Emma's POV
"Emma, it's time for dinner!"
I stepped back from my easel, examining the landscape I'd been chasing to give life all afternoon. The sunset on the Canva needed more warmth, more depth. The colors didn't fit quite right yet,my hands itched to fix it. I dipped my brush into cadmium orange, adding it carefully with the red already on my palette.
"Emma!" My mother called out once more with a sharper tone this time.
"Coming!" I responded back, but I couldn't stop painting now. Not when I was so close to getting this sky perfect, Just a few more strokes to it.
Loud footsteps resonated the marble staircase.
My father knocked once and opened my door without waiting for a response . "Your mother has called you twice."
"I know, I was just finishing this section—
"Family dinner is important, Emma." His voice was weary, exhausted. Dark circles hunged his eyes, his tie loose and his shirt was wrinkled like he'd been wearing it for days. "Don't keep your mother waiting ."
He left before I could respond back. I stared at the empty doorway, my brief moment of creative peace dissolved. That was the thing about my father this days. He was always exhausted, perpetually anxious,always one wrong word away from losing his temper with someone.
I washed my brushes,tidied up swiftly and went downstairs paint still marking my fingertips.
The dining area was arranged flawlessly as usual. Mom was adamant on proper dinners even on week days. napkins folded into swans, our crystal glasses that reflect the candlelight. It was one of the things she clung to fiercely, the illusion that if everything appeared lovely on the outside, the ugliness underneath wouldn't be significant.
My sister Lily was already seated down scrolling through her phone. She appeared impeccable,as always.Her makeup was perfect, her hair arranged in a style that surely took an hour to perfect, her designer dress likely cost more than what I earned in three months of selling my artworks. Lily never went for a look. Every instance felt like a performance with her being the center of attention.
"There you are," Mom remarked, forcing brightness into her tone as I took a seat. "I was starting to worry you have forgotten about your family in the house."
"Apologies mom, I was working on a commission piece."
"Still painting those boring landscapes?" Lily didn't look up from her phone. "Trees and sunsets. How original, Emma."
"Each painting is different," I said quietly. "They're for a gallery show—"
"Hmm." She made that dismissive sound that somehow communicated everything she thought about my art career. Not impressive. Not glamorous. Not worth her time or anyone else's.
I was used to it. I had spent twenty-two years living in Lily's shadow. She was the beautiful daughter, the popular one, the one our parents loved to show off at society events. I was just Emma, the quiet one who chose paint splattered jeans and blank canvases to cocktail attires and socializing .
Dad took his place at the head of the table, and we all began eating in silence. The atmosphere was so tense in the room,it was thick enough to feel suffocated. Something was definitely not right in this household, had been off for few months now, but nobody dared to acknowledge it out loud.
I thought back to when I first started observing the few shifts. Minor details at first such as Dad coming home late at night with his tie undone, his posture drooping as if he was carrying the weight of the world. Phone calls he would take in his study with the door shut. The way Mom's smile grew more strained , more plastic, more eager to convince people around her .
Then came the nights he didn't come home at all. Mom would make excuses at breakfast. He was closing a huge deal. He had meetings that ran late. He was away at a work function. But I'd heard my mother sobbing quietly in the kitchen once she believed everyone was sound asleep,and I knew something was deeply, terribly wrong.
The shouting began about three months back. Intense disputes behind shut doors that would stop instantly whenever Lily or I walked by. I'd catch words sometimes, fragments that made my stomach twist. Debt, Bankruptcy, Lawsuits, Creditors,Liquidation. Words that sounded like the end of everything.
Lily never seemed to notice or maybe she just didn't care as long as her credit cards still worked and her allowance kept coming. But I noticed, I always noticed the fake smiles in our perfect family portraits.
"Dad?" I said, breaking the silence. "Is everything all right with the company?"
His fork halted midway to his mouth. Mom's eyes widened locking onto me. Lily at last glanced up from her phone, showing interest for the first time.
"What leads you to believe that?" Dad's voice was carefully controlled, dangerously quiet.
"You just seem stressed lately. I thought just maybe—"
"Everything is fine," he cut me off. "Monroe Industries is doing well. Stop worrying about things that you have no idea about, Emma Focus on your paintings".
Yet his hand quivered faintly as he grasped his wine glass….Mom turned her gaze away too fast , lowering her head. And I knew he was lying.
We finished dinner in silence again. As soon as she could, Lily excused herself to meet her friends at some exclusive club downtown . Mom retreated to the kitchen even though we had enough staffs to tidy up. Meanwhile Dad retreated to his study like he did every night, shutting the door on the rest of us.
I returned to my room but I found myself unable to concentrate on the landscape waiting on my easel. The colors looked wrong now, empty and lifeless. I stretched out on my bed. Gazing up at the ceiling, listening to the sounds of our house gradually falling apart. Mom's footsteps moving fast in the kitchen. The low tone of Dad's voice on the phone in his study, escalating in volume and with more urgency. The front door closing loudly as Lily exited without saying goodbye.
This house used to feel like home. Now it feels like a beautiful cage trapping us all in, pretending everything was fine while the bars slowly closing in around us.
I must have dozed off because I woke to raised voices. I checked my phone. One fifteen in the morning. The noise were coming from downstairs, from Dad's study. It was his voice and someone else's, a man voice I didn't recognize.
I crept to my door and opened it just a crack.
"Your time has expired, Richard." The stranger's voice was stern, relentless. "I've given you six months of extensions. No more that's it."
"I only required an additional weeks," Dad said, and I'd never heard him plead before. It gave my skin a cold chill. "I'm involved in something very big. A deal that will fix everything—"
"I've heard that before. Every creditor you have has heard that before." The man laughed,coldly. "You have sixty days to settle what you owe or we will begin to confiscate your assets. Your house, your cars, your gold. All of it."
My heart froze. Seizing assets? Taking our house?
"Please," Dad's voice cracked. "I have a family.My wife, my daughters. Don't do this—"
"You should have thought about them before you gambled with money you couldn't afford . Sixty days, Richard. That's your allotment."
I heard the front door open and close. Then silence. Then a sound that made my chest hurt. My father, sobbing. Actual sobs.
I gently shut my door and settled onto my bed, my body shaking. Whatever was going on with the company, it was far worse than I'd expected. We were going to lose all. The house, the cars, probably the clothes on our backs. Everything.
I couldn't sleep the rest of the night. Another realization took root in my mind—
Whatever storm was coming wouldn't just destroy our family.
It would demand a price.