The cabin always had a way of haunting me, not in the supernatural sense, but with the heavy weight of memories.

As I drove the winding, overgrown road leading up to it, I couldn't help but feel a familiar knot in my stomach.

The gravel crunched under the tires, a sound that echoed the unsettled feelings

I'd been carrying for years. My father was an enigma. On the surface, he was the successful accountant

with an office in the city, a man who wore suits that seemed to cost more than most people's

monthly rent. But beneath that polished exterior, there was

a darkness we only came to understand when it was too late. He always had that weary look, bloodshot

eyes that suggested endless nights and hidden burdens. He was sent to prison right after my first

year of college. Fifteen years, they said,

for washing hundreds of millions for various cartels.

It was a sentence that tore our family apart.

My mother, unable to bear the disgrace or the threat of her own impending arrest,

took her own life two weeks after his incarceration.

They said she was his accomplice, but I never could reconcile that with the mother I knew.

The government seized everything.

All the properties, the accounts, everything except this cabin.

It was almost as if they'd missed it, tucked away as it was in the middle of nowhere. As I parked the car and stepped out,

I let the memories flood in. This cabin had been our escape, our summer retreat. It was the

only place where I ever saw my father relax, if you could call it that. His version of relaxation

involved sitting on the porch with a glass of scotch,

staring out into the forest like he was searching for something in the trees. I took a deep breath,

the scent of pine and earth grounding me. I hadn't been here since everything fell apart.

...