The investigation happened in reverse: first the photographs, then the truck’s logo, then the work order with my address and Tyler’s neat, lying signature on the “Owner” line. The company had permits, insurance, a crew that waved politely at my security camera as they committed a crime they didn’t know they were part of. Tyler and Brooke had escalated for years—petitions, design boards, a doomed HOA coup where my house was a slide labeled “visual disruption.” Now their ambition had crossed into forgery. Patricia, my lawyer, spoke in measured sentences about damages and statutes while I stared at the gray, feeling more invaded than if they’d broken a window. She told me to stay clean, to let paper do what rage wanted to. Instead of smashing anything, I called Marcus, the painter who’d once stood in this driveway with my mother and me, stirring pigment until the yellow looked like late afternoon. By Sunday, the gray was gone, buried under the exact shade they’d tried to erase, while Patricia’s filings began to move through offices where consequence traveled slo… Continues…