My relatives linger in the shadows, waiting for the moment I slip out of this world. They whisper about inheriting my flat in the heart of London, yet I have already secured my own exit.
I am, absurdly enough, sixty and living on my own. No children, no husbandthough once I was married. At twentyfive I wed Mark, driven by love.
Marks infidelity shattered the marriage. He barged his lover into our tiny kitchen, a trespass I could not tolerate. I gathered my belongings, fled to my parents house in Manchester, and two months after the divorce discovered I was pregnant.
I chose not to tell Mark; I never called him again. I decided to raise the child alone. When my son, Thomas, entered the world, the doctors delivered the grim news: he was born frail, cursed with a terminal illness, lucky perhaps to reach eleven or twelve.
I didnt know where to turn. I nursed Thomas day after day, my thoughts orbiting the certainty that his time here would be brief.
At fifteen, Thomas slipped away, and a week later my father, Arthur, followed. Two cherished souls vanished, leaving a quiet echo in the flat that Arthur had left mespacious, perched on a bustling London street.
I had spent years alone, scarcely meeting men. I wanted a child, yet fear of history repeating kept me from daring. When I turned fortyfive, I bought a laptop to keep in touch with distant kin and to read the news.
My relatives, upon learning of my solitary existence, began to drift in, one after another, bearing biscuits, jam, and small trinkets. They asked whether I had drawn up a will; when they found none, they complained about my supposed lack of funds. Some even schemed, flattering other relatives to appear more respectable in my eyes. I already knew who would inherit my flat: my old friend Simon, whose daughter Blythe has always helped me without a second thought.
All they seemed to want was the flat itself. I eventually cut off communication, but the knocks persisted. One day my cousin Nigel called, brashly demanding, Are you still breathing, Elaine? Who will get the flat? The insult burned, and I barred every relative from writing or calling, sealing the line in a dreamlike silence.
