I thought inheriting my grandma’s house would bring peace. Instead, it sparked a war I never saw coming. And the person who started it? My own cousin.

My name’s Abigail. I’m 27, a freelance illustrator. Most days, you’ll find me sketching in cafés or curled up on my back porch with a mug of coffee and my dog at my feet. It’s not glamorous, but it’s mine. And I’ve grown to love it.

I don’t talk much about my family. There’s not much left to talk about.

My mom died in a car accident when I was six. After that, everything changed. While other kids were learning to ride bikes or going on family vacations, I was packing my things and moving into a small cottage with my grandmother, Hazel. I always called her Gran.

Gran was everything. Her voice could hush any storm inside me. She made the best cinnamon rolls on earth. She was stubborn, funny, warm, and sharp as a tack even in her late seventies. She filled our quiet house with humming—always some old tune I never knew the name of.

It was just her and me. Through everything.

After Mom passed, my dad disappeared. Gran never spoke ill of him. She’d just shake her head and call him “a wanderer.”

Gran’s other daughter, my aunt Marla, lived in the next town. She had a daughter, Paige, a year older than me. We were never close. Paige walked like the world owed her something. She kept her nails perfect, her tone clipped, and her patience short. She treated anything that didn’t serve her as a waste of time.

They’d show up for Christmas sometimes. Maybe Easter. But they never stayed long. They didn’t call. They didn’t help when Gran was sick. That was always me. Just me.

When Gran passed away last spring, I didn’t cry at the funeral. I’d already cried all I could during her final weeks in hospice. When the lawyer handed me the will and I saw she’d left me the house, I wasn’t surprised. Just quietly heartbroken.

The house wasn’t grand—just a modest two-bedroom cottage with peeling white paint and a creaky porch swing. But it was full of her: the smell of baked apples and lavender, the worn crochet blanket she’d wrap around us during storms, the faded photo of my mom in her prom dress on the mantel.

That house was her heart. And it had become mine too.

Then came the call.

It was a gloomy Tuesday, clouds hanging low, when my phone buzzed. Paige.

I stared at the screen. We hadn’t spoken since the funeral. I picked up, wary.

“Hello?”

“Hey,” she said, skipping pleasantries. “I need a favor. I think Grandma kept some of my papers at her house. Birth stuff, school stuff. I need to get them.”

I frowned. “What kind of papers?”

“Just documents. Can I come by and grab them?”

“I’ve got a work trip tomorrow. I’ll be back Thursday.”

“No, it can’t wait,” she snapped. “Please, just leave the keys. I’ll be quick.”

Her tone made me uneasy. Paige never asked for anything without a catch. Still, she was family.

I sighed. “Fine. I’ll leave them under the doormat.”

“Thanks,” she said, and hung up. No goodbye.

I was gone for one night.

When I got back, the house looked the same from the outside. Porch untouched. Flower pots crooked, just as I’d left them.

Then I opened the door.

The silence inside felt heavy, like the house knew something was wrong.

A sour smell hit me—spoiled milk and something rotten. My stomach turned. I stepped inside, heart racing.

The living room was a disaster zone. Fast-food wrappers littered the floor. Greasy takeout containers oozed sauce. Soda cans were everywhere. Someone had crushed chips into the carpet.

I dropped my bag and moved down the hall, toward Gran’s bedroom.

I opened the door—and nearly collapsed.

Red and black paint splattered across the wallpaper. The bed was torn apart. Feathers floated in the air. Greasy handprints smeared the closet. Candy wrappers and takeout bags spilled from the drawers.

It wasn’t just a mess. It was vandalism.

I called her.

Paige answered immediately.

“What did you do?” I choked out. “Why would you wreck the house? Gran’s room? How could you?”

There was a long pause. Then her voice came, cold and sharp.

“Oh, don’t play innocent. You know why. Grandma left the house to you. It should’ve been mine. You don’t deserve it.”

My grip tightened. “You barely visited her. You weren’t there.”

