“Found a Warmer Neck to Leech On”
“Wait, stop! He’s been frittering away my money, and now I owe him? What nonsense is this?”
“He’s your father!” Mum blurted out.
Emily raised her brows so high her forehead wrinkled like an accordion. Mum stared back, arms crossed. The kitchen was stifling, the air thick—just like their relationship.
“That man is a stranger to me,” Emily said calmly. “Dad left me half the flat.”
“But you must understand,” Helen argued. “He’s lived here ten years. He’s put his share into this place. Helped where he could.”
Emily nearly scoffed. “Helped? When did he ever help? Standing by the cooker lecturing me on how to fry his chips when he can’t even scramble an egg?”
“Well, maybe not financially,” Mum mumbled. “But he’s family. You used to call him Dad.”
Emily’s gaze fixed on the fridge magnets—souvenirs from family trips with her real father. The collection had stopped growing once Victor moved in.
“I said it once, when I was fourteen, so you wouldn’t cry,” Emily admitted softly. “And he waved it around like a banner.”
An unwanted memory surfaced: Emily, humiliated and furious, barred from joining friends at the cinema. Victor had declared, “A girl belongs at home, not gallivanting about.”
“But why? Everyone’s going!”
“In my day, children didn’t argue. We’d have gotten the belt for less.”
He hadn’t raised his voice, but the coldness lodged in her throat till bedtime. She hadn’t cried then, just buried her face in the pillow, listening to him grumble next door.
“You’ve spoiled her. Little princess. All that money wasted—no bloody use. Back in my day…”
Emily clenched her fists. That was just the beginning. The nitpicking never stopped—her clothes, her appetite, her “mouthing off.” He’d order her about like a maid in his castle.
But she’d figured him out: a nobody at work, lording it at home where no one challenged him.
“Mum,” Emily snapped back to the present. “Half this flat’s mine. Legally. Victor’s not on the deeds.”
“You don’t get it. If we sell and split it two ways, Victor—he’ll take it as betrayal. He thinks of you as his daughter.”
“Right. Let’s think. Oh, I’ve got it—what if I sell my half to a stranger? Then he can share a kitchen with his ‘almost-daughter’s’ buyer. Still betrayal?”
Helen fell silent, lips trembling. She was afraid of being alone.
“He’s put his soul into this place,” she whispered. “Don’t you feel that?”
“I feel that if I don’t stand my ground now, no one will. And I feel that if I don’t, I’ll end up just like you—stuck with some bloke leaching off me and my kids.”
She left, unable to breathe in that stranger’s flat. Outside, spring hummed with bus engines and children licking ice creams. Life rolled on, oblivious to the earthquake she’d just walked away from.
For a week, Emily didn’t call. Why talk to someone who only echoed another’s voice?
She focused on selling her share. A bloke going through a divorce made an offer—polite, quiet, didn’t send Helen into hysterics (a miracle, given her flair for drama).
Later, the voice notes flooded in:
“Em… You’re not just selling a flat. You’re selling our family.”
Emily listened in silence, guilt creeping in. Was she wrong? Flat-sharing was no picnic, but where else could she go? Keep renting while owning property?
She rang her dad. They rarely spoke—he’d remarried, moved to Leeds—but sometimes she needed a sane voice amidst the madness.
“Remember the flat you put in my name?”
“’Course. Why?”
“Mum wants Victor to get a cut. Says he’s ‘earned it’ in ten years.”
A long pause. Then a weary sigh.
“Listen, I didn’t fight your mum over that flat for nothing. Yeah, I skipped child support, but that flat was your start. Yours. Not hers. Not his. So you wouldn’t be renting or throwing cash at someone else’s mortgage. Whatever mess she’s made—that’s on her.”
Emily blinked. She’d always thought she only ever owned half.
“So… you think I’m right?”
“I think you’re grown. Do what’s smart, not spiteful.”
The call lifted a weight. But then another memory surfaced.
At college, Victor insisted she “pull her weight.” She’d handed out flyers for pennies, then splurged on yoghurts, cheddar, a bit of smoked sausage—stashed on her fridge shelf.
By morning, only a yoghurt and a sausage stub remained. Victor sat scoffing fried bread, glugging milk straight from the bottle.
“You ate my food.”
“Ours, you mean. Family shares. You’ll understand when you’ve got kids.”
She stopped stocking her shelf. Then came Mum’s “household funds”—detergent she’d already bought, bogus bills. Every quid of her wages vanished into Victor’s belly while he held court on how she should live.
Now, she signed the papers, thanked the estate agent, and stepped into the street with hollow relief.
She didn’t call Helen. Helen didn’t call back. The silence settled like dust.
Two weeks later, Emily treated herself—new bedsheets, a massage, decent trainers. Then she flat-hunted near work. Small, but hers. No shouting over slamming cupboards. No stolen food.
Six months passed. If not for Gran, she’d never have known.
“Love, your mum’s in a state. Sold her half too.”
“What?”
“Couldn’t take it. Victor—well, he’s not easy. They rowed daily. Then the money ran out…”
A heavier sigh.
“He left. Found some other poor soul to mooch off. Your mum’s renting now.”
Emily sat down, words sticking. No gloating—just a grim clarity. Would’ve been nice if he’d left sooner.
“She says you broke the family,” Gran added gently. “Says if you’d just put up with it…”
“Put up with it? She didn’t ‘put up’ when I irritated her precious husband.”
Gran didn’t argue. She knew the truth but wanted peace.
“Don’t hold a grudge. She regrets it, deep down.”
They chatted about the weather, her cousin Tom joining the army. Then the line cut. Emily didn’t call back.
Next day, she walked past estate agents’ windows, fingers brushing the keys in her pocket. Heavy. Metal.
No one lectured her on toast now. No one rifled through her things. And Mum? She’d made her choice.
