My parents always seemed to exist at arms length, flitting in and out of my life like distant train whistles echoing on a foggy night. While I was small, it was my grandparents who wrapped me up in their world; my parents surrendered me to them, their work forever flickering hungrily in the background. We werent short on poundsthe house was always warm, cupboards always fullbut their hearts, I suppose, were spent elsewhere, busied by promotions and deadlines over lullabies and laughter.
From this, an odd closeness grew between me and my grandparents, a world built of garden tea parties and stories by the fire. They became my north star, ushering me forward with soft encouragement, while my parents drifted by like strangers on the High Street, faces glimpsed but never fully known.
On the morning I turned eighteen, I found myself inheriting two small terraced flatsa peculiar windfall, like something out of Dickens. Eager to prove I could stand straight and tall, I sold them and used the pounds to buy a tiny house in Leeds, where I was muddling through my degree. Throughout my university days, my parents absence became so familiar it felt almost ordinarya habit, almost comfortable, like drinking tea with too much milk.
Then, in a dream-shadowed way, my grandparents vanished from the world just as I was cramming for exams. Their loss made the distance between my parents and me seem even vaster, like a river running cold and indifferent between us. They hadnt built the bridge; I saw little reason to cross.
Strangely, when word of the property sale reached them, their disappointment was almost theatrical, as though theyd lost a lottery theyd never bought a ticket for. They impliedwistfully, almost petulantlythat some slice of the cash ought to be theirs. But I felt no pull of obligation. They hadnt shaped my life, hadnt provided anchors or sails in my stormiest seas. Why should I prioritise their wants over my own?
So when their discontent reached meWhy dont you spend time with us?I parried it with the same refrain: Im at work, I havent got the time. A phrase plucked from the very scripts theyd used for years. If anyone ought to grasp how work can devour every hour, surely it would be them.
In the end, putting my happiness and goals before all else felt like slipping on a coat that once belonged to both of them. It was a way to weather the chill of their absence, a way to dream myself something whole again.
