hovered over her father’s jacket, her expression twisting into a mixture of fury and sudden, creeping unease.
“What is wrong with you?” Bianca snapped, her voice trembling slightly as she stepped back. “Are you senile? You just lost twenty-five thousand euros, and you’re sitting there cackling like a witch?”
Helga didn’t stop laughing for a few seconds. Then, very slowly, she reached down, picked up her handbag from the floor beside her chair, and opened the clasp.
She pulled out her linen handkerchief, wiped a phantom speck of dust from her finger where Bianca’s nails had scraped her skin, and carefully tucked the handkerchief away.
“Senile?” Helga said, her voice dropping into that quiet, rhythmic register she used when she was giving instructions to the night cleaning crew at the bank. “No, Bianca. Senility is believing that because someone is old, they are blind. Greed is making the mistake of thinking that because a person cleans your floors, they don't know how to track where the dirt comes from.”
Ewald’s smile faltered. He clutched the stack of bills tighter against his chest, his eyes darting toward the front door. “What is this nonsense? Alex, control your mother before we call a doctor.”
Alexander didn't answer. He was staring at his mother with a sudden, piercing clarity, the fog of the last three years finally burning away from his mind. He knew that look. That was the face Helga wore when she balanced three jobs on four hours of sleep without making a single mistake.
“You think this twenty-five thousand euros is a windfall, Ewald?” Helga asked, her eyes locking onto the older man with terrifying intensity. “You think Alexander saved this from his consulting bonus?”
Bianca’s breath hitched. “Of course he did! What else—?”
“Alexander didn't save twenty-five thousand euros over six months,” Helga interrupted, her voice cutting like glass. “Because Alexander’s salary for the past eight months hasn't been going into his savings account. It’s been going into a joint account that Bianca forced him to open—an account where every single euro is systematically drained within forty-eight hours of hitting the ledger.”
Bianca’s face went completely, bloodlessly white. “That’s a lie! You’re making things up!”
“Am I?” Helga calmly reached down beneath the heavy ceramic flowerpot sitting on the corner of the coffee table. With two fingers, she lifted a small, black, cigarette-pack-sized device: the voice-activated recorder she had hidden there three hours ago, before the first guest even arrived.
She pressed a button.
Instantly, the crystal-clear speakers of the device filled the minimalist living room with voices.
“...just make sure she signs the power of attorney papers by next month, Alex,” Bianca’s recorded voice rang out, sharp and venomous, captured from a conversation recorded two weeks prior in this very room. “If we control her apartment lease and her bank pension, we can force her into that cheap state-run facility in Offenbach. That frees up the rest of her savings for the Kronberg investment. Honestly, if you loved me, you wouldn't hesitate.”
And then came Alexander’s voice on the recording, weak and defeated: “Bianca, please... she worked her whole life for that tiny flat...”
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“Her life is over, Alex!” Bianca’s recorded shriek echoed off the concrete walls. “She’s a parasite! And if you don't break her spirit soon, I’m taking the kids—oh wait, we don't have kids because you’re too pathetic to stand up to your mother!”
The room plunged into an absolute, suffocating vacuum of sound.