Her laugh cut like a knife. “Doesn’t matter. You got what I wanted. So I made sure you wouldn’t enjoy it.”

Then she hung up.

I stood there, phone still to my ear, listening to the dead line.

The room was quiet except for the soft flutter of feathers settling on the floor.

She’d done this out of pure spite. It wasn’t about papers. It was a message.

And as I looked around at the ruins of the woman who raised me, something inside me shifted.

I wanted to collapse. But instead, I rolled up my sleeves.

The next morning, I woke up sore, angry, and still shaken. But when I smelled that awful mix of grease, rotting food, and cheap perfume, I knew what I had to do.

I headed to the hardware store. Buckets, sponges, bleach, gloves, trash bags, lemon-scented cleaner. The cashier raised an eyebrow.

“Big cleanup?”

“You could say that.”

Back home, I tied my hair back, pulled on old jeans, and started in the living room. The stench hit me hard again. I gagged but pushed through.

I scrubbed until my arms burned. Some stains had sunk deep into the wood. I muttered as I sprayed, wiped, and hauled bag after bag of trash to the curb.

By the third day, I knew I couldn’t do it alone. The paint Paige had smeared on Gran’s bedroom walls wouldn’t budge. I tried everything. Nothing worked.

That room—her room—hurt the most.

I called painters. Rick and Brian showed up the next morning. They didn’t ask questions.

“Prank gone wrong?” Rick asked.

“No. Just someone with no respect for the dead.”

They nodded and got to work. It cost me nearly five hundred dollars I hadn’t planned to spend. But when I saw the clean, pale walls, I nearly broke down.

I threw out the ruined bedding. Bought new sheets, fluffed new pillows, spread a soft blanket across the bed. But every time I smoothed it out, I saw Gran’s hands: steady, gentle, warm.

The house no longer smelled like her. That hurt the most.

I rented a carpet cleaner. Scraped dried cheese off the armrest of Gran’s old recliner. Cried when I realized the couch was beyond saving.

I borrowed my friend Kayla’s truck, drove the furniture to the dump myself.

A worker helped me unload. “This thing’s seen better days.”

“You have no idea.”

I picked out new furniture. Simple stuff. A beige loveseat, a small coffee table, a cozy chair that reminded me of Gran’s old one.

I arranged everything. It felt right. It felt clean. But I still wasn’t at peace.

Paige’s words echoed: “It should’ve been mine.”

She thought this was over.

She thought she could wreck what she didn’t get and walk away.

That’s when I knew what I had to do next.

I didn’t call Paige. I didn’t confront her. I called a lawyer.

Michelle was no-nonsense. Sharp eyes. Sharper tone.

I showed her everything. Photos. Receipts. Texts.

She looked through the papers slowly, then met my eyes.

“This is strong,” she said. “She won’t get out of this.”

It took weeks. Then came the call. The court ruled in my favor. Paige was legally responsible for the damage. She had to pay me back for every penny.

I smiled. For the first time since this nightmare began.

But I didn’t just send her the ruling. That felt too easy.

I bought a plain cardboard box. Slipped the court papers into a large envelope. Added copies of the receipts. Tied the box with a bright pink ribbon. Taped a small card to the top:

“From the home you destroyed.”

I drove to her house just before sunset. Her car wasn’t in the driveway. I placed the box on her porch and walked away.

Ten minutes later, my phone rang.

“WHAT IS THIS?!” Paige screamed.

“That’s a court order,” I said. “You’re paying for every trash bag, every wall, every pillow. All of it.”

“You’re crazy!”

“Yes,” I said. “Crazy enough to fight back.”

“You think you’ve won?”

I paused.

“No. Gran won. Because you didn’t take her house from me. And now you’ll pay for trying.”

I hung up.

Weeks passed. Paige tried to appeal. It didn’t work. The judgment stood. The payments started coming—small checks, always late, always with a snarky note. I cashed them anyway.

Each envelope was a reminder: she lost.

Meanwhile, I could finally