In eight months, eleven housemaids had left the billionaire’s home, and I became the twelfth. The owner decided to put me to the test and pretended to be asleep, expecting me to rummage through his belongings. But my unexpected action beside him made him open his eyes and left him speechless. 😬😮
The night before the interview, I carefully folded the new dark-blue uniform beside the bed in our small apartment.
— Grandma, I have a job interview tomorrow, I said.
Margaret looked up from her medication.
— What kind of job?
— As a housekeeper in a private mansion.
When I told her how much I would earn, she remained silent for a long time and then quietly said:
— Then go. And try to stay there.
I understood perfectly why she said that. I had dropped out of medical college to take care of her. The cost of her medication kept rising, we had almost no money left, and paying the bills had become extremely difficult.
This job could change our lives.
The next day, the house manager, Sofia, met me at the door and immediately warned me:
— There are several rules you must never break.
She showed me Adrian Miller’s office.
— Do not touch his desk.
Then she pointed toward a closed door at the end of the hallway.
— And never go in there.
— Why?
Sofia’s expression darkened.
— It is the owner’s order. That room has never been opened since his family died.
Three days later, I saw Adrian for the first time. He was sitting in the living room with his eyes closed, looking as though he were asleep.
I quietly removed the cup, but suddenly noticed that his hand was trembling slightly.
I immediately paid attention to his breathing. It was far too weak.
I stepped closer and carefully checked his pulse. It was racing.
Adrian did not move.
So I covered him with a blanket, and beside him I noticed an old photograph of a little girl and a small music box.
A familiar melody came from it.
I quietly began humming along because it was the exact song my grandmother used to sing to me when I was a child.
Suddenly, Adrian’s fingers stopped trembling.
— Did someone used to sing this song to you too? I whispered.
Something fell behind me.
Sofia was standing in the doorway, pale-faced.
— Elena… How do you know this song?
— My grandmother used to sing it to me.
And then a quiet voice came from the sofa:
— What is your grandmother’s name?
I turned around.
Adrian was looking directly at me. He was not asleep.
— Margaret Salvador.
He froze, then shifted his gaze toward the locked door.
And in that moment, I realized: the song from my childhood was not an ordinary lullaby at all. Somehow, it was connected to that room and the secret Adrian had been hiding for three years. 😨
To be continued in the first comment 👇
He slowly stood up and stared at me for several seconds, as if trying to understand how such a thing could be possible.
— Your grandmother once worked in this house, he finally said. — She was the one who sang this song to my daughter.
I could hardly believe my ears. It turned out that on the day of the tragedy, my grandmother had been the last person to see the girl alive. Before leaving, she had left a music box and a note for Adrian in the room, but after the accident, he had never found the courage to enter it.
We walked up to the locked door. For the first time in three years, Adrian turned the key in the lock.
Everything in the room remained untouched: toys, photographs, children’s drawings, and a small crib. On the table lay that very same note.
Adrian unfolded it with trembling hands.
In the note, my grandmother had written that before leaving, his daughter had hidden a drawing underneath the music box that she desperately wanted to show her father.
Under the music box, there really was a child’s drawing. It showed Adrian, his wife, and their daughter holding hands.
He remained silent for a long time and then cried for the first time.
I realized that all those years, he had been living not only with grief, but also with a deep sense of guilt.
That evening, the door to that room was never closed again. And I stayed on to work in the house that, for the first time in three years, no longer felt lifeless.
Sometimes, a forgotten melody really can give a person back not the past, but the desire to live again.
