Last Friday, my neighbor knocked on my door with a request so ordinary that I felt almost rude for hesitating over it.He said he wanted to throw a small birthday gathering for his brother, but his own backyard was too narrow to fit everyone comfortably. Since I’d already mentioned I was spending the weekend at my mother’s, he asked if he could use mine instead, just for a few hours. He promised no more than twelve guests. He promised nobody would set foot inside my house. Most of all, he promised everything would look exactly the same when I got back.
So I handed him the spare key to my side gate, and I left.
The Hole
When I pulled into my driveway Sunday evening, the street looked perfectly quiet. My neighbor’s car was gone, but I figured he was out returning rented chairs, or picking up groceries, something ordinary. Then I walked into my backyard.
A huge hole had been dug straight through the center of my lawn. This wasn’t some shallow pit left over from a bonfire, or a patch of grass torn up by a few too many folding chairs. It was long, deep, and almost unnervingly square, like something planned with a ruler. Mounds of dark soil covered the patio. My roses had been crushed flat beneath the dirt, and the lavender I’d spent two full summers coaxing into life had been ripped out, roots and all.
For a few seconds I just stood there, unable to process what I was looking at. Then I ran next door and pounded on my neighbor’s front door.
“Bennett!”
Nobody answered. His curtains were open, and through the front window I could see nothing but bare walls and empty rooms.
A woman from across the street noticed me pacing on his porch and came over. “Are you looking for Bennett?” she asked.
“Yes. He used my yard for a birthday party this weekend.”
Her face changed instantly. “What party?”
I stared at her. “He told me he was hosting his brother’s birthday.”
“There wasn’t a party,” she said slowly, like she was working out how to say it. “He loaded his furniture into a moving truck Saturday morning. After that, he spent almost the entire weekend digging behind your house.”
My stomach dropped.
I’d barely made it back to my own kitchen when the doorbell rang. Two police officers stood on my porch. The older one looked past me into the house.
